Barbara Leone Fernandez
PhD in Neuroscience & Education
phone +39 3456009077
email: [email protected]
Brief Summary
As PhD Researcher in the area of Cognitive Neuroscience and Education from La Laguna
University, my research interests are in the cognitive psychology, psycholinguistics, emotions and
psychoneuroimmunoendocrinology. To investigate these topics and other related areas, my
research makes use of behavioural, neuropsychological and neuroimaging techniques, from
subjective questionnaires and/or pencil tests, clinical test batteries to EEG, fMRI and TMS.
Last Position
2015
Psychology service of Santa Maria Hospital (Terni, Italy) as Database Manager of
the project ‘Psycho-Neuro-Endocrine-Immunology factors in cardiopathic and
obese patients’.
Work experiences
2014-2015
Postdoc fellowship grant as a postdoc researcher about “Brain correlates for
emotional language in Subclinical Depression” (University of Valencia,
Department of Behavioural Psychology).
2013-2014
SPSS Teacher at the Department of Psychology, Santa Maria Hospital, Terni,
Italy. Extensive course to help higher education researchers get out of IBM SPSS
software.
2012-2013
TMS Lab Staff at the Department of Psychology, Neurocog Lab in the University
of La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain.
2007-2011
Pre-doctoral research activities (Experimental research and Teaching) at the
University of La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain
2006-2007
Psychologist (Educator and teacher) in the “House of the child”, a nongovernmental organization in Terni, Italy.
Education
2008-2011
PhD in ‘Neuroscience and Education’ La Laguna University,
2007-2008
Master in ‘Neurociencias y Necesidades educativas específicas’ La Laguna University,
Spain
DISSERTATION: ERP studies on the syntax-semantics interplay during language comprehension
ADVISORS: Dr. Horacio A. Barber Friend, Dr. Manuel Carreiras
Spain
1 2002-2004
BS in ‘Health psychology and rehabilitation’ La Sapienza University,
Italy
DISSERTATION: A single study of Hemispatial neglect patient
ADVISOR: Dr. Gabriella Antonucci
1999-2002
Bs in ‘Sciences and psychological approaches on the analysis of cognitive
processes’ La Sapienza University, Italy
DISSERTATION: The developmental dyslexia
ADVISOR: Dr. Luigi Pizzamiglio
1993-1998
HS Scientific Lyceum, Terni, Italy
Teaching experiences
2013
SPSS Teacher at the Department of Psychology, Santa Maria Hospital, Terni,
Italy.
2012
Advanced course on the ‘Transcranial Magnetic stimulation Technique’ La
Laguna University, Spain.
2011
Teaching classes of ‘Language and Thought’ La Laguna University, Spain.
Visiting Research Scientist
2010
Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language-BCBL, San SebastianDonostia, País Vasco, España (2010).
2009
Department of Psychology of the University of Washington, Seattle, USA.
2008
Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychology of the
University of La Sapienza, Rome, Italy.
2004
Practicum: Department of Neuropsychology and Health Rehabilitation at the S.
Lucia Hospital, Rome, Italy.
2003
Practicum: Unity of Neuropsychology of “Government run company”, Terni,
Italy.
Language Knowledge
Italian: native speaker
Spanish: (oral) fluent (write) fluent
English: (oral) fluent (write) fluent
Manuscripts under submission or in preparation
Leone-Fernandez, B., McLaughin, J., Carreiras, M., Barber, H.A. & Osterhout, L. The effect of
thematic-role assignment on local-global processing: an ERP study
Leone-Fernandez, B., Carreiras, M., Hernandez-Cabrera, J. & Barber, H. A. Form- and lexicaldriven syntactic violations: A new perspective on the LAN-N400 distinction
2 Barber, H.A., Molinaro, N., Leone-Fernandez, B. & Carreiras, M. An ERP study on number
interference during agreement processing.
