Cinzia Chiandetti

Cinzia Chiandetti is a fellow at the Animal Cognition and Neuroscience Lab in Mattarello.

I am mainly interested in the investigation of innate cognitive mechanisms shared by vertebrate species and preserved through evolution, I am studying spatial reorientation abilities in both domestic chicks and human infants and causal reasoning about physical objects in chicks, taking advantage of the possibility of a rigorous control over chicks’ early post-natal experiences.From a neurobiological perspective, I am studying biological predisposition in recognition of face-like stimuli, using immunohistochemistry techniques, and the development of cerebral lateralization, by manipulating photic embryonic stimulation in chicks.

Research areas and projects

Comparative spatial abilities

Reorienting abilities in precocial species (chicks, fish), and human infants: a rigorous experimental control on the role of post-natal experiences in animal models allows understanding, when their performance is compared to that of human infants, which basic innate spatial cognitive mechanisms are shared among different species and preserved during evolution.

Lateralization

Neurodevelopment of cerebral lateralization in the domestic chick: by manipulating embryonic photic stimulation, which determines the degree of asymmetries in the nervous system of the domestic chick, left-right discrimination capabilities and functional hemispheric differences are investigated.

Biological predispositions

Identification of neural systems underlying biological predispositions in the domestic chick using neuronal activity markers to localize the brain regions involved, for instance, in the recognition of face-like stimuli.

Intuitive physics

Causal reasoning about physical objects in domestic chick: the capability of representing objects and their interactions due to their physical features is studied in inexperienced animals, taking advantage of the imprinting phenomenon displayed by the chick together with precocial behavioural development.

Inborn musical preferences

Innate appreciation and preference for certain musical features: a non-singing bird as the domestic chick represents an interesting model to investigate which perceptual features of music are due to biological constraints and hence predisposed in the brain.

Last publications

1. VALLORTIGARA G, CHIANDETTI C, SOVRANO VA (2010). Brain Asymmetry (animal). Accepted in Wiley Interdisciplinar Reviews: Cognitive Science.

2. VALLORTIGARA G, REGOLIN L, CHIANDETTI C & RUGANI R (2010). Rudiments of mind: Number and space cognition in animals. Accepted in Comparative Cognition & Behavior Reviews.

3. VALLORTIGARA G, CHIANDETTI C, RUGANI R, SOVRANO VA & REGOLIN L (2010). Animal Cognition. Wiley Interdisciplinar Reviews: Cognitive Science (in press) DOI: 10.1037/a0017013

4. CHIANDETTI C & VALLORTIGARA G. Experience and geometry: Controlled-rearing studies with chicks. Anim Cogn (in press) DOI: 10.1007/s10071-009-0297-x

5. CHIANDETTI C & VALLORTIGARA G. Animals' representation of enclosed spaces: Evidence for use of a similar frame of reference following different disorientation procedures. J Comp Pychol (in press) DOI: 10.1037/a0017013

6. VALLORTIGARA G, SOVRANO VA & CHIANDETTI C (2009). Doing Socrates Experiment Right: Controlled-rearing Studies of Geometrical knowledge in Animals. Curr Op Neurobiol (19) 20-26.

7. CHIANDETTI C & VALLORTIGARA G (2009). Effects of embryonic light stimulation on the ability to discriminate left from right in the domestic chick. Behav Brain Res (198) 240-246.

For the full list of publications, please CLICK HERE (available graphs about publications, collaborations network and citing articles network).