Scientist: Barbara Sahakian

Barbara J. Sahakian ESMH scientistProfessor Barbara J. Sahakian is a Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at the University of Cambridge, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute (BCNI), UK. She is also an Honorary Clinical Psychologist at Addenbrooke’s Hospital and a Fellow of Clare Hall in Cambridge, a Fellow of the British Academy and the Academy of Medical Sciences, an Honorary Professor at Fudan University in Shanghai, and an Advisory Professor at Xinhua Hospital associated with the Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, China. Sahakian has an international reputation in the fields of psychopharmacology, neuropsychology, neuropsychiatry, neuroimaging and neuroethics. She is best known for her work on problems of cognition and motivation in brain injury, ‘hot’ and coldcognitive deficits in depression and early detection, and early treatment with cholinesterase inhibitors in Alzheimers disease. Sahakian co-invented the neuropsychological CANTAB and EMOTICOM tests and the University of Cambridge/PEAK Advanced Training Programme and the Wizard Apprentice Memory Game.

The young woman with medical mask on her face stands on the crowded street

How the coronavirus pandemic is changing us

These stressful and unprecedented circumstances we are living in due to the current pandemic have a deep internal effect on us, which is altering who we are as individuals, our relationships with others, and how we perceive our place in society. Even our brain's hippocampus may have shrunk — but are these changes in our brains and behaviour short-term effects or could they change us and society more profoundly?

Barbara J. Sahakian, The young woman with medical mask on her face stands on the crowded street

A scientist’s opinion: Interview with Professor Barbara Sahakian about brain changes during COVID-19

Interview with Professor Barbara Sahakian, Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at the University of Cambridge, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, UK. How is the pandemic changing our brains, in situations when we haven’t contracted the virus itself? How is it impacting it both physically and psychologically, and are these long-term changes? Barbara ...