Principle Investigator
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Dicle N. Dövencioğlu
PhD. School of Psychology, University of Birmingham, UK
MSc. Cognitive Science, Informatics Institute, METU
BSc. Department of Mathematics, METU
Research focus: Multisensory shape and material perception and sound symbolism using behavioral, psychophysics, and fMRI methods.
Teaching: PSY2202 Perception (Rest 1 Group), PSY2204 Perceptual Processes (Rest 1 Group),
PSY4205 Perceptual Illusions (Rest 1 Group), PSY4206 Psychophysics (Rest 1 Group),
PSY5203 Trends in Vision Sciences (Grad)
Office: Beseri Building Room B45
Virtual office: https://zoom.us/my/dicle
METU e-mail handle: dicled
Postgraduate Students
Saliha Arabacı (M. Sc.) began her undergraduate education at Istanbul Sehir University and graduated from Marmara University in 2021. She earned her master's degree in psychology from Ankara Yıldırım Beyazit University and is currently pursuing her PhD in the Psychology Department at METU.
Research focus: Visual perception, visual processes, ensemble perception and animacy perception.
Ceyda Koca received her Bachelor's degree in Anthropology at Istanbul University, Turkey in 2022. She's currently an MSc student at the Psychology department at Metu and is interested in cognitive evolution.
Research focus: Affordance, affordance perception, tool use, and cognitive evolution
İrem Tuncel is a Ph.D. student in the Cognitive Psychology program at Middle East Technical University (METU). She completed her Master's degree in the same program with a thesis titled "The Effect of Material Sound on Material Perception through Turkish Sound Symbolic Words" and holds a bachelor's degree in psychology, also from METU. Her research interests focus on natural material sounds, multisensory material perception, and sound symbolism. In addition to these, she is a comic book lover.
Research focus: Natural material sounds, multisensory material perception, and sound symbolism.
Defne Akkuş received her Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Middle East Technical University, where she also completed a minor in Philosophy of Science and Logic. She is currently a Master's student in the Cognitive Psychology program at METU. Her research broadly focuses on perception and language, with particular interest in how sensory experiences and symbolic processes shape human understanding across different modalities and languages.
Research focus: Sound symbolism, material perception, haptic perception, and psycholinguistics.
Habibe Sena Dündar is a PhD student in the Cognitive Psychology program at Middle East Technical University. She received her Bachelor's degree in Psychology from KTO Karatay University and completed her Master's degree at Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University with a thesis titled "Processing Face Pareidolia: Does Body Dysmorphia Tendency Make a Difference?". Her research interests focus on visual sensory perception, particularly face perception.
Research focus: Face perception, face pareidolia, and illusory faces.
Faruk Sarıtaş received his Bachelor's degree in Psychology at Ankara University. He's currently a Master's student in Cognitive Psychology program at Middle East Technical University (METU). His main research interests focuses on cognitive film theory, visual perception, neurocinematics, and neuroaesthetics.
Research focus: Cognitive film theory, visual perception, neurocinematics, and neuroaesthetics.
Aslı Bilge Kılınç received her Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Middle East Technical University and completed her Master's degree at Rhineland-Palatinate Technical University of Kaiserslautern-Landau (RPTU) in Germany. She is currently pursuing her PhD in the Psychology Department at METU. Her research interests focus on the effects of sound symbolic words and naturally occuring material sounds in haptic exploration.
Research focus: Haptic perception, sound symbolism, natural material sounds, psycholinguistics, VR.
Fırat Kartal is a Master's student in Cognitive Psychology program at Middle East Technical University (METU). He received his Bachelor's degree in Psychology at Bilkent University. His main research interests focus on visual perception and multidimensional haptic perception.
Research focus: Visual perception, haptic perception and motion perception.
Atacan Tanaydın received his Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from METU NCC and completed his Master’s degree in Clinical Psychology at Bournemouth University. He will commence his PhD studies in the Psychology Department at Middle East Technical University in the upcoming academic term. He is currently involved in a research project at ODTÜ TEKNOKENT focusing on the screening of attention deficits and learning difficulties in young adults through the comparison of game-based cognitive tasks and traditional psychometric scales.
Research focus: Attention and attentinal processes, game-based cognitive screening, learning difficulties, digital assessment tools and VR.
Alper Artan is a senior student at Middle East Technical University. He currently investigates the grasping affordance perception of tools for his AdımODTÜ undergraduate research project.
İlknur Zeynep Kaya is a senior student at Middle East Technical University. Her AdımODTÜ undergraduate research project focuses on multimodal material perception and sound symbolism through formation of novel Turkish onomatopoeic words.
Alumni
Büşra Akdoğan, Defne Akdemir, Dr. Görkem Baysal, Gamze Cengiz, Betül Ayça Coşar, Elif Gülare Çakır, Fatma Çelebi, İzel Deniz Vardar, Zelal Eltaş, Melis Hazır, Fatma Kılıç, Hamza Nalbantoğlu, Alper Soylu, Okan Tayiz, Nefes Tekin, Yunus Emre Türkmen, Özce Özceçelik, Öykü Göze Özdemir, Ebru Özden, Gökhan Özmen, Ömer Faruk Yıldıran, Gamze Yıldız, Sude Yüksel