معرفی
Dr. Colin Palmer is a Visiting Fellow in the School of Psychology at the University of New South Wales (UNSW), where he conducts research on visual perception with a focus on social features of our sensory environment. His work examines how the brain processes elements like eyes, faces, and behaviors of people around us using visual psychophysics, computational modeling, and 3D graphical rendering.
Dr. Palmer completed his Ph.D. in 2016 and Bachelor of Behavioural Neuroscience (Honours) in 2009, both at Monash University. His doctoral research explored how neurocognitive models of sensory processing relate to differences in sensory integration and social cognition in autism.
His primary research interests center on understanding the perceptual and neural mechanisms underlying our sensitivity to dynamic social cues, particularly eye and head movements. Dr. Palmer investigates how the visual system extracts basic environmental elements (color, shape, motion) and develops a mechanistic understanding of how our experience of the social world arises from nervous system activity. His work has clinical applications for understanding sensory and social difficulties in conditions like autism and schizophrenia.
Dr. Palmer's recent publications reveal a consistent focus on social vision, particularly gaze perception, face processing, and animacy detection. His research increasingly incorporates computational modeling approaches to understand visual perception mechanisms. There's a strong emphasis on how lighting and shading affect face and gaze perception, with growing attention to clinical applications for neurodevelopmental conditions.
Dr. Palmer has received recognition for his work through several awards:
- Emerging Investigator Award, Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society, 2017
- Postdoctoral presentation award, Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society, 2016
Dr. Palmer is actively involved in research supervision and teaching. He teaches PSYC 3221 Vision and Brain and is available to supervise research students. His research is supported by significant funding:
- ARC Discovery Project (2020-2022): "Extracting meaning from motion" ($492,000)
- ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (2019-2021): "Human sensitivity to the dynamics of other people's eye movements" ($356,000)
- Experimental Psychology Society Study Visit Grant (2017): "Testing computational theories of autism spectrum disorder in the social domain" (£2,580)
Dr. Palmer collaborates extensively with Professor Colin Clifford at UNSW and maintains international collaborations with researchers in the UK and Australia, particularly on projects related to autism spectrum disorders and social cognition.
