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Fred Mast

Fred Mast

Fred Mast is Full Professor and Head of the Department of Cognitive Psychology, Perception and Methodology. Previous positions include Harvard University (Cambridge), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the Universities of Zürich and Lausanne. He specializes in mental imagery, multisensory integration, and visual perception. He and his team use psychophysical methods, eye-tracking, motion platforms, and brain imaging techniques.

In addition, Fred Mast is co-director of the interfaculty research collaboration "Decoding Sleep: From Neurons to Health & Mind," which brings together 13 research groups from medicine, psychology, psychiatry, and computer science. The research collaboration aims to better understand the mechanisms of sleep, consciousness and cognition and their importance for mental and physical health.

His Video

flashMOOCs University of Bern, Thumbnail to the video "Reality: How Perception Creates the World"

Reality: How Perception Creates the World

Our perception is our reality. We perceive the world around us as distinct and unambiguous and take information for granted. But our perception is not always clear, and we can also be mistaken. But how does our brain process information? And how is the reality we perceive created?

Institute

Selected publications

  • Chiquet, S., Martarelli, C.S. & Mast, F.W. (2022). Imagery-related eye movements in 3D space depend on individual differences in visual object imagery. Scientific Reports, 12, 14136. doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-18080-4 
  • Chiquet, S., Martarelli, C.S., Weibel, D. & Mast, F.W. Learning by teaching in immersive virtual reality – absorption tendency increases learning outcomes. Learning and Instruction, in press.  
  • Ertl., M., Klaus, M., Mast, F.W., Brandt, T. & Dieterich, M. (2020). Spectral fingerprints of correct vestibular discrimination of the intensity of body accelerations. NeuroImage, 219,  doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.117015.
  • Gurtner, L.M., Hartmann, M. & Mast, F.W. (2021). Eye movements during visual imagery and perception show spatial correspondence but have unique temporal signatures. Cognition, 210, p. 104597. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2021.104597
  • Hartmann, M., Falconer, C. J., Kaelin-Lang, A., Müri, R.M. & Mast, F.W. (2022). Imagined paralysis reduces motor cortex excitability. Psychophysiology, 59(10):e14069. doi: 10.1111/psyp.14069
  • Hartmann, M., Singer, S., Savic, B., Müri, R.M. & Mast, F.W. (2020).  Anodal high-definition transcranial direct current stimulation over the posterior parietal cortex modulates approximate mental arithmetic. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 32(5), 862-876. doi: 10.1162/jocn_a_01514
  • Klaus, M.P., Wyssen, G.C., Frank, S.M., Malloni, W.M., Greenlee, M.W. & Mast, F.W. (2020). Vestibular stimulation modulates neural correlates of own-body mental imagery. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 32(3), 484-496. doi: 10.1162/jocn_a_01496.
  • Klaus, M.P., Schöne, C.G., Hartmann, M., Merfeld, D.M., Schubert, M.C. & Mast, F.W. (2020). Roll tilt self-motion direction discrimination training: First evidence for perceptual learning. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 82, 1987–1999. doi.org/10.3758/s13414-019-01967-2

Book publications

  • Mast, Fred (2020). Black Mamba oder die Macht der Imagination.  Herder Verlag, Freiburg i. Br., Deutschland, ISBN: 978-3-451-60087-6.