Viola Störmer

My research aims at understanding the cognitive and neural mechanisms of human perception, attention, and multisensory processing. Particularly, I am interested in understanding the fundamental principles of selective attention, and how attention shapes perception. I am also interested in what role attention plays in connecting across sensory modalities to form multimodal objects. My research draws on a variety of methods, including psychophysics, experimental psychology, and functional neuroimaging with a particular focus on EEG (electroencephalography).

• Störmer, V.S., Feng, W., Martinez, A., McDonald, J.J., & Hillyard, S.A. (2016). Salient, irrelevant sounds reflexively induce alpha rhythm desynchronization in parallel with slow potential shifts in visual cortex. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 28(3), 433-445.
• Störmer, V.S., & Alvarez, G.A. (2014). Feature-based attention elicits surround suppression in feature space. Current Biology, 24(17), 1985-1988. 
• Störmer, V.S., Alvarez, G.A., & Cavanagh, P. (2014). Within-hemifield competition in early visual areas limits the ability to track multiple objects with attention. The Journal of Neuroscience, 34(35), 11526-11533.
• Störmer, V.S., McDonald, J.J., & Hillyard, S.A. (2009). Cross-modal cueing of attention alters appearance and early cortical processing of visual stimuli. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA, 106, 22456-22461.

Updated April 2018