Professor Alan Pickering

Alan’s research aims to understand the cognitive functions and behaviours that are affected by rewards.

Staff details

Professor Alan Pickering

Position

Emeritus Professor

Department

Psychology

Email

a.pickering (@gold.ac.uk)

Website

http://homepages.gold.ac.uk/aphome/

Summary

In my research I want to understand why certain people learn especially well when they are rewarded, whereas other people do no benefit as much when their behaviour is reinforced by rewards. This may have something to do with the way that particular brain pathways, and receptors on certain brain cells, operate differently in differently people. It seems that these differences might be found on brain pathways and receptors that particularly rely upon a chemical called dopamine. A group of colleagues and students, who work on these and related topics, form the Goldsmiths Affective Science and Personality (GASP) lab. 

On the web

 

Publications and research outputs

Book Section

Article

Report

Thesis

Research Interests

I have a wide-range of research interests, but currently they focus on the following topics

  • The biological bases of personality traits (such as extraversion, anxiety-neuroticism, impulsivity, schizotypy) and their influence on cognitive and motivational processes.
  • Psychopathologies (anxiety, addiction, schizophrenia) that might be related to the above personality traits and cognitive-motivational processes.
  • Dopamine, reward and behaviour.
  • Computational models of reinforcement, learning and cognitive control.
  • Statistical methods in psychology.

 

With Dr Andrew Cooper I coordinate the Goldsmiths Affective Science and Personality (GASP) Lab. The lab webpage is forthcoming.

Selected publications (linked to ongoing research)

Pickering, A. D., & Pesola, F. (2014). Modeling dopaminergic and other processes involved in learning from reward prediction error: contributions from an individual differences perspective. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 8, 740.

Kuhn, G., Pickering, A., & Cole, G. G. (2016). “Rare” emotive faces and attentional orienting. Emotion, 16(1), 1–5.

Smillie, L. D., Cooper, A. J., & Pickering, A. D. (2011). Individual differences in reward-prediction-error: extraversion and feedback-related negativity. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 6(5), 646–652.

Smillie, L. D., Cooper, A. J., Proitsi, P., Powell, J. F., & Pickering, A. D. (2010). Variation in DRD2 dopamine gene predicts extraverted personality. Neuroscience Letters, 468(3), 234–237.

Smillie, L. D., Pickering, A. D., & Jackson, C. J. (2006). The new reinforcement sensitivity theory: Implications for personality measurement. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 10, 320–335.

Pickering, A. D., & Gray, J. A. (2001). Dopamine, appetitive reinforcement, and the neuropsychology of human learning : An individual differences approach. In A. Eliasz & A. Angleitner (Eds.), Advances in research on temperament (pp. 113–149). Lengerich, Germany: PABST Science Publishers.