| Brief biography | Research/Publications | Links |
Position: Research Fellow
Location: AE.G.21/AE.G.14
Telephone: +44 (0) 20 8223 4951
Email: p.tomalski@uel.ac.uk
Contact address:
Institute for Research in Child Development2010 - present Research Fellow, Institute for Research in Child Development, UEL, UK
2009 – 2010 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, CBCD Birkbeck. Funding: Eranda Foundation
2009 Ph.D., Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, UK, Supervisors: Prof. Mark Johnson & Prof. Gergely Csibra.
2005 Master in Psychology - Centre for Interfaculty Individual Studies in Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Warsaw, Poland; Subject areas: Psychology (major), Molecular Biology (minor).
My current work as a postdoctoral researcher is concerned with the early impact of diverse socio-economic backgrounds on early language, attention and social-cognitive developmenta of infants in the first year of life. In particular, we study cognitive development of infants coming from families with low SES on a variety of measures, including ERPs, eye-tracking and standardised behavioural assessment. This project is funded by a donation from the Eranda Foundation and run at IRCD with Dr Elena Kushnerenko and Prof. Derek Moore.
My Ph.D. project was focused on the neural basis of face processing in the human brain, especially on the role of subcortical visual pathways during the early stages of such processing. It was aimed at studying how evolutionarily ancient retinotectal visual pathway (including superior colliculus, pulvinar and amygdala) is active in humans from birth through adulthood, allowing rapid detection of faces and facial emotion expressions. I have studied effects of faces and schematic faces on attention and eye movements, with covert and overt orienting tasks. I have also used EEG/ERPs (event-related potentials) and time-frequency analysis to study the influences of the subcortical face pathway on the early stages of cortical face processing.
Previously I have also worked on other aspects of social-cognitive development and its neural mechanisms, especially on attachment representations in families of gay and lesbian couples (this work was published as a book in Polish at Warsaw University Press).
Recent publications
Tomalski P., Johnson MH & Csibra G. (in preparation). N170 responses to faces and face-like patterns: the effects of contrast polarity and orientation and the role of extrageniculate visual pathways.
Tomalski P. & Johnson M.H. (in press). The effects of early adversity on the adult and developing brain. Current Opinion in Psychiatry.
Tomalski P., Johnson MH.& Csibra G. (2009). Temporal-nasal asymmetry of rapid orienting to face-like stimuli. Neuroreport, 20(15), 1309-1312. 
Tomalski P., Csibra G. & Johnson MH. (2009). Rapid orienting towards face-like stimuli with gaze-relevant contrast information. Perception, 38, 569-578. 
Tomalski P. (2007). Nietypowe rodziny. O parach lesbijek i gejow oraz ich dzieciach z perspektywy teorii przywiazania. Warsaw: Warsaw University Press. (authored book based on master thesis, in Polish, more on publisher's website).
Last updated: 10.03.2010
© 2010
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