Aron Keith Barbey is the Andrew J. McKenna Family Professor of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame, where he directs the Human Neuroimaging Center and the Decision Neuroscience Laboratory. He began his academic career at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in 2011 and was promoted to Full Professor in the Departments of Psychology and Bioengineering in 2019. During his time at Illinois, he held several leadership positions, including Director of the Center for Brain Plasticity, Director of the Intelligence, Learning, and Plasticity Initiative, and Chair of the Intelligent Systems Research Theme at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. He later served as the Mildred Francis Thompson Professor and Director of the Center for Brain, Biology and Behavior at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

Dr. Barbey’s research investigates how intelligence emerges from the network organization and dynamics of the human connectome, applying methods from network neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and computer science. His work aims to achieve a deeper understanding of the neural foundations of intelligence and to enable scientific innovation in cognitive enhancement, neurorehabilitation, and biologically inspired artificial intelligence.

Over the course of his career, Dr. Barbey’s research group has won more than $26 million in research funding, with support from organizations including the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Department of Defense, the White House BRAIN Initiative, the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and private industry sponsors such as Abbott Nutrition, Google Brain, and PepsiCo.

Dr. Barbey has received several honors for his contributions to the field, including the Mensa Foundation Prize for his work on the neuroscience of intelligence. He is co-editor of The Cambridge Handbook of Intelligence and Cognitive Neuroscience and The SAGE Handbook of Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience and serves as editor of the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Enhancement and Brain Plasticity. In 2023, he was selected to join the Defense Science Study Group at the Institute for Defense Analyses.

He received his Ph.D. in Psychology from Emory University and completed postdoctoral training in the Cognitive Neuroscience Section of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke at the National Institutes of Health.

Cognitive Neuroscience of Human Intelligence

The human brain is a system like no other, capable of applying knowledge and experience to solve the infinite variety of problems we encounter in life. But the brain doesn’t only solve familiar problems – it adapts to new environments, learns to discover and understand what was once unknown, and creates truly original solutions. Our research aims to understand how this capacity for general intelligence emerges from the network topology and dynamics of the human connectome. We investigate the nature of intelligence through an interdisciplinary lens, combining cognitive experimentation, high-resolution neuroimaging (3T and 7T MRI), computational modeling, and neuropsychological patient studies. By integrating these methods, we seek to bridge cognitive neuroscience with applications that inform both theory and clinical practice.

Guided by this approach, our research pursues three core themes: (1) To understand the network topology and dynamics of human intelligence (Theme 1: Human Intelligence), (2) To identify principles of network organization and plasticity in traumatic brain injury (Theme 2: Traumatic Brain Injury), and (3) To translate advances in neuroscience into personalized interventions to promote cognitive performance and resilience across the lifespan (Theme 3: Scientific Interventions). 

By uncovering the neural foundations of general intelligence, our research provides new insights into this fundamental human capacity and drives innovation in cognitive enhancement, neurorehabilitation, and biologically inspired artificial intelligence. 

For further detail, please visit the Decision Neuroscience Laboratory.