Research Project

Neuroimaging and lesion literature has been inconclusive about the functional role of the insular cortex in the processing of basic and social emotional stimuli, offering conflicting findings that need to be brought in line. One possible attempt on that path is investigating lateralization.
My dissertation project aims to elucidate the (lateralized) functional specificity of the insular cortex regarding emotional processing, by examining larger and better matched samples of patients suffering from isolated left- or right-hemispheric insular lesions. Systematic, standardized and ecologically valid paradigms addressing diverse features of processing basic and social emotions are applied and behavioral, peripheral physiological and neuroimaging data are collected to capture a multi-facetted picture of effects that follow unilateral insular lesions.

PhD Committee

Prof. Dr. Thomas Straube
Prof. Dr. Pienie Zwitserlood
Dr. Bettina Gathmann

Publications

Schröder, O.*, Schriewer, E.*, Golombeck, K.S., Kürten, J., Lohmann, H., Schwindt, W., Wiendl, H., Bruchmann, M., Melzer, N. & Straube, T. (2015). Impaired autonomic responses to emotional stimuli in autoimmune limbic encephalitis. Frontiers in Neurology, 6(250). doi: 10.3389/fneur.2015.00250.
* equal contribution

Conference Contributions

Schriewer, E., Melzer, N., Schröder, O., Kürten, J., Bruchmann, M. & Straube, T. (2015). Impaired autonomic responses to emotional stimuli in limbic encephalitis. Poster presentation at the 41st Annual Meeting “Psychologie und Gehirn”, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.

Schröder, O., Schriewer, E., Golombeck, K.S., Kürten, J., Lohmann, H., Schwindt, W., Wiendl, H., Bruchmann, M., Melzer, N. & Straube, T. (2015). Impaired autonomic responses to emotional stimuli in autoimmune limbic encephalitis: a multiple case study. Poster presentation at the 4th International Symposium „Fear, Anxiety and Anxiety Disorders“ of the Sonderforschungsbereich, Münster, Germany.

Schröder, O., Kürten, J., Melzer, N., Miltner, W.H.R. & Straube, T. (2016). Emotional processing after unilateral insular damage. Poster presentation at the 23rd Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, New York, USA.

CV

since 2014 Research assistant and PhD student at the Institute of Medical Psychology and Systems Neuroscience (IMPS)
2011-2014 Master studies of Cognitive Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena
2008-2011 Bachelor studies of Psychology at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena
*1988 Gurjew, Kazakhstan