Michael McCloskey

Research Area

Cognitive neuropsychology, spatial and lexical representation, foundations of cognitive science

Research Summary

My research focuses on issues of mental representation and computation in the areas of visual-spatial cognition and lexical processing.  I study cognitive deficits in children and adults with brain damage or learning disabilities, with the aim of gaining insight into normal cognitive representations and processes, how these are instantiated in the brain, and how they are disrupted when the brain is damaged or fails to develop normally.  For example, an extensive study of a college student with a remarkable impairment in perceiving the locations and orientations of visual stimuli (despite normal visual acuity) has led to conclusions about the nature of spatial representations in the normal visual system (McCloskey, 2009; McCloskey et al., 1995; McCloskey & Palmer, 1996; McCloskey & Rapp, 2000a, 2000b).  In other research involving brain-damaged patients with impairments in writing, patterns of impaired performance provide grounds for conclusions about the forms of mental representation underlying lexical processing, and the computations carried out over these representations (e.g., McCloskey et al., 1994; McCloskey et al., 2006).

In addition to cognitive neuropsychological studies, I explore spatial cognition and lexical processing through empirical studies of normal individuals, computational modeling, and functional neuroimaging.

Finally, I am interested in foundational issues in cognitive science, including the rationale for adopting a representational/computational conception of the mind, the relationship between cognitive science and neuroscience, the fundamental distinctions between connectionist and symbolic frameworks, and the role of simulation in cognitive science (e.g., McCloskey, 1991).

Courses

Selected Publications

Fischer-Baum, S., Charny, J., & McCloskey, M. (2011).  Both-edges representation of letter position in reading.  Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 18, 1083-1089. (PDF)

Gregory, E., Landau, B., & McCloskey, M.  (2011).  Representation of Object Orientation in Children: Evidence from Mirror-Image Confusions.  Visual Cognition, 19, 1035-1062. (PDF)

Fischer-Baum, S., McCloskey, M., & Rapp, B.  (2010).  Representation of letter position in spelling: Evidence from acquired dysgraphia.  Cognition, 115, 466-490. (PDF)

Gregory, E., & McCloskey, M.  (2010).  Mirror-image confusions: Implications for representation and processing of object orientation.  Cognition, 116, 110-129.McCloskey, M. (PDF)

Visual reflections: A perceptual deficit and its implications.  (2009) New York: Oxford. Oxford Scholarship Online: http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195168693.001.0001/acprof-9780195168693

Valtonen, J., Dilks, D. D., & McCloskey, M. (2008). Cognitive representation of orientation: A case study. Cortex, 44, 1171-1181. (PDF)

Dilks, D. D., Serences, J. T., Rosenau, B. J., Yantis, S., & McCloskey, M. (2007). Human cortical reorganization and consequent visual distortion. Journal of Neuroscience, 27, 9585-9594. (PDF)

McCloskey, M., Valtonen, J., & Sherman, J.  (2006). Representing orientation: A coordinate-system hypothesis, and evidence from developmental deficits.  Cognitive Neuropsychology, 23, 680-713. (PDF)

McCloskey, M., Macaruso, P., & Rapp, B.  (2006).  Grapheme-to-lexeme feedback in the spelling system:  Evidence from a dysgraphic patient.  Cognitive Neuropsychology, 23, 278-307. (PDF)

McCloskey, M.  (2004).  Spatial representations and multiple-visual-systems hypotheses:  Evidence from a developmental deficit in visual location and orientation processing.  Cortex, 40, 677-694.

McCloskey, M. (2003). Beyond task dissociation logic: A richer conception of cognitive neuropsychology. Cortex, 39, 196-202. (PDF)

Whalen, J., McCloskey, M., Lindemann, M., & Bouton, G. (2002). Representing arithmetic table facts in memory: Evidence from acquired impairments. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 19, 505-522. (PDF)

McCloskey, M. (2001). Future directions in cognitive neuropsychology. In B. Rapp (Ed.), What deficits reveal about the human mind/brain: A handbook of cognitive neuropsychology (pp. 593-610). Philadelphia: Psychology Press.

McCloskey, M. (2001). Spatial representation in mind and brain. In B. Rapp (Ed.), What deficits reveal about the human mind/brain: A handbook of cognitive neuropsychology (pp. 101-132). Philadelphia: Psychology Press.

McCloskey, M., & Rapp, B. (2000a). Attention-referenced visual representations: Evidence from impaired visual localization. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 26, 917-933. (PDF)

McCloskey, M., & Rapp, B. (2000b). A visually-based developmental reading deficit. Journal of Memory and Language, 43, 157-181. (PDF)

McCloskey, M., & Palmer, E. (1996). Visual representation of object location: Insights from localization impairments. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 5, 25-28.

McCloskey, M., Rapp, B., Yantis, S., Rubin, G., Bacon, W. F., Dagnelie, G., Gordon, B., Aliminosa, D., Boatman, D. F., Badecker, W., Johnson, D. N., Tusa, R. J., & Palmer, E. (1995). A developmental deficit in localizing objects from vision. Psychological Science, 6, 112-117. (PDF)

McCloskey, M., Badecker, W., Goodman-Schulman, R. A., & Aliminosa, D.  (1994).  The structure of graphemic representations in spelling:  Evidence from a case of acquired dysgraphia.  Cognitive Neuropsychology, 11, 341-392.

McCloskey, M.  (1991).  Networks and theories:  The place of connectionism in cognitive science.  Psychological Science, 2, 387-395. (PDF)

Other Affiliations

Joint appointments: 
        Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
        Zanvyl Krieger Mind/Brain Institute
        Department of Neuroscience

Education

Ph.D., Cognitive Psychology, Princeton University, 1978