Amy Overman
Assistant Dean of Elon College, the College of Arts and Sciences and Professor of Psychology | Elon University
Elon, NC, UNITED STATES
Dr. Overman is a recognized leader in neuroscience and higher education.
Biography
Dr. Amy Overman is a recognized leader in neuroscience and higher education. She is a faculty member in the Psychology Department and Neuroscience Program and is Assistant Dean of Elon College, the College of Arts & Sciences at Elon University. As a cognitive neuroscientist, Overman is an expert in memory, aging, the science of learning, and the brain. Her primary research focuses on memory and other cognitive processes in older and younger adults using both behavioral and neural methodologies. Dr. Overman also conducts collaborative research on other topics in cognitive neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and the science of learning with colleagues at Elon and elsewhere.
Dr. Overman provides internal and external consultation and is a speaker and workshop facilitator on a variety of topics including brain health, learning outcomes, assessment, scholarship of teaching and learning, evidence-based practices in teaching, the science of learning (e.g., metacognition, motivation, how learning works, debunking myths about learning), and effective messaging of strengths for individuals and departments. She has been a keynote, invited speaker, invited panelist, or workshop facilitator for more than 40 events. She has conducted more than 90 individual and group consultations and have served as an external program reviewer and a SACSCOC QEP Lead Evaluator and SACSCOC Reaffirmation Committee Member.
Dr. Overman teaches Behavioral Neuroscience, Memory & Memory Disorders (online and winter term versions), Special Topics in Neuroscience, Elon College Fellows Junior Seminar, and the Neuroscience Capstone Seminar.
Dr. Overman is an active mentor of undergraduate research and is Principal Investigator of a federally-funded lab. She is also a co-founder of Elon's Neuroscience minor and currently serves as a member of the Neuroscience Advisory Committee.
Dr. Overman earned her doctorate in Cognitive Psychology/Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Pittsburgh and the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition, which is jointly administered by Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh.
The majority of Dr. Overman's mentored research students go on to neuroscience-related work after graduation.
Areas of Expertise (8)
High-Impact Practices
Mentoring
Science of Learning
Memory
Neuroscience
Aging
Metacognition
Faculty Development
Media
Publications:
Documents:
Videos:
Audio/Podcasts:
Accomplishments (2)
Elon University President's Report for excellence as a teacher-scholar
2017
College of Arts & Sciences Excellence in Mentoring Award
2017
Education (3)
University of Pittsburgh: Ph.D., Cognitive Neuroscience 2006
University of Pittsburgh: M.S., Cognitive Psychology
Allegheny College: B.S., Neuroscience 1999
Magna Cum Laude
Affiliations (4)
- Psychological Reports : Associate Editor
- Preparing Future Faculty Program, Duke University : Mentor
- Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning : Associate Director
- Neuroscience psychology faculty hire search committee
Links (3)
Media Appearances (6)
An aging question: How an NIH grant is opening new doors for memory and aging research at Elon
Magazine of Elon online
2018-11-08
This article first published in the Magazine of Elon, the university's alumni publication, highlights the research being conducted by Amy Overman into age-related changes in memory.
Overman and students present at the Cognitive Aging Conference
Elon University online
2018-05-29
Members of the Cognitive Neuroscience of Memory and Aging Laboratory traveled to Atlanta for premier scientific meeting in the field.
Federal funding boosts Elon's study of memory impairment
Triad Business Journal online
2016-06-07
Associate Professor Amy Overman has been selected as lead investigator for a study that was recently awarded $344,000 in funding from the National Institutes of Health.
Amy Overman selected to receive a major grant from the NIH
Elon University online
2016-05-31
Amy Overman, associate professor of psychology, is awarded Elon University’s first grant from the National Institutes of Health to study age-related changes in memory.
Lumen Scholar helps older populations sharpen memory
Elon University online
2011-10-04
An Elon psychology major is driven to help the elderly strengthen their minds in part because of a close bond shared with her grandparents.
Elon researchers probe the memory power of gum
Elon University online
2009-07-31
If the maker of Big Red and Juicy Fruit thinks its chewing gums have a monopoly on boosting your memory, it should think again. New work by Elon University faculty member Amy Overman and her undergraduate researchers show that gum itself isn’t special – any candy or oral activity probably works just as well at sharpening the mind.
