Will Harrison

How do we see? What a strange question! It’s obvious we see with our eyes, right? While eyes are indeed critical for seeing, the brain is where all the real action happens. It is the brain - and not the eyes - that makes sense of the visual information we look at. In fact, there are many common disorders of vision that occur because of brain disease. For example, problems with vision are often experienced by people suffering from dementia, a cognitive disorder that grows worse with age.

I’m also a fan of the horror movie genre, and so I’m very interested in the science of horror. Actors and directors are decades ahead of the science - they know exactly what makes people jump! I use cutting-edge tools from the cognitive sciences to understand what makes horror villains scary, and why do some people - like me - love going to the cinema to be scared?