Marc Coutanche, PhD | Center for Neuroscience

Associate Professor, Psychology

Phone

(412) 624-7458

E-mail

marc.coutanche@pitt.edu

Personal Website

www.mcoutanche.com

Education & Training

PhD, MA, University of Pennsylvania (2013)

Bachelor's, University of Oxford (2005)

Campus Address

LRDC, Murdoch, Rm 525, 3420 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh PA 15213

One-Line Research Description

Our lab examines the human memory system, asking how memories are formed, consolidated and retrieved, using fMRI, cognitive studies, virtual reality, and by developing new analytical tools to probe the information present in the brain’s activity patterns

How does our brain transform our perceptual experiences, broadly defined, into interconnected knowledge? Our lab works at the intersection of neuroscience and psychology, drawing on learning, memory consolidation, sleep, perception, and computer science to answer this question. We use cognitive experiments and neuroimaging to understand cognition and the human brain. We also develop and test new analytical methods to better detect and understand the neural information represented in the human brain activity recorded through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

Representative Publications

PEER-REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS (* = student or trainee)

Koch, G.E.*, Libertus, M.E., Fiez, J.A., & Coutanche, M.N. (2023). Representations within the Intraparietal Sulcus Distinguish Numerical Tasks and Formats. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 35(2), 226–240.

Ren, X.*, Liu, R.*, Coutanche, M.N., Fiez, J.A., & Libertus, M.E. (2022). Numerical Estrangement and Integration between Symbolic and Non-symbolic Numerical Information: Task-Dependence and Its Link to Math Abilities in Adults. Cognition, 224.

Hallion, L.S., Wright, A.G.C., Coutanche, M.N., Joormann, J., & Kusmierski, S.N.* (2022). A Five Factor Model of Perseverative Thought. Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science, 131(3), 235-252.

Ren, X.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2021). Sleep reduces the semantic coherence of memory recall: An application of latent semantic analysis to investigate memory reconstruction. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 28(4), 1336-1343.

Koch, G.E.*, Akpan, E.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2020). Image memorability is predicted by discriminability and similarity in different stages of a convolutional neural network. Learning & Memory, 27(12), 503-509.

Bruett, H.*, Calloway, R.C.*, Tokowicz, N., & Coutanche, M.N. (2020). Neural pattern similarity across concept exemplars predicts memory after a long delay. NeuroImage, 219, 1–9.

Coutanche, M.N., Koch, G.E.*, & Paulus, J.P.* (2020). Influences on memory for naturalistic visual episodes: Sleep, familiarity, and traits differentially affect forms of recall. Learning & Memory, 27, 284–291. [selected for cover]

Koch, G.E.*, Paulus, J.P.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2020). Neural patterns are more similar across individuals during successful memory encoding than during failed memory encoding. Cerebral Cortex, 30(7), 3872–3883.

Popov, V.*, Zhang, Q.*, Koch, G.E.*, Calloway, R.C.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2019). Semantic knowledge influences whether novel episodic associations are represented symmetrically or asymmetrically. Memory & Cognition, 47(8), 1567–1581.

Coutanche, M.N. (2019). Addressing misconceptions of Fast Mapping in adults. Invited commentary. Cognitive Neuroscience, 10(4), 226–228.

Carlos, B.J.*, Hirshorn, E.A., Durisko, C., Fiez, J.A., & Coutanche, M.N. (2019). Word inversion sensitivity as a marker of visual word form area lateralization: An application of a novel multivariate measure of laterality. NeuroImage, 191, 493–502.

Martin, L.*, Durisko, C., Moore, M.W., Coutanche, M.N., Chen, D., & Fiez, J.A. (2019). The VWFA is the home of orthographic learning when house images are used as letters. eNeuro, 6(1), ENEURO.0425-17.2019.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2019). Neural activity in human visual cortex is transformed by learning real world size. NeuroImage, 186, 570–576.

Coutanche, M.N., & Paulus, J.P.* (2018). An empirical analysis of popular press claims regarding linguistic change in President Donald J. Trump. Frontiers in Psychology, 9.

Bruett, H.*, Fang, X.*, Kamaraj, D.C.*, Haley, E.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2018). Expertise moderates incidentally learned associations between words and images. Frontiers in Psychology, 9.

Coutanche, M.N., & Koch, G.E.* (2018). Creatures great and small: Real-world size of animals predicts visual cortex representations beyond taxonomic category. NeuroImage, 183, 627–634.

