Professor Dr. James Mcclelland

Biography

James L. McClelland is the Lucie Stern Professor of Social Sciences at Stanford University and the Director of the Center for Mind, Brain, Computation, and Technology in the Department of Psychology. His research addresses a broad range of topics in cognitive science and cognitive neuroscience, including perception, perceptual decision making, learning, memory, language, reading, semantic and mathematical cognition, and cognitive development. McClelland's work emphasizes the emergence of cognitive functions through parallel and distributed processing within neural populations, emphasizing the adaptability of learning in accordance with the connections among neurons. He advocates for the development of explicit computational models to test and refine principles derived from practical research questions through behavioral experiments and simulations. Currently, notable projects in his lab include developing deep learning approaches to numerosity, assessments of numerical magnitude in children, and investigating visuospatial representations in reasoning tasks. McClelland has served as a Senior Editor for Cognitive Science and held leadership roles in various scientific societies, including the Cognitive Science Society. He is a corresponding fellow of the British Academy and has received numerous awards for his contributions to the field, including the APS William James Fellow Award and the David E. Rumelhart prize. He also teaches within the Symbolic Systems Program and engages in research projects with DeepMind.

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Experience

Awards