McNair Scholar 2019 Dante J. Rogers
Dante J. Rogers is a rising Junior at the University of Minnesota, Twin-Cities, pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Psychology with a double minor in neuroscience and mass communication. His interests have been shaped by various academic and professional experiences to the fields of developmental and clinical psychology.
My dream is to obtain a Ph.D. within the field of either developmental or clinical Psychology. I want to use my knowledge and skills gathered throughout my professional and academic career to recognize and diagnose individuals with mental health issues, something that continues to be overlooked, especially in today’s society.
Research project
Antipriming Priming in Spoken Word Recognition
Abstract: Repetition priming outlines how information processing is more effective when recently performed, a phenomenon that extends across many domains of cognition. We believe antipriming is crucial in understanding the underlying structural causes of priming. This contrasting theory, involves a measurable impairment in cognitive processing when similar physical and auditory cues in a stimulus are superimposed on each other. Previous studies evaluating this theory have found different stimuli, activate similar regions of the human ventral temporal cortex (Ishai et al. 1999), supporting evidence of overlapping knowledge representations in the brain (Seidenberg and McClelland, 1989; masson, 1995). Most studies focused on antipriming in the domain of visual identification. We’ve broadened the application of antipriming to the auditory system, testing its presence in similar phonetic words. Our four phase experiment includes variables such as modification of volume levels and excluding primed words to observe the conditions in which antipriming is present.
Faculty mentor
Dr. Chad J. Marsolek is a professor at the University of Minnesota within the Department of Psychology. His career consists of prestigious academic and professional accomplishments that have furthered his understanding of cognitive psychology. Dr. Marsolek received his B.A. in Psychology from the University of Minnesota in 1988, shortly after, obtaining a Ph.D. in cognitive psychology from the renowned Harvard University with minors in behavioral neuroscience and philosophy. Dr. Marsolek researches Human memory, learning and vision, Cognitive neuroscience, Affective and social influences on cognitive abilities have been refined through a plethora of academic coursework and external personal experiences.