Douglas K. Bemis
Douglas K. Bemis
Curriculum Vitae
INSERM-CEA Cognitive Neuroimaging unit
CEA/SAC/DSV/DRM/Neurospin center
Bât 145, Point Courier 156
F-91191 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex FRANCE
Phone: +33 1 69 08 83 90
Email: [email protected]
Employment
2012-
Postdoctoral Research Associate, INSERM-CEA Neurospin center
Supervisors: Stanislas Dehaene, Christophe Pallier
Education
2012
Ph.D., New York University, Psychology
Advisor: Liina Pylkkänen
Dissertation: Simple Composition during Language Processing:
An MEG Investigation
2011
M.A., New York University, Psychology
2004
B.A., Harvard University, Computational Neuroscience (Magna Cum Laude)
Certificate in Mind / Brain / Behavior
Research
Interests
Neural bases of semantic composition and linguistic structure building
Mental representations of meaning (events and states)
Theoretical semantic models of vagueness
Journal
Publications
2013
Bemis, D. K., & Pylkkänen, L. (2013). Combination Across Domains: An MEG
Investigation into the Relationship between Mathematical, Pictorial, and Linguistic
Processing. Frontiers in Psychology, 3, 583.
2012
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. (2012). Basic linguistic composition recruits the left
anterior temporal lobe and left angular gyrus during both listening and reading. Cerebral
Cortex.
Berent, I., Wilson, C., Marcus, G. F., & Bemis, D. K. (2012). On the Role of Variables in
Phonology: Remarks on Hayes and Wilson 2008. Linguistic Inquiry, 43, 97-119.
2011
Bemis, D. K., & Pylkkänen, L. (2011). Simple Composition: A Magnetoencephalography
Investigation into the Comprehension of Minimal Linguistic Phrases. Journal of
Neuroscience 31(8), 2801-2814.
Pylkkänen, L., Brennan, J., & Bemis, D. K. (2011). Grounding the cognitive
neuroscience of semantics in linguistic theory. Language and Cognitive Processes 26 (9),
1317-1337.
Douglas K. Bemis
2009
Franconeri, S. L., Bemis, D. K., & Alvarez, G. A. (2009). Number estimation relies on a
set of segmented objects. Cognition 113, 1-13.
2008
Franconeri, S. L., & Bemis, D. K. (2008). Similarity grouping is feature selection. Vision
Sciences Society, Naples, FL.
2005
Bemis, D. K., Franconeri, S. L., & Alvarez, G. A. (2005). It takes attention to capture
attention. Vision Sciences 2005.
Bemis, D. K., Franconeri, S. L., & Alvarez, G. A. (2005). Rapid number estimation: A
new paradigm for investigating the rules of objecthood. Vision Sciences 2004.
Manuscripts
Under Review
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. (submitted). The spatio-temporal dynamics of basic
composition during language production: An MEG investigation into minimal phrases.
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. (under revision). Flexible composition: MEG evidence for
the deployment of basic combinatorial linguistic mechanisms in response to task
demands.
Brennan, J., Bemis, D. K., & Pylkkänen, L. (under revision). The role of the left anterior
temporal lobe in linguistic combinatorics.
Bemis, D. K. (under revision). Dynamic Induction and the Sorites Paradox.
In Prep.
Inhoff, M., Bemis, D.K., & Poeppel, D. (in prep.) Two Face: The effects of social cues on
early processing of faces.
Invited Talks
2011
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. Simple Composition in Reading, Listening, and
Production: An MEG Investigation. 17th Annual Conference on Architectures and
Mechanisms for Language Processing, Paris, France, September 1-3, 2011.
2010
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. Domain-general Mechanisms in the Construction of
Meaning. 23rd Annual CUNY Conference on Human Sentence Processing, New York,
NY, March 18-20, 2010.
2009
Bemis, D. K. The Neural Bases of Simple Linguistic Composition. MEGLANG
Workshop, Neurospin, Paris, October 8-9, 2009.
Bemis, D. K. & Brennan, J. BESA Distributed Source Analysis. MEG Opening and MEG
Analysis Workshop, New York University, New York, NY, January 23-24, 2009.
Conference
Presentations
Douglas K. Bemis
2012
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. Automatic but recruitable: MEG evidence for an
obligatory yet flexible combinatory mechanism in the left anterior temporal lobe. 25th
Annual CUNY Conference on Human Sentence Processing, CUNY New York, March 1416, 2012.
2011
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. Simple Composition in Reading, Listening, and
Production: An MEG Investigation. Third Annual Neurobiology of Language
Conference, Annapolis, MD, November 10-11, 2011.
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. An MEG Investigation into the Temporal Dynamics of
Basic Mathematical Processing. Cognitive Neuroscience Society Meeting, San Francisco,
CA, April 2-5, 2011.
2010
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. Evidence for a Domain General Cognitive Mechanism in
the Construction of Basic Linguistic Meaning. Mid-Atlantic Colloquium of Studies in
Meaning, Pennsylvania, April 10, 2010.
2009
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. The Neural Correlates of Basic Linguistic Composition:
An MEG Investigation. Neurobiology of Language Conference, Chicago, October 15-16,
2009.
Bemis, D. K. & Pylkkänen, L. The Neural Correlates of Basic Linguistic Composition:
An MEG Investigation. 22nd Annual CUNY Conference on Human Sentence Processing,
UC Davis, March 26-28, 2009.
2004
Honors &
Awards
Teaching
Bemis, D. K., Franconeri, S. L., & Alvarez, G. A. It takes attention to capture attention.
Vision Sciences Society, Sarasota, FL, May 1-4, 2004.
Douglas and Katherine Fryer Thesis Fellowship (2011)
McCracken Fellow, New York University. (2007 – Present)
Honorable Mention, NSF Graduate Research Fellowship. (2008)
Received Magna cum Laude honors, Computer Science, Harvard University. (2004)
John Harvard scholarship for academic distinction. (2003)
Instructor, Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences, NYU, Summer 2011
TA, Math. Tools for Cog. and Neural Sci., taught by Eero Simoncelli, NYU, Fall 2010
TA, Lab in Cognitive Neuroscience, taught by David Poeppel, NYU, Spring 2010
TA, Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences, taught by Beth Bauer, NYU, Spring 2009
Advisor, Liza Strauss, A Study of the Cognitive Neuroscience of Arithmetic
Combinatorial Processing Using Magnetoencephalography (MEG), First place ISEF
2011
Academic
Service
Reviewing
Invited reviewer: Cognitive Science, Philosophical Psychology, NeuroImage, Brain &
Language
Referee: CUNY Conference on Sentence Processing, AMLaP Conference