Research Scientist Affiliate

Richard Haier’s research is focused on the neural basis of human intelligence. Dr. Haier works with neuroimaging technologies to study individual differences in mental abilities. His first imaging paper with positron emission tomography (PET) in 1988 identified inverse correlations between cerebral glucose metabolic rate and performance on a non-verbal test of intelligence. 

This finding was the basis for the brain efficiency hypothesis of intelligence. A series of papers supported this hypothesis including a study showing decreased brain activation after acquiring expertise in the computer game Tetris, and other studies showing increased brain activations in lower IQ individuals. Recently, Dr. Haier has published findings relating regional densities of gray and white matter to individual differences in scores on intelligence tests. A detailed model of the neural basis of intelligence was developed with Rex Jung and published in 2007, along with commentaries from other researchers in the field. Current projects are aimed at identifying brain parameters that predict scores on tests of intelligence with special attention to age and sex differences. Dr. Haier also is continuing a long collaboration with Dr. Michael Alkire researching the neural basis of consciousness using brain imaging and anesthetic drugs.
 
Dr. Haier received a PhD in Psychology from Johns Hopkins University in 1975; he has held appointments in the Intramural Research Program at NIMH, and in the Medical Schools at Brown University, and the University of California, Irvine.

For more information on Dr. Haier, please refer to his Curriculum Vitae

Publications

• Scientific American Mind

• Book Review on Consciousness

• Science

• Nature  

Video & Audio Presentations 
• American Enterprise Institute

• Public Radio