Dr. Gilam is the director of the translational Social, Cognitive, and Affective Neuroscience (tSCAN) lab.
The lab’s primary research focuses on the causes, consequences, and prevention of human suffering related to affective states, such as pain and anger, as they manifest at the intersection of psychopathological and chronic pain conditions. These strongly co-morbid conditions are globally, the leading factors contributing to years living with disability, resulting in incredible personal, societal, and financial costs. To address these issues, the tSCAN lab uses a combination of methods from cognitive neuroscience, experimental psychology, and health informatics, while integrating perspectives from emotion science, social psychology, and pain medicine.
We are always looking for motivated and talented students - please feel free to reach out if you are interested in joining our research efforts.
Selected Publications:
1. Gilam, G., Cramer, E. M., Weber, K. A., Ziadni, M. S., Kao, M. C., & Mackey, S.C. (2021). Classifying chronic pain using multidimensional pain-agnostic symptom assessments and clustering analysis. Science Advances, 8(37) https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abj0320
2. Mercer Lindsay, N., Chen, C., Gilam, G., Mackey, S.C., & Scherrer, G. (2021). Brain Circuits for pain and its treatment. Science Translational Medicine, 13(619) https://doi.org/10.1126/scitranslmed.abj7360
3. Zhang, J., ten Brink, M., Kreibig, S.D., Gilam, G., Manber, R., Mackey, S.C., & Gross, J.J. (2021). Individual differences in perceived sleep quality does not predict negative affect reactivity or regulation. Biological Psychology https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2021.108149
4. Gilam, G., Gross, J.J., Wager, T.D., Keefe, F.J., & Mackey. S.C. (2020). What is the relationship between pain and emotion? Bridging constructs and communities. Neuron, 107(1), 17-21. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2020.05.024
5. Gilam, G., Horing, B., Sivan, R. Weinman, N., & Mackey, S.C. The decline in task performance after witnessing rudeness is moderated by emotional empathy (2020; materials and data available at https://osf.io/fh6pb/). Frontiers in Psychology – Personality and Social Psychology; https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01584
6. Gilam, G., Sturgeon, J.A., You, D.S., Wasan, A.D., Darnall, B.D., & Mackey, S.C. (2019). Negative affect-related factors have the strongest association with prescription opioid misuse in a cross-sectional cohort of patients with chronic pain. Pain Medicine, 21(2), e127-e138. https://doi.org/10.1093/pm/pnz249
7. Gilam*, G., Abend*, R., Gurevitch, G., Erdman, A., Baker, H., Ben-Zion, Z., & Hendler, T. (2018). Attenuating anger and aggression with neuromodulation of the vmPFC – a simultaneous tDCS-fMRI study. Cortex, 109, 156-170. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2018.09.010
8. Gilam, G., Lin, T., Fruchter, E., & Hendler, T. (2017). Neural indicators of interpersonal anger as cause and consequence of combat-training stress symptoms. Psychological Medicine, 47(9), 1561-1572. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0033291716003354
9. Gilam, G., & Hendler, T. (2016). With love, from me to you: Embedding social interactions in affective neuroscience. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 68, 590-601. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2016.06.027
10. Gilam, G., Lin, T., Raz, G., Azrielant, S., Fruchter, E., Ariely, D. & Hendler, T. (2015). Neural substrates underlaying the tendency to accept anger-infused ultimatum offers during dynamic social interactions. Neuroimage, 120, 400-411. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2015.07.003