Rani Gera
Sagol School of neuroscience and Department of Neurobiology, The George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences and School of Psychological Sciences, Tel-Aviv University
A novel smartphone app for habit induction in humans: on the path to optimizing and personalizing habit induction based on physiological, psychological and behavioral indices
Project description
Habits are a fundamental feature of behavior. One of habits prominent advantages is their ability if transforming highly demanding and exhaustive tasks (e.g., learning or exercising) to be performed seamlessly and automatically. Yet, it is often difficult to form desired habits, especially when associated actions do not carry immediate tangible rewards (as in learning).
In contrast to animal research in the field, habits in humans are relatively poorly characterized, mainly as there are no well-established procedures to induce habits in humans.
Here, we take a new approach to induce, manipulate and study habits we will develop a novel smartphone app, free of the traditional laboratory constraints, yet well-controlled and informed by basic scientific principles. This app is designed to overcome the shortcoming of recent attempts of habit induction in laboratory settings..
About me
Rani is a PhD student in the Sagol School of Neuroscience. He obtained his B.A. inbehavioral sciences from The College of Management Academic Studies and his MS.c.in neurobiology from Tel Aviv University. During his MS.c. Rani led a translational studywhere we developed a human procedure to alter appetitive memories by employingcounterconditioning during memory reconsolidation. In his PhD Rani focuses on theneurobehavioral formation and manifestation of habits in humans and in particular onthe transition from goal directed to habitual action control. He is using behavioral,psychophysiological and multi modal neuroimaging methods to characterize habitlearning at both the group and individual levels.