Berna Güler

What is the role of working memory in segmenting continuous experience into events? Does information gradually accumulate in working memory, or is the preceding event reactivated when we encounter a boundary? Check our new paper in JoCN🧵: direct.mit.edu/jocn/article...

Does knowing that distractions are coming change how we use working memory? In two EEG experiments, anticipating interference did not change how strongly previously learned information was reactivated in working memory. doi.org/10.1162/JOCN...

🌈 New preprint! With Sage, Melissa, and Kia (@dynacog-lab.bsky.social, @scenegrammarlab.bsky.social, @kianobre.bsky.social), we explore how attention is divided across external perception and internal working memory - revealing a dynamic trade-off between these two domains. doi.org/10.64898/202...

In a new preprint, @keisukefukuda.bsky.social and I investigated stimulus-specific memorability with ROC analysis. We find that the variability of latent memory effects (familiarity) caused by individual memory items across people is a game-changing dimension of memorability osf.io/c62an/files/...

ATTENTION!!! The program of Working Memory Symposium (WMS) 2026 (July 14-17) is out! sites.google.com/view/wmsympo... This year, WMS will feature a single stream presentation of 52 talks (39 talks and 13 blitz) + 1 panel discussion across 4 days. Looking forward to seeing you all!!!

Postdoc position available at postlab.psych.wisc.edu. Pls send cv to postle@wisc.edu

Can you make your life feel “longer” in retrospect? Add a dose of change and novelty in the present to later expand memories of your past. Excited to share our work on how dopamine-related processing bends memory to reflect the passage of distinct events. newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/can...

“It absolutely defied all of our expectations. This was so surprising that my whole project changed.” This phenomenon could have far-reaching implications, and is leaving neuroscientists baffled. go.nature.com/3RPAhhc

Now out in Current Opinion in Neurobiology! We propose that biases in perception & memory emerge naturally from an adaptive, hierarchical human learning system. w/ @timbrady.bsky.social + sky-less et al. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Happy to share that I will give a colloquium talk at the Heymans Institute for Psychological Research, University of Groningen, on June 2 I will present my work on how experiences are segmented into meaningful events, and how contextual stability and working memory contribute to this process ✨

Under stress, two things happened in the hippocampus: 1) Less reactivation of the prior related memory during new learning 2) Greater neural dissimilarity between overlapping events To put it another way, stress pushed related memories apart instead of pulling them together.

Excited to share our new paper on how distraction affects memory retrieval. Using a continuous report paradigm, we show that distraction reduces whether memories are accessed but not how precisely they are represented. link.springer.com/article/10.3...

In collaboration with @monicarosenb.bsky.social , we showed that individual diffs in LTM encoding is uniquely predicted by inter-electrode correlations even controlling for working memory abilities. This suggests that WM & LTM encoding are separate abilities coded by different neural signatures! 1/n

New paper out in J. Neuro! We used MEG and pattern classifiers to ask: if a memory is reactivated in the brain, does that mean you'll recall it? Short answer: no. www.jneurosci.org/content/46/1... Read on for the details! [1/7] #neuroscience #memory

Abstract submission for WMS2026 (July 14th-17th) is now open! If you are an early career researcher of working memory, please let us hear about your cool work by submitting your abstract (forms.gle/MccRLJC1xXQ3...). Deadline is May 31st.

Failure is part and parcel of research, but discussing it sometimes seems to be taboo in science. It doesn’t need to be go.nature.com/3QHXZvk

Many claim memory biases toward percepts reflect corruption in sensory signals. We challenge this view by showing that ppl adapt their integration rationally w/ experience. w/ @timbrady.bsky.social Humans adaptively integrate memory and perception based on stimulus history | osf.io/preprints/ps...

New paper out 🧠 We synthesize findings from aging, ADHD, dyslexia & OCD and propose that event segmentation emerges from the interaction of attention, working memory, and schemas/contextual modulation. Curious to hear your thoughts! link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Our new review with Berna Güler (@bernaguler.bsky.social) is out! We ask a basic but under-specified question: What shapes the segmented nature of episodic memories?

📍2003 marked the year in which the retro-cue paradigm was born. Fast forward, 23 years later, we adapt this logic to long-term memory and ask how does attention shape retrieval from long-term memory? 🤔 w/ @william-nm.bsky.social Kia Nobre, Nahid Zokaei and Nora Roüast osf.io/preprints/ps... 1/n

Honored to receive a Fulbright Postdoctoral Research Fellowship and to join Prof. Kia Nobre at Yale University. Excited to continue my work on the role of working memory in event segmentation. Grateful for this opportunity! www.brognition.yale.edu/%f0%9f%8c%8d...

Super excited to see this out in the world!

Happy to share that I’ll be an Editorial Fellow for Journal of Experimental Psychology: General in 2026, working with Sarah Brown-Schmidt on the journal’s editorial process. Grateful for this opportunity! ✨ www.apa.org/pubs/journal...

It is so moving to see my colleagues raising their voice and awareness. Proud moment ✨ @erinmorrow.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/06/16/s...

Bilim Akademisi'ne tüm destekleri için içtenlikle teşekkür ederim! / I sincerely thank the Science Academy for supporting my attendance at the VSS by providing travel funding 😊 @bilimakademisi.bsky.social bilimakademisi.org/sen-de-bilim...

I’ll share findings from my recent research — which has been accepted for publication in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review — on how contextual stability, rather than prediction errors, might play a more dominant role in structuring episodic memories. Hoping to see you there! 😊