Anzellotti, S.^†, & Coutanche, M.N.^† (2018). Beyond Functional Connectivity: Investigating networks of multivariate representations. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 22(3), 258–269. ^†equal contributions

Coutanche, M.N., & Koch, G.E.* (2017). Variation across individuals and items determine learning outcomes from fast mapping. Neuropsychologia, 106, 187–193.

Coutanche, M.N., Solomon, S.H.*, & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2016). A meta-analysis of fMRI decoding: Quantifying influences on human visual population codes. Neuropsychologia, 82, 134–141.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2015). Rapid consolidation of new knowledge in adulthood via fast mapping. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 19(9), 486–488.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2015). Creating concepts from converging features in human cortex. Cerebral Cortex, 25(9), 2584–2593.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2014). Fast mapping rapidly integrates information into existing memory networks. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143(6), 2296–2303.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2014). Using informational connectivity to measure the synchronous emergence of fMRI multi-voxel information across time. Journal of Visualized Experiments (89), e51226.

Coutanche, M.N. (2013). Distinguishing multi-voxel patterns and mean activation: Why, how, and what does it tell us? Cognitive, Affective and Behavioral Neuroscience (CABN), 13(3), 667–673.

Coutanche, M.N. Gianessi, C.A.*, Chanales, A.J.H.*, Willison, K.W.*, & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2013). The role of sleep in forming a memory representation of a two-dimensional space. Hippocampus, 23(12), 1189–1197.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2013). Informational Connectivity: Identifying synchronized discriminability of multi-voxel patterns across the brain. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 7:15, 1–14.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2012). The advantage of brief fMRI acquisition runs for multi-voxel pattern detection across runs. NeuroImage, 61(4), 1113–1119.

Coutanche, M.N., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2012). Reversal without remapping: What we can (and cannot) conclude about learned associations from training-induced behavior changes. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(2), 118–134.

Kylliäinen, A., Wallace, S., Coutanche, M.N., Leppänen, J.M., Cusack, J., Bailey, A.J., & Hietanen, J. (2012). Affective-motivational brain responses to direct gaze in children with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53(7), 790–797.

Coutanche, M.N., Thompson-Schill, S.L., & Schultz, R.T. (2011). Multi-voxel pattern analysis of fMRI data predicts clinical symptom severity. NeuroImage, 57(1), 113–123.

Casey, J.P., Magalhaes, T., Conroy, J.M., Regan, R., Shah, N., Anney, R., Shields, D.C., et al. (2012). A novel approach of homozygous haplotype sharing identifies candidate genes in autism spectrum disorder. Human Genetics, 131(4), 565–579.

BOOK CHAPTERS

Coutanche, M.N. (2022). The link between conceptual and perceptual information in memory. In W.A. Bainbridge and T.F. Brady (Eds.), Visual Memory. Routledge.

Coutanche, M.N., & Hallion, L.S. (2020). Machine learning for clinical psychology and clinical neuroscience. In A.G.C. Wright and M.N. Hallquist (Eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Research Methods in Clinical Psychology. Cambridge University Press.

Coutanche, M.N., Solomon, S.H., & Thompson-Schill, S.L. (2020). Conceptual Combination. In D. Poeppel, G.R. Mangun and M.S. Gazzaniga (Eds.), The Cognitive Neurosciences, 6^th edition. MIT Press.

EDITORSHIPS

Cooper, H. (Ed.-in-Chief), Coutanche, M.N., McMullen, L.M., Panter, A.T., Rindskopf, D., & Sher, K.J. (Assoc. Eds.). (2023). APA handbook of research methods in psychology (2nd ed., Vols. 1-3). American Psychological Association.

Lee, S.-H., Liu, X.L., & Coutanche, M.N. (2021). Editorial: Neural Mechanisms of Memory Retrieval and its Links to Other Cognitive Processes. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 15.

PEER-REVIEWED CONFERENCE PAPERS (* = student or trainee)

Koch, G.E. * & Coutanche, M.N. (accepted). Unpacking how Context Reinstatement aids Memory using Virtual Reality. Proceedings of the 45^th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society.

Popov, V.*, Zhang, Q.*, Koch, G.E.*, Calloway, R.C.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2019). The effect of semantic relatedness on associative asymmetry in memory. Oral presentation. In A.K. Goel, C.M. Seifert, & C. Freksa (Eds.), Proceedings of the 41^st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 944–945).

Zhang, Q.*, Popov, V.*, Koch, G.E.*, Calloway, R.C.*, & Coutanche, M.N. (2018). Fast memory integration facilitated by schema consistency. Poster presentation and inclusion in proceedings. In C. Kalish, M. Rau, J. Zhu, & T.T. Rogers (Eds.), Proceedings of the 40^th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 2777–2782).