Split-Second Perception

This episode explores Split-Second Perception with our guest, Dr. Jon Freeman. We discuss the use of his software MouseTracker to investigate implicit biases, how these biases affect our perception of others, and what can be done to mitigate them. 

Jon Freeman is an Associate Professor of Psychology and Neural Science at New York University and director of the Social Cognitive & Neural Sciences Lab. He received his Ph.D. from Tufts University and was on the faculty at Dartmouth before coming to NYU in 2014. His research focuses on how we perceive other people, such as how we categorize others into social groups, infer their emotion or personality via facial cues, and more generally how we understand and react to our social world. His work examines the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying person perception, stereotyping and decision-making in social contexts. He takes an integrative, multi-level approach that makes use of several techniques, including functional neuroimaging, computational modeling, and behavioral paradigms. He is also the developer of the data collection and analysis software, MouseTracker.

Dr. Freeman is the recipient of a number of awards, including the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, the Janet T. Spence Award for Transformative Early Career Contributions from the Association for Psychological Science, the Early Career Award from the Society for Social Neuroscience, the SAGE Young Scholars Award from the Society for Personality & Social Psychology, and the Early Career Award from the International Social Cognition Network. His work has appeared in media outlets such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and TIME Magazine.