JUSTIN STORBECK

Title	Assistant Professor
Area	Social Psychology
Ph.D.	University of Virginia
Office	D-312 Science Building
E-mail	justin.storbeck@qc.cuny.edu
Office Phone	718-997-3465
Website

Professional Activities:

Society Memberships:
    Society for Personality and Social Psychology
    American Psychological Society
    Society for Psychonomic Research

Research Interests:

• Emotion
• EEG & Prefrontal Asymmetries
• Emotion & Cognition Interactions

Dr. Storbeck runs the Queens Affective Neuroscience Laboratory. The laboratory investigates the cognitive costs and benefits of emotions using the brain imaging technique of EEG, creating a visual window into neural activity during emotional states and cognitive tasks. Dr. Storbeck is specifically interested in seeing how emotional states change brain activation patterns (e.g., prefrontal asymmetries) and whether the different activation patterns can predict cognitive performance. The lab currently has multiple ongoing projects designed to answer the following questions: (1) Are certain cognitive tasks (verbal vs. spatial tasks) performed better when in a specific emotional state (happy vs. sad)? And if certain cognitive tasks are enhanced by specific emotional states, does this influence neural efficiency and self-control ability? (2) Does emotional arousal influence evaluations, attitudes and perceptions? For example, if one was emotionally aroused or stressed, would they form stronger attitudes and heightened perceptions? (3) How do emotional states influence thinking and memory? Specifically, can emotional states guide how we learn new information, and as a result influence memory for better and sometimes for worse?

Selected Publications:

    Stefanucci, J. K. & Storbeck, J. (2009). Don’t look down: Emotional arousal elevates height perception. Journal of Experiment Psychology: General, 138, 131-145.

    Storbeck, J. & Clore, G. L. (2008). Affective arousal as information: How affective arousal influences judgments, learning, and memory. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2, 1824-1843.

    Storbeck, J. & Clore, G. L. (2008). The affective regulation of cognitive priming. Emotion, 8, 208-215.

    Storbeck, J. & Clore, G. L. (2007). Emotional controls on cognitive processes. In Eder, A. B., Hommel, B., & De Houwer, J. (Eds.), How distinctive is affective processing? Special issue of the Journal Cognition and Emotion, 21, 1212-1237.

    Storbeck, J., Robinson, M. D., & McCourt, M. (2006). Semantic processing precedes affect retrieval: The neurological case for cognitive primacy in visual processing. Review of General Psychology, 10, 41-55.