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Psychology
Articles
Getting Inside a Criminal's Mind
Putting Thought into Cognition
Rats and Students on the Brain
Fighting Depression on a Cellular Level
Putting
Thought into Cognition
Manouel Hourmozi
GORAN LAZENDIC is a PhD student in the final stages of completing his thesis on cognition, in particular how semantic memory is structured. His study helps further understanding of how knowledge can be enhanced or hindered by varying the time between when a word is presented and when a related picture is presented. He is also exploring the relationship between the word and the picture stimulus when they are related and when they are conflicting and whether this has an impact on learning ability.
Our day with Goran began with an interview in the morning where we gathered information concerning his background, what he is currently doing, the problems he had encountered, his explanation of why he is doing a PhD, and his future aspirations. Throughout the rest of the day, we followed what he did, which consisted of much reading of past research, looking at Goran’s own theory and the statistics he had gathered from his subjects. The day ended with a tutorial lesson that he gave to a first year psychology class.
Goran described how, even on other days, his time is still divided between researching and tutoring. The amount and type of researching that needs to be done depends on what stage of the thesis is being completed. It can range from reading material of past researchers on the area he is studying specifically, which can either validate or dispute his hypothesis, to supervising experimental subjects, or concluding the write up his thesis. In the final stages, Goran needed to obtain results from a few more subjects. This was then integrated with the initial research he had conducted in order to replicate the findings of past researchers. By incorporating past research and his own original thoughts, Goran hopes to introduce new findings that further the knowledge of cognition.
Goran originally completed his undergraduate study in Yugoslavia. There, he was planning to take up a career as an oil-mining engineer since his hometown was situated on an oil field; however he became interested in Psychology particularly in the field of marketing for companies. Coming to Australia to complete his PhD, he chose to focus on “cognition” as he was greatly interested in a science that was precise and primarily based on numbers to draw conclusions. Areas of psychology that were not particularly scientific, such as Freudian theory, did not interest him.
Goran feels that completing a doctorate will provide him with generic skills that enable him to find work in a constantly changing market environment. The ability to propose new ideas and provide justification for them will be highly valued particularly in the research areas of cognition. Secondly, Goran feels that the ability to conduct his own experiments and draw conclusions contributes to greater knowledge in his field, something that he finds empowering and that drives him to succeed.
Goran, although uncertain where his future will lead him, believes that he will continue in the field of cognition. He aims to be involved in research that has applications to the world by working with government organisations, such as the CSIRO.
The life
of a science PhD student is torn between experiments, research, and tutoring.
The practice of working with deadlines as well as managing teaching responsibilities
is a balancing act that Goran is successful in, and by producing his thesis,
will contribute to the scientific knowledge of Australia.
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