Biographical sketch name
Download 42.22 Kb.
|
- Navigate this page:
- Personal Statement
- Positions and Honors
Personal StatementI am a cognitive neuroscientist interested in the mechanisms involved in music perception and how they relate to language and other non-musical skills. To this end, I have over a decade of experience with cognitive neuroscience methods with a focus on using electroencephalography (EEG) to investigate brain activity involved in auditory perception. My graduate work used singing as a model to compare music and language cognition, and my postdoctoral work applies these concepts to studying music and other auditory skills in people with developmental disabilities, adding to current understanding of the comparison of neural resources used by language and music. My interest in translational research led me to a postdoctoral position at the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, where I have collaborated on a number of multi-disciplinary studies that investigate auditory processing in individuals with developmental disabilities, including Specific Language Impairment, Williams syndrome, and Rett syndrome. I also developed and implemented an EEG analysis workshop with a customized Matlab-based EEG analysis tutorial toolkit, which I then utilized in multiple studies. In my faculty position at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center, I am Director of the Music Cognition Laboratory, which is focused on rhythm skills and how they relate to other skills such as language and social development. I am also a founding member of our new cross-campus initiative in Music, Mind & Society, for which I am director of the Department of Otolaryngology’s arm of the Program. Positions and HonorsPositions and Employment 2001 – 2005 Translator/English Tutor, self-employed 2003 – 2004 Master’s Student/Research Technician, Institut de Neurosciences Cognitives de la Méditerranée, Marseille, France 2005 – 2010 Doctoral Student/Teaching Assistant/Research Assistant, Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, FL 2011 – 2012 Postdoctoral Trainee, Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 2010 – 2013 Postdoctoral Fellow, Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 2014 (August) – 2015 (June): Research Fellow, Department of Otolaryngology and Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN July 2015- present Research Assistant Professor, Department of Otolaryngology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center July 2015-present Director, Music Cognition Lab and Program for Music Mind Society, Department of Otolaryngology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center Sept. 2015- present Member, Vanderbilt Kennedy Center Fellowships 2006 – 2007 National Institute of Mental Health Pre-doctoral Trainee Fellowship 2007 – 2008 American Association of University Women Dissertation Fellowship 2008 – 2009 Dr. Daniel B. and Aurel B. Newell Doctoral Fellowship Other Experience and Professional Memberships 2006 Entrainment Network 2008- present Ad-hoc reviewer: PLoS ONE, Psychology of Music, Developmental Neuropsychology,
2008 – 2012 American Association of University Women 2009 – Present Society for Music Perception and Cognition 2010 – Present Society for the Neurobiology of Language 2010 – Present State of Tennessee Council of Certified Professional Midwifery (Consumer Member) 2011 – 2012 Association for Women in Science 2013 – present Acoustical Society of America 2014 – present American Cochlear Implant Alliance 2014 Participant at ASHA Lessons for Success (grantsmanship workshop) 2013-2015 Conference Co-Chair, Biennial meeting of the Society for Music Perception and Cognition (hosted by Vanderbilt, August 1-5, 2015). Honors/Awards 2004 Best Poster Award, Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology 2007 Florida Atlantic University Graduate Committee Travel Grant 2007 SEMPRE Bursary Travel Award 2012 Theodore Tjossem Travel Award 2013 Honorable Mention, Poster at Vanderbilt University Kennedy Center Science Day C. Contribution to Science Neural bases of linguistic and musical aspects of song perception At the time that I began my Master’s degree in 2003 only a handful of studies had examined the neural basis of song with imaging methods, and only a relatively small number of studies had compared language and music perception in general. Two publications resulted from the new paradigms we developed and tested during my Master’s thesis work: in the ERP paper, we reported an exciting finding that the N400 effect, a well-established marker of semantic processing, was modulated by musical melody in song, suggesting that variations in musical features affect word processing in sung language (Gordon, Schön, Magne, Astésano, & Besson, 2010, PLoS One). Those ERP results, showing interactions between the linguistic and musical dimensions of song, coincided with results obtained in the fMRI study showing widespread, interactive involvement between brain areas recruited to perceive words and melodies, and thus argue against functional specificity of brain areas for language and musical processing (Schön, Gordon, Campagne, Magne, Astésano, Anton, & Besson, 2010, NeuroImage). Schön, D., Gordon, R. L., & Besson, M. (2005). Musical and Linguistic Processing in Song Perception. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences (1060), pp. 71-81. PMID: 16597752. Schön, D., Gordon, R.L., Campagne, A., Magne, C., Astésano, C., Anton, J.L., Besson, M. (2010). Similar cerebral networks in language, music and song perception. NeuroImage 51, pp. 450-461. PMID: 15102118. Gordon, R.L., Schön, D., Magne, C., Astésano, C., Besson, M. (2010). Words and melody are intertwined in perception of sung words: EEG and behavioral evidence. PLoS ONE 5(3): e9889, pp. 1-12. PMCID: PMC2847603. Gordon, R.L., Magne, C.L., Large, E.W. (2011). EEG Correlates of Song Prosody: A new look at the relationship between linguistic and musical rhythm. Frontiers in Psychology: Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience 2:352, pp. 1-13. PMCID: PMC3225926. Auditory processing in developmental disabilities A substantial portion of my postdoctoral work has used time-frequency and ERP analyses of EEG data to examine on the dynamics of auditory perception and their relation to social cognition. In one study (Lense et al, 2013, SCAN), we showed that the emotional valence of musical primes influenced the perception of emotionally-valenced facial targets in people with Williams Syndrome. These modulations were reflected in both behavioral data and EEG gamma oscillations, which are markers of cross-modal integration. As a trainee in the Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network, I conducted a study that looked at autism spectrum features in children with single-gene disorders (Peters, Gordon & Key, 2014, J. of Child Neurology). With an innovative combination of brain and behavioral methods, we demonstrated that brain responses reflecting sensitivity to the mother’s voice were associated with higher social functioning, and differentiated patterns of responses for over- vs. under-expression of MeCP2 protein. Peters, S.U., Gordon, R.L., Key, A.P. (2014). Induced gamma oscillations differentiate familiar and novel voices in children with MECP2 Duplication and Rett syndromes. Journal of Child Neurology. