Rate My Professor Petr Janata

Petr Janata is a Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychology and Center for Mind and Brain at the University of California, Davis. He received his Ph.D. in Biology (Neuroscience) from the University of Oregon in 1996, where he conducted electrophysiological studies of auditory object representations in the barn owl brain and musical image formation in the human brain. He earned his B.A. in Interdisciplinary Biology/Psychology from Reed College in 1990. Following his doctorate, Janata served as a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy at the University of Chicago from 1997 to 1999, investigating song perception and learning in songbirds using electrophysiological and computational methods. From 2000 to 2004, he held research faculty positions, including Research Assistant Professor, in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Dartmouth College. He joined UC Davis in 2004 as Assistant Professor, was promoted to Associate Professor in 2008, and to full Professor in 2013.

Janata's research specializes in the cognitive neuroscience of music, employing behavioral measures, functional neuroimaging (fMRI), electrophysiological recordings (EEG/ERP), and computational modeling to explore music-evoked autobiographical memories, auditory attention and imagery, emotion, sensorimotor synchronization (groove), and tonal expectancies. Notable publications include 'The Cortical Topography of Tonal Structures Underlying Western Music' (Science, 2002), 'The Neural Architecture of Music-Evoked Autobiographical Memories' (Cerebral Cortex, 2009), and 'Audio Features Underlying Perceived Groove and Sensorimotor Synchronization in Music' (Music Perception, 2016). His contributions have illuminated the neural mechanisms linking music to memory and emotion, with implications for neurology, aging, and therapeutic applications. Janata has received major awards including the Guggenheim Fellowship (2010), Fulbright Fellowship to Prague (2010-2011), Music Has Power Award (2010), and Institute for Social Sciences Fellowship at UC Davis (2015-2016). He has secured significant grants from NSF, NIH, GRAMMY Foundation, and Templeton Foundation, and served as Reviewing Editor for Brain Research (2006-2007).