Daniel Simons
Encyclopedia
Daniel J. Simons is a prominent experimental psychologist
, cognitive scientist
, and Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois.
Simons is most well known for his work on change blindness
and inattentional blindness
, two surprising examples of how people can be unaware of information right in front of their eyes. His research interests also include visual cognition, perception
, memory
, attention
, and awareness
.
in 1991 and a Ph.D. from Cornell University
in 1997. Simons then spent 5 years at Harvard University
, first as an Assistant professor and then as a John Loeb Associate Professor. In 2002, Simons became a Professor at the University of Illinois where he runs the Visual Cognition Laboratory.
Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contributions to Psychology. He was also an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow
from 1999 to 2003. In 2005, Simons and his collaborator, Christopher Chabris, won the Ig Nobel Prize
for demonstrating that even gorillas can become invisible when people are attending to something else. Throughout his career, Simons has also been awarded numerous teaching and mentoring awards for his dedication to quality undergraduate and graduate education.
Experimental psychology
Experimental psychology is a methodological approach, rather than a subject, and encompasses varied fields within psychology. Experimental psychologists have traditionally conducted research, published articles, and taught classes on neuroscience, developmental psychology, sensation, perception,...
, cognitive scientist
Cognitive science
Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary scientific study of mind and its processes. It examines what cognition is, what it does and how it works. It includes research on how information is processed , represented, and transformed in behaviour, nervous system or machine...
, and Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois.
Simons is most well known for his work on change blindness
Change blindness
In visual perception, change blindness is a normal phenomenon of the brain which show in light that the brain does not have a precise representation of the world but a lacunar one, made of partial details...
and inattentional blindness
Inattentional blindness
Inattentional blindness, also known as perceptual blindness, is when a person fails to notice some stimulus that is in plain sight. This stimulus is usually unexpected but fully visible. This typically happens because humans are overloaded with inputs. It is impossible to pay attention to every...
, two surprising examples of how people can be unaware of information right in front of their eyes. His research interests also include visual cognition, perception
Perception
Perception is the process of attaining awareness or understanding of the environment by organizing and interpreting sensory information. All perception involves signals in the nervous system, which in turn result from physical stimulation of the sense organs...
, memory
Memory
In psychology, memory is an organism's ability to store, retain, and recall information and experiences. Traditional studies of memory began in the fields of philosophy, including techniques of artificially enhancing memory....
, attention
Attention
Attention is the cognitive process of paying attention to one aspect of the environment while ignoring others. Attention is one of the most intensely studied topics within psychology and cognitive neuroscience....
, and awareness
Awareness
Awareness is the state or ability to perceive, to feel, or to be conscious of events, objects or sensory patterns. In this level of consciousness, sense data can be confirmed by an observer without necessarily implying understanding. More broadly, it is the state or quality of being aware of...
.
Career
Simons received a B.A. in psychology from Carleton CollegeCarleton College
Carleton College is an independent non-sectarian, coeducational, liberal arts college in Northfield, Minnesota, USA. The college enrolls 1,958 undergraduate students, and employs 198 full-time faculty members. In 2012 U.S...
in 1991 and a Ph.D. from Cornell University
Cornell University
Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...
in 1997. Simons then spent 5 years at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, first as an Assistant professor and then as a John Loeb Associate Professor. In 2002, Simons became a Professor at the University of Illinois where he runs the Visual Cognition Laboratory.
Research
Professor Simons' research has focused on the cognitive underpinnings of our experience of a stable and continuous visual world. One line of research focuses on change blindness. These failures to notice large changes to scenes suggest that we are aware of far less of our visual world than we think. Related studies explore what aspects of our environment automatically capture attention and what objects and events go unnoticed. Such studies reveal the surprising extent of inattentional blindness - the failure to notice unusual and salient events in their visual world when attention is otherwise engaged and the events are unexpected. Other active research interests include scene perception, object recognition, visual memory, visual fading, attention, and driving and distraction. Research in his laboratory adopts methods ranging from real-world and video-based approaches to computer-based psychophysical techniques, and it includes basic behavioral measures, eye tracking, simulator studies, and training studies. This diversity of approaches helps establish closer links between basic research on the mechanisms of attention and the real-world implications and consequences of the findings.Awards
In 2003, Simons won the APAAmerican Psychological Association
The American Psychological Association is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States. It is the world's largest association of psychologists with around 154,000 members including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. The APA...
Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contributions to Psychology. He was also an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow
Sloan Fellowship
The Sloan Research Fellowships are awarded annually by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation since 1955 to "provide support and recognition to early-career scientists and scholars". This is distinct from the Sloan Fellows in business....
from 1999 to 2003. In 2005, Simons and his collaborator, Christopher Chabris, won the Ig Nobel Prize
Ig Nobel Prize
The Ig Nobel Prizes are an American parody of the Nobel Prizes and are given each year in early October for ten unusual or trivial achievements in scientific research. The stated aim of the prizes is to "first make people laugh, and then make them think"...
for demonstrating that even gorillas can become invisible when people are attending to something else. Throughout his career, Simons has also been awarded numerous teaching and mentoring awards for his dedication to quality undergraduate and graduate education.
Articles and essays
External links
- Daniel Simons's website
- The SimonsLab website
- University of Illinois Listing
- The Invisible Gorilla
- Daniel Simons's blog