Event Appearances (7)
Amy Overman and student present research at North Carolina Cognition Conference
North Carolina Cognition Conference Raleigh, N.C.
2019-04-30
Amy Overman leads sessions on metacognition at meeting of NSF-sponsored student success project
NSF STEM Scholars in Biology Institute Durham, N.C.
2019-04-04
Neural encoding differences in older adults’ associative memory
Cognitive Aging Conference Atlanta, GA
2018-05-03
Effect of congruency between encoding and retrieval on associative retrieval
Cognitive Neuroscience Society Annual Meeting Boston, MA
2018-03-24
Characterizing the age-related associative deficit: Is it uniform?
Center for Cognitive Neuroscience Colloquium Series, Duke University Durham, NC
2018-01-26
fMRI activation likelihood estimation of item-item and item-context associative memory
Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting Washington, DC
2017-11-11
The role of corrective feedback in memory for contextual details
Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting Washington, DC
2017-11-11
Articles (3)
Older adults’ associative memory is modified by manner of presentation at encoding and retrieval.
Psychology and Aging
Overman, A.A., Huhn III, J.M., Dennis, N.A., Salerno, J.M., & Giglio, A.P.
2018 Relative to young adults, older adults typically exhibit a reduced ability to accurately remember associations between stimuli. Prior research has assumed that this age-related memory impairment affects different types of associations similarly. However, research in young adults has suggested that item–item and item–context associations are supported by different underlying neural mechanisms that could be unequally affected by aging. This experiment compared memory across association types in younger and older adults by presenting the same types of stimuli as either item–item or item–context pairs. Manner of presentation during retrieval was also manipulated so that pairs were presented in a manner that was either congruent or incongruent with their presentation during encoding. Older adults showed a particular benefit of encoding–retrieval congruency for item–context associations, supporting the idea that the associative deficit may be reduced by unitization at encoding and reinstatement of this prior stimulus configuration at retrieval.
Modeling age differences in effects of pair repetition and proactive interference using a single parameter.
Psychology and Aging
Stephens, J.D.W. & Overman, A.A.
2018 In this article, we apply the REM model (Shiffrin & Steyvers, 1997) to age differences in associative memory. Using Criss and Shiffrin’s (2005) associative version of REM, we show that in a task with pairs repeated across 2 study lists, older adults’ reduced benefit of pair repetition can be produced by a general reduction in the diagnosticity of information stored in memory. This reduction can be modeled similarly well by reducing the overall distinctiveness of memory features, or by reducing the accuracy of memory encoding. We report a new experiment in which pairs are repeated across 3 study lists and extend the model accordingly. Finally, we extend the model to previously reported data using the same task paradigm, in which the use of a high-association strategy introduced proactive interference effects in young adults but not older adults. Reducing the diagnosticity of information in memory also reduces the proactive interference effect. Taken together, the modeling and empirical results reported here are consistent with the claim that some age differences that appear to be specific to associative information can be produced via general degradation of information stored in memory. The REM model provides a useful framework for examining age differences in memory as well as harmonizing seemingly conflicting prior modeling approaches for the associative deficit.
Same face, same place, different memory: manner of presentation modulates the associative deficit in older adults
Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition
Amy A. Overman, Nancy A. Dennis, John M. McCormick-Huhn, Abigail B. Steinsiek & Luisa B. Cesar
2017 One of the more severe and consequential memory impairments experienced by older adults is the loss of the ability to form and remember associations. Although the associative deficit is often assumed to be unitary, memory episodes may contain different types of associations (e.g., item–item, item–context). Research in younger adults suggests that these different association types may involve different neural mechanisms. This raises the possibility that different association types are not equally affected by aging. In order to investigate this, the current study directly compared memory across item–item and item–context associations in younger and older adults by manipulating the manner of presentation of the associations. Results indicate that the associative deficit in aging is not uniform and that aging has a greater impact on item–context compared to item–item associations. The results have implications for theories of associative memory, age-related cognitive decline, and the functional organization of the medial temporal lobe in aging.
Social