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 24776956. Lense, M.D., Gordon, R.L., Key, A. P., Dykens, E.M. (2014). Neural Correlates of Cross-Modal Affective Priming by Music in Williams Syndrome. Social, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience. 9:4, 529-37. PMID: 23386738. Lense, M.D., Gordon, R.L., Key, A.P., and Dykens, E.M. (2012). “Neural correlates of musical timbre perception in Williams syndrome.” Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Musical Perception and Cognition, (Thessaloniki, Greece). pp. 576-582. http://icmpcescom2012.web.auth.gr/sites/default/files/papers/576_Proc.pdf Rhythm and Language Development in Children My innovative pre- and postdoctoral work laid the foundation for a long-term research program that looks at the interface between language skills and rhythm abilities. As a postdoc, I designed a study, funded by an internal grant that I co-wrote which investigates the relationship between morpho-syntactic competence and rhythm in children with typical and atypical language development. We developed a new computer-based rhythm skills assessment tool that is appropriate for children. The results showed that 48% of the variance in grammar skills was predicted by musical rhythm perception abilities in children with typical development, even after controlling for differences in IQ and socio-economic status. This project has recently been funded by an NIDCD R03 grant to extend the work to children with language impairment and investigate mechanisms underlying the correlation between rhythm and grammar, which I obtained at the end of my postdoctoral fellowship in mid-2015. I have also conducted a meta-analysis of studies on the effects of music training on reading-related skills. Gordon, R.L., Shivers, C.M., Wieland, E.A., Kotz, S.A., Yoder, P.J., McAuley, J.D. (2014). Musical rhythm discrimination explains individual differences in grammar skills in children. Developmental Science. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 25195623. Gordon, R.L., Jacobs, M.S., Schuele, C.M., McAuley, J.D. (2015) Perspectives on the rhythm-grammar link and its implications for typical and atypical language development. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1337, 16-25. PMID: 25773612. Gordon, R.L., Fehd, H.M., McCandliss, B.M. (in revision). Current issues in determining the impact of music training on reading skills: Meta-analysis and neuro-developmental framework. Frontiers in Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience. Magne, C., Gordon, R.L., Jordan, D. (in revision). Speech Rhythm Sensitivity and Musical Aptitude: ERPs and Individual Differences. Brain & Language. Institutional Cohesion and Infrastructure for Music Cognition research I am involved in several different efforts to foster institutional support for Music and Mind research, including: spearheading the bid to host a major international music cognition conference in August 2015 and co-chairing this conference http://vkc.mc.vanderbilt.edu/smpc2015/about/; organizing the poster session at the Music & Mind event in June 2014; coordinating the Music and Brain Seminar & Discussion Series, conducting an interest poll on the State of Music, Mind & Health research at Vanderbilt; and participation as one of the core investigators in creating/writing an internal proposal for a new Program in Music, Mind & Society at Vanderbilt, which was recently funded by the Chancellor’s Initiative. http://news.vanderbilt.edu/2015/09/new-program-set-to-explore-effects-of-music-on-the-mind/. I am now responsible for implementing this new cross-campus initiative. D. Research Support Ongoing Research Support NIH/NIDCD 1 R03-DC014802-01 Rhythm in Atypical Language Development: Mechanisms and Individual Differences $478,489. Gordon (PI) 07/15/15–07/14/18 Our preliminary work shows a strong association between musical rhythm and grammar skills in typically developing children. The R03 extends this work to children with Specific language impairment (SLI, a disorder which affects 7% of young children in the U.S.) to investigate the mechanisms underlying the association, and to investigate rhythm deficits in this population and determine to what extent rhythm skills in these children are predictive of their language difficulties in grammar and word learning. Role: PI
The Science of Music Research: Creating a Program for Music, Mind & Society 07/01/15 – 06/30/17 This project allows us to form a trans-institutional interdisciplinary Program for Music, Mind and Society as a hub to harness the intellectual capital and existing Vanderbilt resources to study the science of music and society. The goal of the program will be to discover how music works, from molecules to neurons that constitute the brain response, through explorations of how music training changes the brain, therapeutic uses of music in clinical settings, ethnographic studies of the role of music in society, to predictive modeling of musical popularity, and arts policy grounded in scientific research. I am the primary person responsible for implementing this new cross-campus initiative, including supervising a pilot study on music intervention for children with language disorders. Completed Research Support Vanderbilt Kennedy Center Hobbs Discovery Award, Yoder (PI), Gordon (Co-Investigator) $29,636 Investigating the Relationship between Syntax and Rhythm in SLI 01/26/12-06/30/15 This pilot project used EEG and behavioral measures to study the relationship between rhythmic processing and language skills in children with specific language impairment and with typical development. Dr. Yoder was the pro-forma faculty PI, and I developed the proposal and implemented the project. Download 42.22 Kb. Share with your friends:
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||