Skip to content
People  •  Music  •  Associate Professor

Psyche Loui

Departments

Music

Education

  • Ph.D.,  University of California Berkeley

Research Focus

  • Music Perception and Cognition
  • Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Creativity and Creative Practice

The neuroscience of music cognition, musical perception, pitch problems, singing, tone-deafness, music disorders and emotional impact of music and the voice, comprise much of Psyche Loui’s research and work. What happens in the brain when we create music? What gives some people a chill when they are moved by music? Can music be used to help with psychiatric and neurological disorders? These are questions that Loui tackles in the lab. Director of the MIND Lab (Music, Imaging and Neural Dynamics) at Northeastern University, Loui has published in the journals Current Biology, Journal of Neuroscience, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, NeuroImage, Frontiers in Psychology, Current Neurology and Neuroscience Reports, Music Perception, Annuals of the New York Academy of Sciences, and others.

For her research on music and the brain, Loui has been interviewed by the Associated Press, CNN, WNYC, the Boston Globe, BBC Radio 4, NBC news and CBS radio, and the Scientist magazine. Loui graduated the University of California, Berkeley with her PhD in Psychology (Specialization: Cognition, Brain and Behavior) and attended Duke University as an undergraduate graduating with degrees in Psychology and Music and a certificate in Neuroscience. She has since held faculty positions in Psychology, Neuroscience, and Integrative Sciences at Wesleyan University, and in Neurology at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School.

Courses Taught

  • Music Cognition
  • Acoustics and Psychoacoustics
  • Creative Cognition