Rick O. Gilmore, assistant professor of psychology, is principal investigator on the five-year project, which was awarded $394,070. He is head of the Brain Development Laboratory in the Department of Psychology at Penn State.

The NSF research project will examine how spatial perception and action planning develop in early infancy and what factors influence their development. It will study how infants develop the ability to perceive where their bodies are located in space and which way they are moving. This information is crucial for maintaining balance, crawling, and walking. The research will provide data that does not currently exist about how these abilities are related to changes in vision that occur early in life. In addition, the educational activities in the research project will provide Penn State students with the latest methods for planning and carrying out research in developmental cognitive neuroscience, the field that studies how the mind and brain develop.

Dr. Gilmore is the author of several articles and book chapters, and his book, Brain Development and Cognition: A Reader, second edition, with M. H. Johnson and Y. Munakata is forthcoming. He received his B.A. in cognitive science from Brown University and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in psychology from Carnegie Mellon University.

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Contact:  Donna F. Williams, editor (814) 863-1827