Rate My Professor Peter Walla

Professor Peter Walla serves as Honorary Professor in the School of Science (Psychology), College of Engineering, Science and Environment, at the University of Newcastle. His career commenced with anatomical and physiological studies on photoreceptor cells in spider eyes under Professor F.G. Barth, followed by advanced training in neurophysiology, including single-cell recordings, at Yokohama City University in Japan. Walla graduated from the Department of Zoology at the University of Vienna and completed his PhD in 1998 on human memory functions, during which he authored nine peer-reviewed neuroscience publications in journals including Nature. He conducted postdoctoral research primarily in Vienna, with further training at the University of Melbourne, Howard Florey Institute, National Neuroscience Facility in Melbourne, Marta Kutas Lab, and Larry Squire Lab in San Diego. In 2007, he received habilitations—equivalent to a Doctor of Science—in Cognitive Neurobiology at the Medical University of Vienna and Biological Psychology at the University of Vienna. Prior to joining the University of Newcastle in 2008 upon invitation for a neuroscience-oriented professorship, he headed the Biological Psychology Unit at the Faculty of Psychology and served as Deputy Head of the Institute for Clinical, Biological and Differential Psychology at the University of Vienna. He has authored several successful grant proposals and engaged in international collaborations.

Walla's research specializes in subconscious and unconscious information processing in the human brain, which forms the basis of higher cognitive functions and guides human behavior. He employs neuroimaging techniques such as EEG, MEG, fMRI, startle reflex modulation, and psychophysiology to examine memory, olfaction, cognition, and emotion, often revealing discrepancies between explicit behavioral reports and objective physiological measures. Key publications include "Dissociation of the neural correlates of implicit and explicit memory" (1998), "Ambient odor of orange in a dental office reduces anxiety and improves mood in female patients" (2000), "Olfaction, taste, and cognition" (2002), "Objective measures of emotion related to brand attitude: A new way to quantify emotion-related aspects relevant to marketing" (2011), "Carpe diem instead of losing your social mind: Beyond digital addiction and why we all suffer from digital overuse" (2016), "Brain Activities Show There Is Nothing Like a Real Friend in Contrast to Influencers and Other Celebrities" (2023), "The Power of Time: Editorial on the Advantages of Electroencephalography (EEG) and Event-Related Potentials (ERPs) in Affective and Cognitive Neuroscience" (2025), and "The Olfactory Origins of Affective Processing: A Neurobiological Synthesis Through the Walla Emotion Model" (2026).