How do we get from noisy sensory inputs to meaningful representations that we can reason and talk about?
This is the focus of my research as a PhD candidate in
EvLab
at the Department of Brain & Cognitive Sciences at MIT.
I am thankful to the Integrative Computational Neuroscience (ICoN), the McGovern, and the MIT Presidential Fellowships for their generous support.
CV | Google Scholar | Project Website: InterestingBrains.com
I study how cognitive architecture (the measurable selectivity structure in cortical systems) is implemented in the human brain, in these three main lines of research.
We are looking at cognitive architecture in the brains of individuals who sustained brain lesions early in life (many in the womb!) and whose brains have reorganized such that they show little to no behavioral effects and relocalized high-level cortical networks.
InterestingBrains.com | Media: NYT article
What is the nature of human reasoning? How do we acquire logically structured representations in the frontal-parietal Multiple Demand Network and use them to reason?
Media: Artistic collaboration
Can we figure out which cognitive operations are being executed in our high-level cortical networks? We do this by disambiguating between hypotheses about network selectivity. For instance, in the frontotemporal Language Network
Media: Psychology Today article
Intuitive physical reasoning is not mediated by linguistic nor exclusively domain-general abstract representations
Kean HH, Fung A, Pramod RT, Chomik-Morales J, Kanwisher N, and Fedorenko E. (2025).
Neuropsychologia
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Preserved functional organization of human auditory cortex in individuals missing one temporal lobe from infancy
Regev T, Lipkin B, Boebinger D, Paunov A, Kean HH, Norman-Haignere S, and Fedorenko E. (2023). iScience
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Intact reading ability despite lacking a canonical visual word form area in an individual born without the left superior temporal lobe
Li J, Kean HH, and Fedorenko E & Saygin Z. (2022). Cog Neuropsych
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LanA (Language Atlas): A probabilistic atlas for the language network based on fMRI data from >800 individuals
Lipkin B, Tuckute G, Affourtit J, Small H, Mineroff Z, Kean HH, Jouravlev O, Rakocevic L, Pitchett B, Siegelman M, Hoeflin C, Pongos A, Blank I, Kline M, Ivanova A, Shannon S, Sathe A, Hoffman M, Nieto-Castañón A, and Fedorenko E. (2022). Nature Scientific Data
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The human language system does not support music processing
Chen X, Affourtit J, Ryskin R, Regev T, Norman-Haignere S, Jouravlev O, Malik-Moraleda S, Kean H, Varley R, and Fedorenko E. (2022). Cerebral Cortex
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Precision fMRI reveals that the language-selective network supports both phrase-structure building and lexical access during language production
Hu J, Small H, Kean H, Takahashi A, Zekelman L, Kleinman D, Ryan E, Nieto-Castañón A, Ferreira V, and Fedorenko E. (2022). Cerebral Cortex
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Frontal language areas do not emerge in the absence of temporal language areas: A case study of an individual born without a left temporal lobe
Tuckute G, Paunov A, Kean HH, Blank I, Mineroff Z & Fedorenko E. (2022). Neuropsychologia
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Comprehension of computer code relies primarily on domain-general executive resources
Ivanova, A. A., Srikant, S., Sueoka, Y., Kean, HH., Dhamala, R., O’Reilly, U.-M., Bers, M. U., & Fedorenko, E. (2020). eLife
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Composition is the core driver of the language-selective network
Mollica F, Siegelman M, Diachek E, Piantadosi S, Mineroff Z, Futrell R, Kean HH, Qian P & Fedorenko E. (2020). Neurobiology of Language
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Implicit Model of Other People’s Visual Attention as an Invisible, Force-Carrying Beam Projecting from the Eyes
*Guterstam A, *Kean HH, Webb TW, Kean FS, Graziano MSA (2019). PNAS
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Effects of awareness on the control of attention
Webb TW, Kean HH, and Graziano MSA (2016). Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 28: 842-851.
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The human language system is not necessary for inductive reasoning
Kean HH, Fung A, Jaggers P, Rule J, Piantadosi S, Tenenbaum J, Varley R, and Fedorenko E. (in prep)
Functional specificity is preserved in highly anatomically atypical brains
Kean HH*, Wolna A*, Jinghan N, Swords S, Poliak M, Nieto-Castañón A, Shewmon A, Richardson M, and Fedorenko E (in prep)
Deductive and Inductive Processing Dissociate
in the Human Brain
Kean HH, Fung A, Rule J, Piantadosi S, Tenenbaum J, and Fedorenko E. (in prep)
hope kean at em eye tea dot ee dee you