Perea, M., Leone-Fernandez, B. & Vergara-Martinez, M. ERP correlates of letter-case in visual
word recognition
Perea, M., Leone-Fernandez, B. & Vergara-Martinez, M. ERP correlates of letter-spaces in
visual word recognition
Leone-Fernandez, B., Perea, M., Vergara-Martinez, M., Baños, R.M. Brain correlates for
emotional language in Depression
Publications in Journals and/or Book
2012
Leone-Fernandez, B., Molinaro, N., Carreiras, M., Barber, H. A.. Objects, events
and ‘to be’ verbs in Spanish – an ERP study of the syntax-semantic interface.
Brain and Language, 120(2): 127-34.
2010
Candidi, M., Leone-Fernandez, B., Barber, H. A., Carreiras, M., Aglioti, S. M.
Hands on the future: facilitation of cortico-spinal hand-representation when
reading the future tense of hand-related action verbs. European Journal of
Neuroscience, 32(4):677-83.
Key skills and training
Behavioural tasks (lexical decision, word naming, masked priming, ect..), neuropsychological
tests (WAIS-R Battery, Boston naming Test, Verbal fluency test, Token Test, ect..)
Electroencephalogram recordings (Neuroscan, BrainVision Analyzer and Geodesics systems),
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (Magstim, single-pulse, paired pulse and repetitive
stimulation), Evoked Potentials (LAN, N400, P600, Neuroscan, Analyser), Functional Magnetic
Resonance (modelbased voxelwise general linear model (GLM)).
Statistical Software: Statistica, SPSS, Matlab and R
Programming: Presentation, E-Prime, DMDX, High proficiency of Windows, Mac OS, Word,
Excel, PowerPoint, Photoshop (International Computer Driving License, Italy, 2008)
Conference Presentations
2015
2015
Leone-Fernandez, B., Perea, M., Vergara-Martínez, M.
ERP correlates of
letter-space in visual word recognition. XII International Symposium of
Psycholinguistics, 1-4 July, Valencia, Spain.
Leone-Fernandez, B., Perea, M., Vergara-Martínez, M. ERP correlates of lettercase in visual word recognition. NetWords, March 30-April 1, Pisa, Italy.
3 2013
Leone-Fernandez, B., Carreiras, M., Hernàndez-Cabrera, J.A., Barber, H.A. The
Spanish verb “to be” for transient versus permanent states: an ERP study of
syntax-semantics interaction. 11Th Symposium of psycholinguistics, March 2023, Canary Islands, Spain.
2010
Leone-Fernandez, B., McLaughin, J., Carreiras, M., Barber, H., Osterhout, L.
Being an experiencer or being an actor? An ERP investigation on the processing
of the participial adjectives. Conceptual structure, discourse and language and
Embodied and situated language processing (CSDL and ESLP), 16-19
September
2010
Leone-Fernandez, B., Barber, H. A., Candidi, M., Aglioti, M., Carreiras, M.
Hands on the future: facilitation of cortico-spinal hand representation when
reading the future tense of hand related action verbs. Sepex Granada Conference,
15-18 April
2009
Candidi, M., Leone-Fernandez, B., Barber, H., Carreiras, M., Aglioti, M.
Afferrare il futuro con la mano: modulazioni dell’eccitabilità cortico-spinale
legate ad aspetti temporali di verbi di movimento corporeo. AIP, Chieti, (Italy),
24-26 September
2009
Leone-Fernandez, B., Molinaro, N., Barber, H., Carreiras, M. An ERP study on
number interference during agreement processing. Simposio di Psicolinguistica,
Santiago de Compostela (Spain), 23-25 April
2009
Molinaro, N., Barber, H., Leone-Fernandez, B., & Carreiras, M. (2009). An ERP
study on number interference during agreement processing. '22nd Annual CUNY
Sentence Processing Conference'. Davis (CA, USA), March 26-28
2008
Leone-Fernandez, B., Molinaro, N., Carreiras, M., Barber, H. Correlati ERP
dell’elaborazione di caratteristiche transitorie e permanenti di oggetti ed eventi.
