We are seeking an enthusiastic, talented, and innovative individual, the position is part of the MRC-funded project "The influence of individual differences in brain rhythms on speech perception with and without age-related hearing loss". It involves help in data acquisition for an EEG population study. Project description Age-related hearing loss is a huge burden for individuals, societies, and economies. Even with mild age-related hearing loss, individuals often experience difficulties in conversations, which can lead to severe mental health problems, such as anxiety and depression, and increases the probability of cognitive decline.
However, there are big interindividual differences when it comes to the consequences of hearing loss. Even with the same objectively measured hearing loss, some individuals can understand speech better than others, which is due to mitigating neural processes. In the proposed project, we will find out why some individuals have better speech understanding by looking at individual brain rhythm profiles and how they affect speech comprehension in challenging listening situations.
The first and most important objective of the research is to identify which intrinsic brain rhythms predict individual speech comprehension in challenging listening situations by looking at a large sample of the typical population with different levels of age-related hearing loss. We will comprehensively map rhythmic brain activity in electroencephalography (EEG) data, using our previously developed spectral fingerprinting tool.
Candidate Key requirements for the post are:
- Completed undergraduate degree in Psychology, or another related discipline, or in final year of undergraduate education
- Interest in neural mechanisms of perception, auditory processing, and speech, as well as intrinsic brain rhythms
- Willingness to gain expertise with recording and preprocessing of electrophysiological data (EEG)
- Willingness to learn basic programming skills (e.g., Matlab, Python, R)
- Strong written and oral communication skills
The job entails 416 hours of work over a 1-year period and is part of the MRC-funded study "The influence of individual differences in brain rhythms on speech perception with and without age-related hearing loss". The PI will be Dr Anne Keitel, Psychology, School of Humanities, Social Sciences, and Law, University of Dundee. Specifically, help with EEG data acquisition for the large population study is required. The job may involve scheduling and inviting participants to the lab, acquisition of EEG data, and preparing the analysis of the data. This requires limited learning of using MATLAB and Python for conducting the experiments (no actual programming). Furthermore, the job entails attending lab meetings. Hours will likely be distributed unevenly over the 12 months (i.e. with more intensive work load in some weeks than others, depending on the stage of the project).
Please ensure that you upload a cover letter and CV in the Upload section of the online application. The cover letter should outline how you match the requirements for the post and why you are applying for this role.
Informal enquiries may be made to the project lead, Dr Anne Keitel, a.keitel@dundee.ac.uk.
https://keitelscience.com/
https://www.dundee.ac.uk/people/anne-keitel
