<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial">Ph.D Title: "Neuroimaging
study of neural correlates of motivated social interaction”</span></p>

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<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:Arial">Keywords: social neuroscience ; affective
neuroscience ; social context of affiliation ; empathy ;
motivation</span></p>

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<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial">Summary: </span></p>

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial">Two
important areas in cognitive neuroscience have developed exponentially for the
last 15 years: </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">(i) the affective neuroscience that focuses on the study of
brain processes involved in the processing of </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">emotional information and
psychological processes associated, and (ii) social neuroscience that focuses </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">on the study of the role of the brain in social relations and the psychological
processes involved. These two </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">fields converge on the issue of psychological and
neural processing of emotional information expressed by congeners.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">In most social relations, we
can consider a motivational component of inter-attraction. It is therefore
possible </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">t</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">o understand the psychological and brain processes involved in
various working models, made of different </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">functional contexts of
inter-attraction. Ongoing work in our laboratory includes the study of these
mechanisms </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">through two functional contexts: empathy for pain and sexual
motivation. These studies are mainly focused on </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">the knowledge of generalizable
cerebral and psychological processes involved in these contexts, as well as </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">the
determinants modulating the responses (familiarity, social class etc.).</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">The thesis project aims to understand the neural
mechanisms involved by conducting experiments using two </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">functional neuroimaging
techniques: on the one hand, high-density electroencephalography characterized
by high </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">temporal resolution, and on the other hand, functional Magnetic
Resonance Imaging characterized by a high </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">spatial resolution. In a second step,
these techniques will be coupled in a single experimental phase to access </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">to
the indices of correlations between these two types of signals.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">The central research question of the project will be
to determine the variation of the neural correlates of both </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent:18.0pt;line-height:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Arial">functional contexts
of affiliation mentioned above, according to the social determinants of the
congeners that interact.</span></p>

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<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial">Required
qualification / Experience:</span></p>

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal;text-autospace:none"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial">     - Interest in social and affective neuroscience</span></p>

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial">     - Experience in functional
neuroimaging methodology: design of experimental paradigms (E-Prime); </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial">     fMRI and
/ or EEG data collection ; fMRI and / or EEG analysis (SPM ; BrainVision
Analyzer2 ; Matlab ...)</span></p>

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<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal"><span style="font-family:Arial">Location :</span><span style="font-family:Arial"> </span><span style="font-family:Arial">Laboratoire de
Neurosciences Fonctionnelles et Pathologies, Amiens, France.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial"></span></p>

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<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:normal;text-autospace:none"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial">Contact information: Dr Harold Mouras,
<a href="mailto:hmouras@u-picardie.fr">hmouras@u-picardie.fr</a></span></p>