Padova (Italy), 18-20 September
2008
Leone-Fernandez, B., Molinaro, N., Carreiras, M., Barber, H. ¿Están los objetos
y son los eventos? : Potenciales Relacionados con Eventos asociados al
procesamiento de los verbos “ser” y “estar”. SEPEX, San Sebastian-Donostia
(Spain) 3-5 April
Awards
I was selected for Award as a young scientist by the Spanish Society of Experimental
Psychology, 2009. This award is given to me for the Syntactic Processing of Motor Cortex
Investigation with Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation technique. The award has been presented
in the SEPEX Conference 2010, Granada (Spain).
Grants
Fellowship of Ministry of Education and Science of Spain during four years: 2007-2011:
Professional Investigator in Formation (FPI) Manuel Carreiras Valiña grant, director of
4 “Basque Centre Research of Cognition Brain and Language” and the prof. Adelina Estévez
Monzó of the University of La Laguna.
Other Achievements
2013
Personal Assistant, at the Center of Autonomy, Terni, Italy.
2011
Tutoring of undergraduate students at the University of La Laguna.
2010
Participation in the Week of Science in the BCBL, 11-13, November, San
Sebastian-Donostia, Spain.
2010
Facilitated student learning in tutorship modality of Italian language.
2009
Program Course of Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation technique in the
University College of London from 24-28 of January, London.
2006
Certificate of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) at the Section of Terni, Italy.
2005
Grade Intermediate in the Examination for the Certificate in Spanish – Cervantes
Academy in Rome, Italy.
2004
Red Cross Volunteer, Red Cross Section of Terni, Italy.
Courses, seminaries and conference participations
2011
Course of “Advanced methods on the preparation of European projects for the
research in the FP7”, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain.
2011
Course of “Introductive methods on the preparation of European projects for the
research in the FP7” Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain.
2011
Course of “Strategies and Marketing” Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain.
2011
Seminary: Hemispheric Asymmetry in Prefrontal Cortex, Neurocog-Project,
University of La Laguna, Spain
2011
Seminary: Neuroimaging the dynamic of language comprehension, NeurocogProject, University of La Laguna, Spain
2011
Seminary: Substrato Neurologico de la Substitución sensorial, Neurocog-Project,
University of La Laguna, Spain.
2011
Seminary: El ritmo perezoso: oscilación alfa y procesamiento cerebral,
Neurocog-Project, University of La Laguna, Spain.
2011
Seminary: Lenguaje, cerebro y acción, Neurocog-Project, University of La
Laguna, Spain.
5 2011
Seminary: Bases Neurológicas y de Personalidad de la Insensibilidad ante las
señales infantiles en madres negligentes. Neurocog-Project, University of La
Laguna, Spain.
2011
Seminary: Cambios cognitivos en el Envejecimiento normal. Neurocog-Project,
University of La Laguna, Spain.
2009
Magstim Brain Stimulation Training Course, London, UK.
2008
Summer School of “Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation”, London, UK.
2006
Conference of “Psychology and Sport: an integrate study”, Terni, Italy.
2002
Conference of “Education for Prevention”, Amelia, Italy.
2001
Seminary of Psychology of Reasoning in Rome, La Sapienza, Rome, Italy.
2001
Seminary of investigation “Methodology of Behavioural Sciences”, La Sapienza,
Rome, Italy.
2001
Seminary of Statistic Methodology “Psychometric”, La Sapienza, Rome, Italy.
2001
Conference of “The university population and the health”, La Sapienza, Rome,
Italy.
2000
IV Italian Conference of the Health, Orvieto Italy.
2000
Congress of “Psychopathology of Alimentation”, Rome, Italy.
1999
Seminary of investigation of Sexology, “General Identity”, University of
Psychology in Rome, La Sapienza, Rome, Italy.
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