Dr. R.M. (Renée) Visser
Faculteit der Maatschappij- en Gedragswetenschappen
Programmagroep: Clinical Psychology
Bezoekadres
- Nieuwe Achtergracht 129
Postadres
- Postbus 15933
1001 NK Amsterdam
Contactgegevens
Social media
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Profile
I am an Assistant Professor in the Amsterdam Emotional Memory Lab at the Department of Clinical Psychology. As a cognitive neuroscientist with a focus on clinical psychology, I investigate brain mechanisms underlying the plasticity of emotional memory. Specifically, by combining behavioural experimentation with psychophysiology and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) I seek to gain fundamental insights into the evolution of autobiographical memory over time, as well as into procedures that target maladaptive processes underlying (intrusive) memories of trauma. In general, I am interested in how cognitive neuroscience can improve mental health care by informing psychological treatment development.
Currently, I am focusing on three research lines: one on the role of odour in the formation and (spontaneous) recollection of distressing memories of analogue trauma, one on translating insights in emotional memory from animal models to human models and clinical populations, and a third on mapping (change in) the affective tone of autobiographical memories using neuroimaging and representational similarity analysis. I have been awarded a NWO Veni grant for my project "In search of the affective engram of autobiographical memory", and the L'Oreal-UNESCO For Women in Science Fellowship 2023, allowing me to spend a semester at the NIAS.
Biography
After completing a clinical master (2009, cum laude), and a research master (2010, cum laude), I did my PhD (2016, cum laude) with Prof Merel Kindt and Dr H. Steven Scholte at the University of Amsterdam. For my post-doctoral training (November 2015-August 2018) I worked with Prof Emily Holmes and Prof Rik Henson at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge. During this time I was gratefully supported by a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship from the European Union. In 2020 I obtained my University Teaching Qualification (BKO).
Expertise and research fields
- Emotional learning and memory
- Experimental psychopathology
- functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging
- Representational similarity analysis
- Intrusive memories of (analogue) trauma
- Odour memory
- Affective disorders
- Translational science
- Open science
Collaborations
- Prof Merel Kindt, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Dr Vanessa van Ast, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Prof Arnoud Arntz, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Prof Emily Holmes, Uppsala University, Sweden
- Prof Richard Henson, MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
- Dr Martina DiSimplicio, Imperial College, London, United Kingdom
- Prof Ed Tan, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands/ University of Copenhagen, Denmark
- Dr Deborah Talmi, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
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PhD supervision
- Copromotor of Faya Reinhold
- Copromotor of Jacqueline Peters
- Copromotor of Inga Marie Freund
- Other affiliations
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Publicaties
2023
Freund, I. M., Peters, J., Kindt, M., & Visser, R. M. (2023). Emotional memory in the lab: Using the Trier Social Stress Test to induce a sensory-rich and personally meaningful episodic experience. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 148, [105971]. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psyneuen.2022.105971 [details]- Visser, R. M., & Arntz, A. (2023). A faulty compass: Why do some people choose situations that are not good for them? Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 78, [101793]. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbtep.2022.101793 [details]
2022
- Bas-Hoogendam, J. M., Veltman, D. J., & ENIGMA-Anxiety Working Group (2022). ENIGMA-anxiety working group: Rationale for and organization of large-scale neuroimaging studies of anxiety disorders. Human Brain Mapping, 43(1), 83-112. https://doi.org/10.1002/hbm.25100
- Filmer, A. I., Peters, J., Bridge, L. A., Visser, R. M., & Kindt, M. (2022). Over the Edge: Extending the duration of a reconsolidation intervention for spider fear. Translational Psychiatry, 12, [261]. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41398-022-02020-x [details]
- Freund, I. M., Arntz, A., Visser, R. M., & Kindt, M. (2022). Jumping back onto the giants’ shoulders: Why emotional memory should be considered in a network perspective of psychopathology. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 156, [104154]. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brat.2022.104154 [details]
- Peters, J., Visser, R. M., & Kindt, M. (2022). More than just fear: Development and psychometric evaluation of the Spider Distress Scale to assess spider fear and spider-related disgust. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 90, [102602]. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.janxdis.2022.102602 [details]
- Visser, R. M., Henson, R. N., & Holmes, E. A. (2022). A Naturalistic Paradigm to Investigate Postencoding Neural Activation Patterns in Relation to Subsequent Voluntary and Intrusive Recall of Distressing Events. Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging, 7(10), 960-969. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpsc.2021.08.006 [details]
2021
- Undeger, I., Visser, R. M., Becker, N., de Boer, L., Golkar, A., & Olsson, A. (2021). Model-based representational similarity analysis of blood-oxygen-level-dependent fMRI captures threat learning in social interactions. Royal Society Open Science, 8(11), [202116]. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.202116 [details]
- Visser, R. M., Bathelt, J., Scholte, H. S., & Kindt, M. (2021). Robust BOLD Responses to Faces But Not to Conditioned Threat: Challenging the Amygdala’s Reputation in Human Fear and Extinction Learning. Journal of Neuroscience, 41(50), 10278-10292. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0857-21.2021 [details]
2020
