I am an Associate Professor dedicated to the exploration of the neural underpinnings of consciousness and metacognition. With a keen focus on understanding how the brain represents conscious experiences and the awareness of one's own cognitive processes, I employ psychophysics, neuroimaging, and computational modeling techniques to dissect the complexities of higher-order cognitive functions. My research endeavors to bridge the gap between neuroscience and cognitive science by elucidating the mechanisms that govern metacognitive abilities, contributing significantly to our understanding of how individuals monitor and regulate their thoughts and actions. Through his work, my research aims not only to advance the field's knowledge but also to develop more brain-inspired AI algorithms that can emulate these sophisticated cognitive processes.
ACEDEMIC POSITIONS
Oct 2023-Shenzhen University, School of Psychology Associate Professor
EDUCATION
Sep 2018 – Nov 2022 Basque Center for Brain, Cognitive, and Language (BCBL), Donostia/San Sebastian, Basque, Spain, Ph.D in Cognitive Neuroscience
Sep 2014 – Jun 2016 New York University (NYU), New York, NY, US, M.A in Psychology (General)
Sep 2012 – Jun 2014 Arizona State University (ASU), Tempe, AZ, US, B.A. in Psychology (minor in Statistics)
Sep 2007 – Jun 2011 Guangzhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine (UTCM), Guangzhou,Guangdong, China, B.S. in Applied Psychology
GRANTS
2025-2027 Representations and Processing of Visual Content Under Different States of Consciousness - A Study Combining Magnetoencephalography (MEG) and Computational Modeling, National Natural Science Foundation of China (Youth Science Fund Project)
PUBLICATIONS
1.Mei, N., Rahnev, D. & Soto, D. Using serial dependence to predict confidence across observers and cognitive domains. Psychon Bull Rev (2023). https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-023-02261-x
2.Mei, N., Santana, R. & Soto, D. Informative neural representations of unseen contents during higher-order processing in human brains and deep artificial networks. Nat Hum Behav 6, 720–731 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-021-01274-7
3.Soto, D., Sheikh, U.A., Mei, N., & Santana, R. (2020). Decoding and encoding models reveal the role of mental simulation in the brain representation of meaning. Royal Society Open Science, 7:192043. Doi: 10.1098/rsos.192043
4.Mei, N., Rankine, S., Olafsson, E., & Soto, D. (2020). Similar history biases for distinct prospective decisions of self-performance. Scientific Reports, 10:5854. Doi:10.1038/s41598-020-62719-z
5.Mei, N., Flinker, A., Zhu, M., Cai, Q., And Tian, X. (2020). Lateralization in the dichotic listening of tones is influenced by the content of speech. Neuropsychologia
6.Mei, N., Grossberg, M. D., Ng, K., Navarro, K. T., & Ellmore, T. M. (2017). Identifying sleep spindles with multichannel EEG and classification optimization. Computers in biology and medicine, 89, 441-453.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Lecturer in 'Statistics for undergrads’.
