Prof. Iroise Dumontheil

Professor. Iroise Dumontheil is a Professor at the Department of Psychological Sciences at Birkbeck, ‎University of London.‎

Research Interests

The main topic of Prof. Dumontheil’s research is the typical development of social cognition and ‎cognitive control during adolescence and their functioning in adulthood. Social cognition ‎refers to how we process, store and use information about other people, and how this in turn ‎influences our behaviour, feelings and social interactions, while cognitive control allows us to ‎flexibly adapt our behaviour in the pursuit of an internal goal. To investigate this, she ‎combines different methods including behavioural assessments, genetics, and structural and ‎functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). She is further interested in the potential ‎implications of this neuroscience research for education.‎
One recent project completed by Prof. Dumontheil involved the collection of behavioural and ‎genetic data from healthy children, adolescents and adults. The aim was to investigate ‎whether genetic variants of the dopamine system can account for some of the individual ‎differences in social cognition and cognitive control. While analysis of the child and adolescent ‎data is ongoing, analysis of the adult data showed novel genetic associations between ‎variation of two genes affecting dopamine levels and the manipulation of information about ‎social traits (e.g. which of three of my friends is the happiest) (Dumontheil, Jensen et al., ‎‎2014), and the ability to resist distraction by faces showing fear or happiness (Kilford, ‎Dumontheil et al., in press).‎

Publications

Please see the list below for the most recent of Prof. Dumontheil’s publications. More ‎information about Prof. Dumontheil’s including a more extensive publication list can be found ‎here. Prof. Dumontheil’s Publications  ‎

  • Kilford E*, Dumontheil I*, Wood NW, Blakemore S-J, Influence of COMT genotype and ‎affective distractors on the processing of self-generated thought. Social Cognitive and ‎Affective Neuroscience (in press).
  •  Dumontheil I, Development of abstract thinking during childhood and adolescence: The ‎role of rostrolateral prefrontal cortex. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience (2014), ‎‎10:57-76.‎ For full text click here 
  • Dumontheil I*, Jensen SKG*, Wood NW, Meyer ML, Lieberman MD, Blakemore S-J. ‎Preliminary investigation of the influence of dopamine regulating genes on social ‎working memory. Social Neuroscience (2014), 9(5):437-51. (* indicates shared first ‎authorship)‎ For full text click here
  • Jensen SKG, Dumontheil I, Barker ED. Developmental inter-relations between early ‎maternal depression, contextual risks, and interpersonal stress, and their effect on later ‎child cognitive functioning. Depression and Anxiety (2014), 31(7):599-607. Click here 
  •  Bazargani N, Hillebrandt HF, Christoff K, Dumontheil I. Developmental changes in ‎effective connectivity associated with relational reasoning. Human Brain Mapping ‎‎(2014), 35(7):3262-3276.‎For full text click here