- Undeger, I., Visser, R. M., & Olsson, A. (2020). Neural Pattern Similarity Unveils the Integration of Social Information and Aversive Learning. Cerebral Cortex, 30(10), 5410-5419. https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhaa122 [details]
2019
- Iyadurai, L., Visser, R. M., Lau-Zhu, A., Porcheret, K., Horsch, A., Holmes, E. A., & James, E. L. (2019). Intrusive memories of trauma: A target for research bridging cognitive science and its clinical application. Clinical Psychology Review, 69, 67-82. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2018.08.005 [details]
2018
- Goodwin, G. M., Holmes, E. A., Andersson, E., Browning, M., Jones, A., Lass-Hennemann, J., Månsson, K. N. T., Moessnang, C., Salemink, E., Sanchez, A., van Zuthphen, L., & Visser, R. M. (2018). From neuroscience to evidence based psychological treatments – The promise and the challenge, ECNP March 2016, Nice, France. European Neuropsychopharmacology, 28(2), 317-333. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroneuro.2017.10.036 [details]
- Sevenster, D., Visser, R. M., & D'Hooge, R. (2018). A translational perspective on neural circuits of fear extinction: Current promises and challenges. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 155, 113-126. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nlm.2018.07.002 [details]
- Visser, R. M., Lau-Zhu, A., Henson, R. N., & Holmes, E. A. (2018). Multiple memory systems, multiple time points: How science can inform treatment to control the expression of unwanted emotional memories. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B - Biological Sciences, 373(1742), [20170209]. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2017.0209 [details]
- de Haan, M. I. C., van Well, S., Visser, R. M., Scholte, H. S., van Wingen, G. A., & Kindt, M. (2018). The influence of acoustic startle probes on fear learning in humans. Scientific Reports, 8, [14552]. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-32646-1 [details]
2017
- Holmes, E. A., Ghaderi, A., Eriksson, E., Olofsdotter Lauri, K., Kukacka, O. M., Mamish, M., James, E. L., & Visser, R. M. (2017). “I can’t concentrate”: A feasibility study with young refugees in Sweden on developing science-driven interventions for intrusive memories related to trauma. Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy, 45(2), 97-109. https://doi.org/10.1017/S135246581600062X [details]
2016
- James, E. L., Lau-Zhu, A., Clark, I. A., Visser, R. M., Hagenaars, M. A., & Holmes, E. A. (2016). The trauma film paradigm as an experimental psychopathology model of psychological trauma: intrusive memories and beyond. Clinical Psychology Review, 47.
- Visser, R. M., Haver, P., Zwitser, R. J., Scholte, H. S., & Kindt, M. (2016). First steps in using multi-voxel pattern analysis to disentangle neural processes underlying generalization of spider fear. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 10, [222]. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2016.00222 [details]
- Visser, R. M., de Haan, M. I. C., Beemsterboer, T., Haver, P., Kindt, M., & Scholte, H. S. (2016). Quantifying learning‐dependent changes in the brain: Single trial multivoxel pattern analysis requires slow event related fMRI. Psychophysiology, 53(8), 1117-1127. https://doi.org/10.1111/psyp.12665 [details]
2015
- Visser, R. M., Kunze, A. E., Westhoff, B., Scholte, H. S., & Kindt, M. (2015). Representational similarity analysis offers a preview of the noradrenergic modulation of long-term fear memory at the time of encoding. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 55, 8-20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psyneuen.2015.01.021 [details]
2013
- Visser, R. M., Scholte, H. S., Beemsterboer, T., & Kindt, M. (2013). Neural pattern similarity predicts long-term fear memory. Nature Neuroscience, 16(4), 388-390. https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.3345 [details]
2012
- van Well, S., Visser, R. M., Scholte, H. S., & Kindt, M. (2012). Neural substrates of individual differences in human fear learning: evidence from concurrent fMRI, fear-potentiated startle, and US-expectancy data. Cognitive Affective & Behavioral Neuroscience, 12(3), 499-512. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13415-012-0089-7 [details]
2011
- Visser, R. M., Scholte, H. S., & Kindt, M. (2011). Associative learning increases trial-by-trial similarity of BOLD-MRI patterns. The Journal of Neuroscience, 31(33), 12021-12028. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2178-11.2011 [details]
2010
- Nomura, E. M., Gratton, C., Visser, R. M., Kayser, A., Perez, F., & D'Esposito, M. (2010). Double dissociation of two cognitive control networks in patients with focal brain lesions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 107(26), 12017-12022. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1002431107 [details]
2020
- Visser, R. M. (2020). Why do certain moments haunt us? Conceptualizing intrusive memories as conditioned responses. Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging, 5(4), 375-376. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpsc.2020.02.007 [details]
2020
- Holmes, E. A., Espinosa, L., Visser, R. M., Bonsall, M. B., & Singh, L. (2020). Psychological Interventions as They Relate to Intrusive Thinking: Intrusive, Emotional Mental Imagery after Traumatic and Negative Events. In P. W. Kalivas, & M. P. Paulus (Eds.), Intrusive Thinking: From Molecules to Free Will (pp. 287-314). (Strüngmann Forum Reports). MIT Press. [details]
- Visser, R. M., Anderson, M. C., Aron, A., Banich, M. T., Brady, K. T., Huys, Q. J. M., Monfils, M-H., Schiller, D., Schlagenhauf, F., Schooler, J., & Robbins, T. W. (2020). Neuropsychological Mechanisms of Intrusive Thinking. In P. W. Kalivas, & M. P. Paulus (Eds.), Intrusive Thinking : From Molecules to Free Will (pp. 124-184). (Strüngmann Forum Reports). The MIT Press. https://labs.psych.ucsb.edu/schooler/jonathan/publications/2011 [details]
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Nevenwerkzaamheden
Geen nevenwerkzaamheden
Freund, I. M., Peters, J., Kindt, M., & Visser, R. M. (2023). Emotional memory in the lab: Using the Trier Social Stress Test to induce a sensory-rich and personally meaningful episodic experience. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 148, [105971].