Psychology Faculty Profiles

Joan Y. Chiao, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Brain, Behavior, and Cognition; Social Psychology

Office: Swift 113
Phone: (847) 467-0481
E-mail: jchiao@northwestern.edu

Links

Curriculum Vitae

Lab

Courses

Research Interests

How do cultural and biological forces give rise to everyday emotion and social interaction? I use a 'cultural neuroscience' framework to investigate how cultural factors influence basic psychological and neural processes underlying social behavior and emotion processing, using functional neuroimaging (fMRI), event-related potentials (ERP), genotyping and behavioral paradigms. Research in my lab also examines how high-level factors, such as race, gender and age, affect basic cognitive, perceptual and emotional processes. At a broader level, I'm interested in integrating psychology and neuroscience research with public policy and population health issues.

Selected Publications

Chiao, J.Y. (in press). Cultural neuroscience: A once and future discipline. Progress in Brain Research.

Chiao, J.Y. & Blizinsky, K.D. (in press).  Culture-gene coevolution of individualism-collectivism and the serotonin transporter gene (5-HTTLPR).  Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

Harada, T., Li, Z., Chiao, J.Y. (in press).  Differential dorsal and ventral medial prefrontal representations of the implicit self modulated by individualism and collectivism: an fMRI study. Social Neuroscience.

Chiao, J.Y. (Ed). (in press). Cultural neuroscience: Cultural influences on brain function.  Progress in Brain Research, Elsevier Press.

Chiao, J.Y., Mathur, V.A., Harada, T., Lipke, T. (2009). Neural basis of preference for human social hierarchy versus egalitarianism.  Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.

Kuhnen, C.M. & Chiao, J.Y. (2009). Genetic determinants of financial risk-taking. PLoS ONE.

 Chiao, J.Y., Harada, T., Komeda, H., Li, Z., Mano, Y., Saito, D.N., Parrish, T.B., Sadato, N., Iidaka, T. (2009).  Dynamic cultural influences on neural representations of the self.  Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience.

Chiao, J.Y., Harada, T., Komeda, H., Li, Z., Mano, Y., Saito, D.N., Parrish, T.B., Sadato, N., Iidaka, T. (2009).  Neural basis of individualistic and collectivistic views of self.  Human Brain Mapping.

 Chiao, J.Y. (forthcoming). Cultural neuroscience: Visualizing culture-gene influences on brain function.  In Decety, J. and Cacioppo, J. (Eds.) Handbook of Social Neuroscience, Oxford University Press, UK.

Chiao, J.Y., Bowman, N.E., Gill, H. (2009).  The political gender gap: Gender bias in facial inferences that predict voting behavior. PLoS One.

Chiao, J.Y., Harada, T., Oby, E.R. Li, Z., Parrish, T.B., Bridge, D.J.  (2008).  Neural representations of social status hierarchy in human inferior parietal cortex.  Neuropsychologia.

Chiao, J.Y., Li, Z., Harada, T. (2008).  Cultural neuroscience of consciousness: From visual perception to self-awareness. Journal of Consciousness Studies.

Chiao, J.Y., Iidaka, T., Gordon, H.L., Nogawa, J., Bar, M., Aminoff, E., Sadato, N., Ambady, N.  (2008).   Cultural specificity in amygdala response to fear faces.   Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience.