Webpage: www.relcog.com

 

2013 - Present: Assistant Professor, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands

2010 - 2012: Marie Curie Research Fellow, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland

2010: Visiting Researcher, University of California Santa Barbara, USA

2006 - 2010: PhD 'Action Semantics: Functional and Neural Dynamics', Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands

2006: MSc Biological Psychology, Utrecht University, the Netherlands

2005: MA Philosophy of Science, Utrecht University, the Netherlands

2005: MSc Psychology of Culture & Religion, Radboud University, the Netherlands 

 

Research Interests: Embodied Cognition, Action Semantics, Cognitive Science of Religion

 

Grants Awarded

2013 - present VENI Research grant (NWO, the Netherlands)

2010 - 2012 Marie Curie IEF Grant

2010 Short-term Fellowship (Human Frontiers in Science Program)

2014

 

van Elk, M., Salomon, R., Kannape, O., & Blanke, O. (2014). Suppression of the N1 auditory evoked potential for sounds generated by the upper and lower limbs. Biological Psychology.

 

van Elk, M., Rutjens, B., van Harreveld, F., & van der Pligt, J. (2014). Priming of supernatural agent concepts and agency detection. Religion, Brain and Behavior.

 

van Elk, M. (2014). The left Inferior Parietal Lobe represents stored hand-postures for object use and action prediction. Frontiers in Psychology 5(333), DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00333. 

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2014). The scope and limits of action semantics. Reply to comments on ‘Action Semantics: A unifying conceptual framework for the selective use of multimodal and modality-specific object knowledge’. Physics of Life Reviews 11(2), 273-279. 

 

van Elk, M., Lenggenhager, B., Heydrich, L. & Blanke, O. (2014). Suppression of the auditory N1-component for heartbeat-related sounds reflects interoceptive predictive coding. Biological Psychology 99, 172-182.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2014). Action semantics: A unifying conceptual framework for the selective use of multimodal and modality-specific object knowledge. Physics of Life Reviews 11(2), 220-250. 

 

van Elk, M. & Blanke, O. (2014). Imagined own body transformations during passive self motion. Psychological Research 78(1), 18-27. 

 

van Elk, M. (2014). The effect of manipulability and religion on the multisensory integration of objects in peripersonal space. Cognitive Neuroscience 5(1), 36-44.

 

2013

 

van Elk, M. (2013). Paranormal believers are more prone to illusory agency detection than skeptics. Consciousness & Cognition 22(3), 1041-1046.

 

Sengül, A., Rognini, G., van Elk, M., Aspell, J., Bleuler, H., Blanke, O. (2013). Force feedback facilitates multisensory integration during robotic tool use. Experimental Brain Research, 227(4), 497-507.

 

van Elk, M., Forget, J. & Blanke, O. (2013). The effect of limb crossing and limb congruency on multisensory integration in peripersonal space for the upper and lower extremities. Consciousness & Cognition 22(2), 545-555.

 

 

 

 

 

2012

 

Sengül, A., van Elk, M., Rognini, G., Aspell, J., Bleuler, H. & Blanke, O. (2012).  Extending the body to virtual tools using a robotic surgical interface: evidence from the crossmodal congruency task. PLoS ONE, 7(12):e49473.

 

van Elk, M. & Blanke, O. (2012). Balancing bistable perception during self-motion. Experimental Brain Research 222(3), 219-228.

 

Salomon, R., van Elk, M., Aspell, J. & Blanke O., (2012). I feel who I see: Visual body identity affects visual-tactile integration in peripersonal space. Consciousness & Cognition 21(3), 1355-1364.

 

de Bruin, L, van Elk, M., & Newen, A. (2012). Reconceptualizing second-person interaction. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. 6(151), 1-10. 

 

van Elk, M., Bousardt, R., Bekkering, H., & van Schie, H.T. (2012). Using goal- and grip-related information for understanding the correctness of other's actions: an ERP study. PLoS ONE, 7(5), 1-8. 

 

Paulus, M., van Elk, M. & Bekkering, H. (2012). Acquiring functional object knowledge through motor imagery? Experimental Brain Research, 218(2), 181–188. 

 

van Elk, M., Viswanathan, S., van Schie, H.T., Bekkering, H. & Grafton, S. (2012). Pouring or chilling a bottle of wine: An fMRI study on the prospective planning of object-directed actions. Experimental Brain Research, 218(2), 189-200.

 

Paulus, M., Hunnius, S., van Elk, M., & Bekkering, H. (2012). How learning to shake a rattle affects 8-month-old infants' perception of the rattle's sound: Electrophysiological evidence for action-effect binding in infancy. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 2, 90-96.   

 

2011

 

van Elk, M. & Blanke, O. (2011). The relation between body semantics and spatial body representations. Acta Psychologica, 138(3), 347-58.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2011). Imitation of hand and tool actions is effector-independent. Experimental Brain Research, 214(4), 539-547.

 

van Elk, M. & Blanke, O. (2011). Manipulable objects facilitate cross-modal integration in peripersonal space. PLoS ONE, 6 (9), 3-7.

 

van Elk, M., Paulus, M., Pfeiffer, C., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2011). Learning to use novel objects: a training study on the acquisition of novel action representations. Consciousness and Cognition, 20(4), 1304-14.

 

van Elk, M. & Blanke, O. (2011). Bodily self-consciousness and the primacy of self related signals such as the 1st person perspective and self-location. Cognitive Neuroscience, 2(2), 123-124.

 

Meyer, M., Hunnius, S., van Elk, M., van Eede, F. & Bekkering, H. (2011). Joint action modulates motor system involvement during action observation in 3-year-olds. Experimental Brain Research, 211, 581-591.

 

 

2010

 

van Elk, M., Slors, M. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Embodied language understanding requires an enactivist paradigm of cognition. Frontiers in Psychology 1:234. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2010.00234

 

van Elk, M., Crajé, C., Beeren, M.E.G.V., Steenbergen, B., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Neural evidence for compromised motor imagery in right hemiparetic cerebral palsy. Frontiers in Neurology 1:150. doi: 10.3389/fneur.2010.00150

 

van Elk, M., Crajé, C., Beeren, M.E.G.V., Steenbergen, B., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Neural evidence for impaired action selection in right hemiparetic cerebral palsy. Brain Research, 1349, 56-67. 

 

Crajé, C., van Elk, M., Beeren, M.E.G.V., van Schie, H.T., Steenbergen, B. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Compromised motor planning and motor imagery in right hemiparetic cerebral palsy. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 31(6), 1313-22.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T., Neggers, B. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Neural and temporal dynamics underlying visual selection for action.  Journal of Neurophysiology, 104(2), 972-83. 

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2010). From left to right: Processing acronyms referring to names of political parties activates spatial associations. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 63(11), 22202-19.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2010). The N400-concreteness effect reflects the retrieval of semantic information for action. Biological Psychology, 85(1), 134-42.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T., Zwaan, R.A. & Bekkering, H. (2010). The functional role of motor resonance in language processing: motor-cortical oscillations support lexical-semantic retrieval. Neuroimage, 50(2), 665-677.

 

Stapel, J.C., Hunnius, S., van Elk, M. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Motor activation during observation of unusual versus ordinary actions in infancy. Social Neuroscience, 5, 451-460.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T., van den Heuvel, R. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Semantics in the motor system: motor-cortical beta oscillations reflect semantic knowledge of end-postures for object use. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 4:8. doi: 10.3389/neuro.09.008.2010.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering (2010). Dorsal stream areas process action semantics. Cognitive Neuroscience, 1(1), 70.

 

Rueschemeyer, S.A., Lindemann, O., van Elk, M. & Bekkering, H. (2010). Embodied cognition: The interplay between automatic resonance and selection-for-action mechanisms. European Journal of Social Psychology, 39(7), 1180-1187.

 

 

2009

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2009). Semantic knowledge about objects is supported by functional motor activation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 35(4), 1118-1128.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2009). Short-term action intentions overrule long-term semantic knowledge. Cognition, 111(1),72-83.

 

 

2008

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T., Hunnius, H., Vesper, C. & Bekkering, H. (2008). You’ll never crawl alone: Neurophysiological evidence for motor resonance in infancy. Neuroimage, 43(4), 808-814.

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2008). Semantics in Action: An electrophysiological study on the use of semantic knowledge for action. Journal of Physiology – Paris, (102), 95-100. 

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T. & Bekkering, H. (2008). Conceptual knowledge for understanding other’s actions is organized primarily around action goals. Experimental Brain Research, 189(1), 99-107.

 

Professional Publications:

 

van Elk, M., van Schie, H.T., Lindemann, O. & Bekkering, H. (2007) Using conceptual knowledge in action and language. In: P. Haggard, Y. Rossetti & M. Kawato (eds.) Attention and Performance XXII: Sensorimotor foundations of higher cognition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp 575-599.

 

van Elk, M. (2007) Cognitive science meets the design plan. South African Journal of Philosophy Vol. 26 (3), pp. 319-328.

 

 

In Dutch:

 

van Elk, M. (2014). Het religieuze brein. Psyche & Geloof. 

 

van Elk, M. (2012). De gelovige geest: op zoek naar de biologische en psychologische wortels van religie. (The Believing Brain: in search of the biological and psychological origins of religion). Amsterdam: Uitgeverij Bert Bakker / Prometheus.

 

van Elk, M. & Hunnius, S. (2010). Het babybrein: over de ontwikkeling van de hersenen bij baby’s. (The Baby Brain: About Brain Development in Infants). Amsterdam: Uitgeverij Bert Bakker / Prometheus.

 

van Schie, H.T. & van Elk, M. (2009). Het brein als religieuze proeftuin.  In: Religie doen. Religieuze praktijken in tijden van individualisering. Edited by: C. P. M. van Halen, M. H. Prins & M. H. F. van Uden. Tilburg: KSGV, 121-133.

 

Ik schrijf graag over wetenschap: 

•  De Gelovige Geest (2012): Populair-wetenschappelijk boek over psychologisch en neurowetenschappelijk onderzoek naar religie en spiritualiteit (http://www.bol.com/nl/p/de-gelovige-geest/9200000002271772/)
• Het Babybrein (2010): Samen met Sabine Hunnius heb ik een populair wetenschappelijk boek geschreven over de hersenontwikkeling bij baby's.

 

Ik maak muziek. Tot mijn vertrek naar Zwitserland was ik toetsenist bij Blaudzun (http://blaudzun.com/en/home), vervolgens speelde ik samen met een Zwitserse jodel zangeres (http://ethnoyoutze.wordpress.com/) en momenteel bezin ik mij op mijn Nederlandse roots.

 

Ik ben getrouwd en vader van 2 zoons van 5 en 7 jaar oud.  Als ik de kans krijg stap ik op de racefiets om de stad te verruilen voor de rust en ruimte van ons vlakke land.

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