Is mental imagery a single process? Our meta-analysis of 46 fMRI studies suggests not. We find a key divide between object imagery (visualizing an object in rich detail) and spatial imagery (mentally transforming objects). This split mirrors the ventral and dorsal streams of vision

New study led by our PhD student Begüm Yılmaz! @begumyilmaz.bsky.social @sultankarakas.bsky.social @tilbegoksun.bsky.social @ecedemirlira.bsky.social "The Links Between Spatial and Math Skills in Preterm and Full-Term Children" @tandfresearch.bsky.social www.tandfonline.com/eprint/3PWR7...

Are you studying underlying mechanisms? I recently started and struggled with what exactly a mechanism was and how to research it. I wrote a theoretical statement aiming to clarify how we conceptualise mechanisms, which is now in press @ Journal of Numerical Cognition doi.org/10.23668/psy...

We plan to hire a post doc to start in Fall 2026 (flexible), in the Aulet Lab at UMass Amherst, funded for two years. The postdoc will help establish our developmental fMRI research program studying symbolic number acquisition in 4-8 year old children (among other things!).

New research from #FIU highlighted in #BOLDblog @jacobsfoundation.bsky.social boldscience.org/how-do-child...

📣📣 A recent paper by Emily K Farran et al. in JCD: "Deconstructing Block Building Behaviours in 7- to 9-year-olds; Associations with Spatial and Mathematics Performance" www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

It never ends (you’ll see): another paper from @urvi.bsky.social this time on how language structure impacts children’s intuition that numbers are infinite (see?)!

I'm delighted to share this interesting work, a wonderful collaboration with colleagues based in the Canary Islands. ☀️ Acta Psychol. 2026 [https://lnkd.in/e3Q_xQ-H]. #MathAnxiety #MathEd #MathTeacher #CogSci #Edusky #DevPsy @mclstrainee.bsky.social @mcls-official.bsky.social @ioe.bsky.social

Share link to new article from our early fraction understanding project-- www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Structural Alignment and Linguistic Contrast Help Children Learn a Key Principle of Spatial Construction - Zheng - 2025 - Cognitive Science - Wiley Online Library onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Last week, we were delighted to host Dr. Can Çarkoğlu, a former undergraduate assistant in our lab. He presented his doctoral research at Purdue University and is now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Chicago!

I'm planning to organize a symposium at #MCLS2026 on the (longitudinal) associations between spatial ability (e.g., mental rotation) and math in preschoolers, if you'd like to join or know anyone who might be interested let me know! @mclstrainee.bsky.social @mcls-official.bsky.social

New paper alert! We examined the effects of a teacher-delivered quantitative language intervention. In just 3 weeks, dual-language learners improved in their quantitative language skills. It was a privilege to work with such a great team! Free access: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Hello #MCLS2026, Padua, Italy! 🇮🇹 This is the moment to find international researchers to compose your #symposium. The call for submissions will open in November! 🎯 Registration will open by mid-January. Check @mcls-official.bsky.social and @mclstrainee.bsky.social for updates.

Such a pleasure to work with @boldinsights.bsky.social to put this piece together. Always happy to discuss the role of spatial thinking in STEM learning and beyond

New paper with @euniceyiu.bsky.social both a theoretical account of how empowerment in RL could lead to causal learning and some lovely experiments showing that children do just that.

Training children's spatial skills improves their maths performance, research shows – and here are 6 ways teachers can do that

✨New publication✨ #MathActivities on #SocialMedia: Examining content, design, and alignment with mathematical cognition research doi.org/10.1016/j.ec... with Juyun Lee and Eric Dearing @ericdearing.bsky.social

Sharing my recent pub with the bsky community! The Factor Structure of Parents' Math-Related Talk and Its Relation to Children's Early Academic Skills doi.org/10.1111/cdev...

New paper alert: “From language to mathematics and vice versa?: A longitudinal study on the associations between preschoolers' mathematical language and mathematical abilities” with a wonderful team @bertdesmedt.bsky.social 🥳 Access here ➡️ www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Come check out our lab's research this week at @srcdorg.bsky.social! ✨

It's different from the work I'm doing now, but I was involved in an fMRI project during my Master's and it's so exciting to see the outcome of it! Special thanks to Estela Camara and Audrey E. De Paepe as well as the whole Brainvitge group! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

New paper out of the lab! Can Carkoglu investigated the different ways parents respond to children's math errors (and correct responses). www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I am one of these NSF postdocs. NSF has frozen everyone’s access to their salaries and research stipends (that were already awarded) with no information about when they might be expected to be unfrozen. It still appears like we are expected to continue doing our work though.

@mclstrainee.bsky.social @mcls-official.bsky.social Still making sense of ur data or looking for the 4th symposium speaker?😬 ✨We've got you covered✨ 📢MCLS deadline is extended to 26 JAN 2025. That's 9⃣more days or 2⃣1⃣6⃣hrs‼️ If you don't have a symposium, there's definitely time to form/join one😉

www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/ai-... — Alison Gopnik

Thrilled to share exciting news! I’ve joined Ariel Starr and her amazing team, the LCD Lab, as a Postdoc! I received the warmest welcome, and couldn’t be more excited to work alongside such brilliant minds 🥳 Yay Huskies!

New year, new paper! 4- and 5-year-olds can represent abstract relations (i.e., sameness and difference) predicated on an abstract dimension (i.e., kind membership) in a relational match-to-sample task. Moreover, noun label training facilitates task performance. direct.mit.edu/opmi/article...

I am incredibly happy to have been part of this work! A wonderful team to work with and to learn from ☺️

Delighted to write for the Times Education Supplement. Timms: Could a focus on spatial reasoning improve maths scores? www.tes.com/magazine/tea... For more: www.surrey.ac.uk/spatial-reas...

A reminder to join us tomorrow (December 3) for our Speed Networking Events! Join us at 4pm HKT / 7pm AEDT / 8am GMT / 9am CET  and/or 11am EST / 8am PST / 4pm GMT / 5pm CET to chat informally with potential mentors, mentees, and buddy matches!

For my first post on bsky, a throwback: me two months ago becoming a Dr. 🤓 Forever grateful to my fabulous advisor @bertdesmedt.bsky.social and jury members @ekfarran.bsky.social @davidjpurpura.bsky.social and Pol Ghesquière. Bonus: the beautiful sea in Turkey & lovely gift from my colleagues!