PSY Student Research Spotlight with Tristan Janisse

January 27, 2025 - Shelly DeJong

Meet Tristan Janisse, a junior psychology major with a minor in cognitive science. Tristan is an undergraduate researcher in both the Attention and Perception Lab and the Clinical Psychophysiology Lab. This year, he received a PURI Award from the College of Social Science to help fund his research with Dr. Mark Becker. We met with Tristan recently to talk about his research, why he finds cognitive science fascinating, and his advice on how other students could get started in research. 

 

How did you end up studying psychology and cognitive science? 

I have loved psychology since I was a kid. I read a book about illusions in elementary school, and I was hooked ever since. Since starting college, the classes and research I've done in cognitive psychology have been my favorite.  

I find cognitive processes fascinating because they show how complex and rapidly the brain is working every day. I think learning about visual search is so interesting.  Vision is our most significant sense, and so much of our brain is dedicated to processing visual information. It’s so applicable to our everyday experiences and it’s really interesting to learn about how it's actually happening in our brains.   

 

Tell us about the research that you’re doing with Dr. Becker. 

In Dr. Becker’s lab, we focus on fundamental cognitive processes, particularly visual search, which plays a significant role in everyone's daily life. For instance, when you look for the clothes you want to wear, you're engaging in visual search. One key concept we explore is called feature-based attention. This involves identifying specific characteristics of a stimulus, such as size, shape, or color to direct visual attention. By elevating the importance of certain characteristics, you're more likely to notice them when they appear in your field of vision.  

We are investigating how the combination of color and location can work together. Specifically, we want to determine if these two factors can enhance the effectiveness of finding a target based on its location or color. We're examining whether these effects can work simultaneously or in an additive manner. For example, if you store all your sweaters in one area and keep your T-shirts and pants in another, and you want to find a blue sweater, you will instinctively look in the sweater area. At the same time, blue would stand out, making it easier to spot. We're trying to see if those effects can work simultaneously or additively. 

  

How will you conduct this study? 

This study is essentially a computer-based experiment. We use a group of participants and present them with a circular array of Landolt Cs. The Cs have very thin slits, all oriented either upward or downward, except for one which is oriented to the left or right, which the participant must identify. We explore various conditions based on color and location: one color has the target appear more often and one location has the color appear more often. The idea is that as participants become accustomed to these effective features, we will observe the quickest reaction times corresponding to the location or quadrant and the color that appears most frequently.

 

What is something that has surprised you about cognitive science?

The most surprising thing about cognitive science research now that I’m involved with it is how study design works. There's a lot of computer studies that have you do super simple tasks to understand and observe different cognitive behaviors. Previously I hadn't really given much thought to how you would study those types of things, but it is interesting to see how much you can learn from a simple computer study!

 

Why are you interested in research?  

I'm interested in research because it has always been a dream of mine to pursue a PhD, which naturally involves engaging in research. I decided to explore this path by joining a few labs, and I found that I have really enjoyed the experience. I appreciate all aspects of the research process, from formulating questions to analyzing statistics, working with random participants, and discussing the results. I like the whole academic process. I find it very fulfilling; it feels rewarding to contribute to research, and there’s a sense of being at the forefront of new developments, which I find fascinating. 

There are a lot of different disciplines in psychology, so I’ve paid attention to what areas stick out towards me through classes, research projects, and even YouTube videos.  The two fields that stand out to me the most are cognitive and clinical psychology. So, I started with Dr. Becker’s lab and joined Dr. Jason Moser’s lab, which focuses on clinical psychophysiology. 

Do you have any advice for people who were looking to get into research? 

I sent out a bunch of emails to labs that I thought were interesting, trying to learn more and meet the faculty. At the same time, I was taking Dr. Becker’s class and had a conversation afterwards with him that led to me joining his lab. So, actively participate in your classes, especially the ones you enjoy, to get to know the faculty members who oversee labs and to let them know you a little bit.  

It's also beneficial to conduct your own research on labs. MSU has an excellent website where you can find information about ongoing research and see which labs are looking for students. Don't hesitate to reach out to professors and ask for some of their time to better understand their work. Many professors are looking for undergraduate research assistants, so if you show genuine interest and commitment and put yourself out there, you can definitely get valuable research experience. Be open and communicative.