In this course you will learn how to use modern computational approaches to further your understanding of the human mind and its neural implementation. You will learn how to combine state%E2%80%90of%E2%80%90the art research approaches, adopting computational models of human behaviour and testing those models with neurophysiological and neuroimaging methods. This course will promote the integration of these disciplines and approaches, stimulating new ways of conceptualising human behaviour, and new lines of research to understand complex brain functions.The knowledge and skills taught in this course will help advance our understanding of the healthy brain, but will also help you to bridge the gap between neuroscience and psychiatry, i.e. the primary aim of the budding field of computational psychiatry.The expertise and quantitative tools required to address this gap exist only across disciplines, and requires us to combine skills and knowledge from investigators jointly interested in solving problems of the brain. Computational psychiatry aims to bring together experts in neuroscience, psychiatry, economics, decision sciences and computational modelling to quantitatively define problems in psychiatric disease. One of our priorities is to move from simply describing psychiatric disorders to understanding mechanistically how they develop. Understanding how different processes give rise to the disease by making use of computational models might open up new personalised treatment strategies. Moreover the models may enable us to identify drugs already in existence that could be used to treat people with specific versions of a disorder.Skills will range from mathematical and computational modelling of behaviour (reinforcement learning and decision making) to dynamic causal modelling, multivariate decoding and data%E2%80%90driven approaches to global, large scale, brain%E2%80%90wide functional networks. You will acquire these skills through the guidance of well%E2%80%90known leading experts in the field. Besides traditional lectures, those experts will guide you to directly implement and explore the tools and concepts presented during the summer school through a large number of well%E2%80%90prepared hands%E2%80%90on sessions.

Course leader
Prof. Roshan CoolsProf. Ivan ToniDonders Institute for Brain, Cognition and BehaviourRadboud University

Target group
This course is aimed at graduate students (MSc & PhD) in Cognitive Neuroscience (or related disciplines) who wish to develop an integrated and quantitative perspective on current computational approaches to understand the human mind and its neural implementation, with a special focus on decision making.Entry levelMaster PhD

Course aim
After this course you are able to:Understand human behaviours according to quantitative and biologicallyinformed theoretical models Organise empirical tests suitable to distinguish between different formal models of cognitive functions (e.g. decision making)

Credits info
2 ECTS European Credits

Fee info
EUR 600: The course fee includes the registration fee, course materials, access to library and IT facilities, coffee/tea, lunch, and a number of social activities.Possible discounts10% discount for early bird applicants. The early bird deadline is 1 April 2015 15% discount for students and PhD candidates from Radboud University and partner universities



Radboud University
Address: P.O Box 9102 Nijmegen
Postal code: 6500 HC
City: Nijmegen
Country: Netherlands
Website: http://www.ru.nl/radboudsummerschool/
E-mail: radboudsummerschool@ru.nl
Phone: +31 (0)24 8187706