2010–present: Research Fellow, Institute for Research in Child Development, UEL, UK.

2009–2010: Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, UK. Funding: Eranda Foundation.

2009: PhD, Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck. Supervisors: Professor Mark Johnson and Professor 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 development 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 Professor Derek Moore. Visit IRCD Babylab site for more information.

My PhD 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.)

Peer-reviewed Journal Articles

1. Tomalski, P., & Johnson, M.H. (2010). The effects of early adversity on the adult and developing brain. Current Opinion in Psychiatry, 23(3), 233–238. doi:10.1097/YCO.0b013e3283387a8c
2. Tomalski, P., Csibra, G., & Johnson, M.H. (2009). Rapid orienting towards face-like stimuli with gaze-relevant contrast information. Perception, 38, 569–578. doi:10.1068/p6137
3. Tomalski, P., Johnson, M.H., & Csibra, G. (2009). Temporal-nasal asymmetry of rapid orienting to face-like stimuli. Neuroreport, 20(15), 1309–1312. doi:10.1097/WNR.0b013e32832f0acd

Poster Sessions

1. Tomalski, P., Ribeiro, H., Axelsson, E., Murphy, E., Johnson, M.H., Moore, D.G., et al. (2010, March). Audio-visual integration of speech information in 6–9-month-old infants. Poster session presented at the International Conference on Infancy Studies, Baltimore.

Books

1. Tomalski, P. (2007). Nietypowe rodziny. O parach lesbijek i gejów oraz ich dzieciach z perspektywy teorii przywiązania. [Uncommon families. On relationships of lesbian and gay couples and their children from the perspective of attachment theory]. Warsaw: Warsaw University Press.

• Institute for Research in Child Development, University of East London
• Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London