Research focus is on the development and validation of Virtual Reality and mobile applications for cognitive training and clinical interventions.

Advances in technology and the gaming industry in particular have provided the opportunity to create innovative applications to either improve human cognition in the typical population or ameliorate behavioural difficulties associated with psychological disorders. These applications rely on interactive and fun tasks that, depending on the situation, can be self-administered (as in the case of cognitive training) or can complement the work of a therapist (as in the case of various clinical interventions). Examples are applications that exploit the appeal of Virtual Reality to improve social skills in individuals on the Autism Spectrum Disorder and applications that take advantage of the ubiquity of mobile technology to provide game-like training for cognitive mechanisms such as attention and memory.

The goal of this MRG is to capitalise on past research from Cognitive and Clinical Psychology/Neuroscience and to draw insights from computational models of cognitive processes, to (1) develop novel technological applications for cognitive training and clinical therapy, and (2) test their efficacy in highly-controlled laboratory-based experiments with typical and atypical populations.

MRG leader:
Dr. Marios Avraamides