Faculty


Justin Wood

Assistant Professor of Psychology

Contact Information
E-mail: justinnw@usc.edu
Phone: (213) 740-2203
Office: SGM 501

LINKS
Personal Website
 

Biographical Sketch

What accounts for our human capacity to perceive and reason about the world? My research examines the origins and development of knowledge, in relation to how knowledge emerges during development and may have emerged on a biological timescale. I study various systems of knowledge using three cross-cutting approaches. First, I study how cognition functions in adult humans. Second, I study how cognition functions in adult nonhuman animals, such as birds and primates. Third, I study how cognition functions at birth, before an animal has acquired experiences with the world. Each approach enables specific and unique questions to be asked about the origins and development of knowledge. Studies of animals explore questions of evolutionary origins, but also, questions concerning the necessity of language and other distinctively human capacities. Studies of newborn animals reveal which adult capacities are acquired and in particular, the ways in which infant knowledge is continuous with adult knowledge. Lastly, studies of human adults allow detailed examination of the mental processes that comprise full-fledged, mature cognition. Currently, my research focuses on three general topics: (1) the perceptual and cognitive systems that underlie object and number representation; (2) the perceptual and cognitive systems that underlie event representation; and (3) the social systems that allow humans and nonhuman animals to make inferences about others’ goals, intentions, beliefs, and desires.

Education

  • B.A. Psychology, University of Virginia, 6/2002
  • M.A. Psychology, Harvard University, 6/2005
  • Ph.D. Psychology, Harvard University, 6/2008

    • Academic Appointment, Affiliation, and Employment History

    • Assistant Professor, University of Southern California, 08/16/2008-  

    Publications


    Journal Article
    • Wood, J. N. (2011). When do spatial and visual working memory interact?. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics. Vol. 73, pp. 420-439.
    • Hyde, D., Wood, J. N. (2011). Spatial attention determines the nature of non-verbal numerical cognition. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. Vol. 23 (9), pp. 2336-2351.
    • Wood, J. N. (2011). A core knowledge architecture of visual working memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance. Vol. 37 (2), pp. 357-381.
    • Endress, A., Wood, J. N. (2011). From movements to actions: Two mechanisms for learning action sequences. Cognitive Psychology. Vol. 63, pp. 141-171.
    • Hauser, M. D., Wood, J. N. (2010). Evolving the capacity to understand actions, intentions and goals. Annual Review of Psychology. Vol. 61, pp. 303-324.
    • Wood, J. N. (2010). Visual working memory retains movement information within an allocentric reference frame. Visual Cognition. Vol. 10, pp. 1464-1485.
    • Wood, J. N. (2009). Distinct Visual Working Memory Systems for View-Dependent and View-Invariant Representation. PLoS ONE. Vol. 4 (8)
    • Wood, J. N., Kouider, S., Carey, S. (2009). Acquisition of Singular–Plural Morphology. Developmental Psychology. Vol. 45 (1), pp. 202-206.
    • Wood, J. N., Hauser, M. D. (2008). Action comprehension in nonhuman primates: Motor simulation or inferential reasoning?. Trends in Cognitive Sciences. Vol. 12 (12), pp. 461-465.
    • Wood, J. N. (2008). Visual memory for agents and their actions. Cognition. Vol. 108, pp. 522-532.
    • Barner, D., Wood, J. N., Hauser, M. D., Carey, S. (2008). Wild rhesus monkeys compute the singular-plural distinction. Cognition. Vol. 107, pp. 603-622.
    • Wood, J. N., Glynn, D. D., Hauser, M. D. (2008). Rhesus Monkeys' Understanding of Actions and Goals. Social Neuroscience. Vol. 3 (1), pp. 60-68.
    • Wood, J. N., Hauser, M. D., Glynn, D. D., Barner, D. (2008). Free-ranging rhesus monkeys spontaneously individuate and enumerate small numbers of non-solid portions. Cognition. Vol. 106, pp. 207-221.
    • Wood, J. N. (2007). Visual working memory for observed actions. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. Vol. 136 (4), pp. 639-652.
    • Wood, J. N., Glynn, D. D., Philips, B., Hauser, M. D. (2007). The perception of rational, goal-directed action in non-human primates. Science. Vol. 317 (5843), pp. 1402-1405.
    • Wood, J. N., Glynn, D. D., Hauser, M. D. (2007). The uniquely human capacity to throw evolved from a non-throwing primate: An evolutionary dissociation between action and perception. Biology Letters. Vol. 3 (4), pp. 360-364.
    • Hauser, M. D., Glynn, D. D., Wood, J. N. (2007). Wild, untrained and non-enculturated rhesus monkeys correctly read the goal-relevant gestures of a human agent. Proceedings of the Royal Society, B.. Vol. 274 (1620), pp. 1913-1918.
    • Stevens, J., Wood, J. N., Hauser, M. D. (2007). When quantity trumps number: discrimination experiments in cotton-top tamarins (Saguinas oedipus) and common marmosets (Callithrix jacchus). Animal Cognition. Vol. 10, pp. 429-437.
    • Barner, D., Thalwitz, D., Wood, J. N., Carey, S. (2007). Children's ability to distinguish "one" from "more than one" and the acquisition of singular-plural morpho-syntax. Developmental Science. Vol. 10 (7), pp. 365-373.
    • Kouider, S., Halberda, J., Wood, J. N., Carey, S. (2006). Acquisition of English number marking: The singular-plural distinction. Language Learning & Development. Vol. 2 (1), pp. 1-25.
    • Wood, J. N., Spelke, E. S. (2005). Chronometric studies of numerical cognition in five-month-old infants. Cognition. Vol. 97, pp. 23-39.
    • Wood, J. N., Spelke, E. S. (2005). Infants’ enumeration of actions: numerical discrimination and its signature limits. Developmental Science. Vol. 8 (2), pp. 173-181.


    Honors and Awards

    • Excellence in Teaching Award for General Education, 2010-2011   
    • New Investigator Award, awarded by the American Psychological Association, 2007-2008   


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  • Department of Psychology
  • University of Southern California
  • SGM 501
  • 3620 South McClintock Ave.
  • Los Angeles, CA 90089-1061