Biography
Education
- Ph.D. Stanford University
- B.A. University of California at Santa Cruz
Specialty Areas: Visual perception, perception-action coupling
Courses Taught
PSY 150 – Introduction to Psychology
PSY 250 – Neural correlates of human behavior
PSY 367 – Cognitive Psychology
**Currently not accepting Research Assistants.
Selected Honors
2011 Faculty Leader in Diversity Award, Rutgers University
2008 Board of Trustees Award for Excellence in Research, Rutgers University
2005 Elected Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science
2004 Elected Fellow of the American Psychological Association
2003 Recipient of the Lansdowne Scholar Award, University of Victoria
2003 Max Planck Gesellschaft Scholarship, Germany
Selected Publications
Biederman, I. & Shiffrar, M. (1987). Sexing day-old chicks: a case study and expert systems analysis of a difficult perceptual learning task. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 13, 640-645.
Shiffrar, M. & Freyd, J. (1990). Apparent motion of the human body. Psychological Science, 1, 257-264.
Shiffrar, M. & Pavel, M. (1991). Percepts of rigid motion within and across apertures. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 17, 749-761.
Shiffrar, M. & Shepard, R. N. (1991). Comparison of cube rotations around axes inclined relative to the environment or to the cube. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 17, 44-54.
Lorenceau, J. & Shiffrar, M. (1992). The influence of terminators on motion integration across space. Vision Research, 32, 263-273.
Shiffrar, M. & Freyd, J. (1993). Timing and apparent motion path choice with human body photographs. Psychological Science, 4, 379-384.
Shiffrar, M. (1994). When what meets where. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 3, 96-100.
Shiffrar, M., Li, X., & Lorenceau, J. (1995). Motion integration across differing image features. Vision Research, 35, 2137-2146.
Heptulla-Chatterjee, S., Freyd, J., & Shiffrar, M. (1996). Configural processing in the perception of apparent biological motion. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 22, 916-929.
Shiffrar, M. & Lorenceau, J. (1996). Increased motion linking across edges with decreased luminance contrast, edge width and duration. Vision Research, 36, 2061-2067.
Shiffrar, M., Lichtey, L., & Heptulla Chatterjee, S. (1997). The perception of biological motion across apertures. Perception & Psychophysics, 59, 51-59.
Kourtzi, Z. & Shiffrar, M. (1997). One-shot view invariance in a moving world. Psychological Science, 8, 461-466.
Loula, F., Kourtzi, Z., & Shiffrar, M. (2000). Surface segmentation cues influence negative priming for novel and familiar shapes. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 26, 929 - 944.
Stevens, J.A., Fonlupt, P., Shiffrar, M., & Decety, J. (2000). New aspects of motion perception: Selective neural encoding of apparent human movements, NeuroReport, 11, 109 - 115.
Kourtzi, Z. & Shiffrar, M. (2001). Visual representation of malleable and rigid objects that deform as they rotate. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27, 335 - 355.
Shiffrar, M. & Pinto, J. (2002). The visual analysis of bodily motion. Common mechanisms in perception and action: Attention and Performance, Vol. XIX. (Prinz, W., & Hommel, B., Eds.) Oxford: Oxford University Press, 381-399.
Thornton, I. M., Rensink, R. A., & Shiffrar, M. (2002). Active versus passive processing of biological motion. Perception, 31, 837-853.
Jacobs, A., Pinto, J., & Shiffrar, M. (2004). Experience, context, and the visual perception of human movement, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance, 30, 822-835.
Jacobs, A. & Shiffrar, M. (2005). Walking perception by walking observers. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance, 31, 157-169.
Loula, F., Prasad, S., Harber, K., & Shiffrar, M. (2005). Recognizing people from their movement. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance, 31, 210-220.
Funk, M., Brugger, P., & Shiffrar, M. (2005). Hand movement observation by individuals born without hands: Phantom limb experience constrains visual limb perception. Experimental Brain Research, 164, 341-346.
Knoblich, G., Grosjean, M., Thornton, I., & Shiffrar, M. (Eds.). (2006). Perception of the human body from the inside out. Oxford University Press.
Chouchourelou, A., Matsuka, T., Harber, K., & Shiffrar, M. (2006). The visual analysis of emotional actions. Social Neuroscience, 1, 63-74.
Virji-Babul, N., Kerns, K., Zhou, E., Kapur, A., & Shiffrar, M. (2006). Perceptual-motor deficits in children with Down syndrome: Implications for intervention. Down Syndrome Research and Practice, 10, 74-82.
Blake, R. & Shiffrar, M. (2007). Perception of human motion. Annual Review of Psychology, 58, 47-74.
Grosjean, M., Shiffrar, M., & Knoblich, G. (2007). Fitts’ Law Holds for Action Perception, Psychological Science, 18, 95-99.
Sebanz, N. & Shiffrar, M. (2007). Bodily bonds: Effects of social context on ideomotor movements. Sensorimotor Foundations of Higher Cognition: Attention and Performance,Vol. XXII, Oxford University Press, 267-291.
Kaiser, M. & Shiffrar, M. (2009). The visual perception of motion by observers with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A review and synthesis. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 16, 761-777.
Pinto, J., & Shiffrar, M. (2009). The visual perception of human and animal motion in point-light displays, Social Neuroscience, 4(4), 332-346.
Prasad, S. & Shiffrar, M. (2009). Viewpoint and the recognition of people from their movements. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance, 35, 39-49.
Thomas, J. & Shiffrar, M. (2010). I can see you better if I can hear you coming: Action-consistent sounds facilitate the visual detection of human gait. Journal of Vision, 10(12): 14.
Shiffrar, M. (2011). People Watching: Visual, motor, and social processes in the perception of human movement. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Cognitive Science, 2, 68-78.
Sebanz, N. & Shiffrar, M. (2009). Detecting deception in a bluffing body: The role of expertise. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 16, 170-175.
Kaiser, M., Delmolino, L., Tanaka, J. & Shiffrar, M. (2010). Comparison of visual sensitivity to human and object motion in Autism Spectrum Disorder. Autism Research, 3(4), 191-195.
Serino, A., Casavecchia, C., DeFilippo, L., Coccia, M., Shiffrar, M., & Ladavas, E. (2010). Lesions to the motor system affect action understanding. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 22(3), 413-426.
Kaiser, M. D., Shiffrar, M., & Pelphrey, K. A. (2012). Socially tuned: Brain responses differentiating human and animal motion. Social Neuroscience, 7(3), 301-310.
Johnson, K. & Shiffrar, M. (Eds.). (2012). People Watching: Social, Perceptual, and Neurophysiological Studies of Body Perception. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Price, K., Shiffrar, M. & Kerns, K. (2012). Movement perception and movement production in Asperger’s Syndrome. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, 6, 391-398.
Thomas, J. & Shiffrar, M. (2013). Meaningful sounds enhance visual sensitivity to human gait regardless of timing. Journal of Vision, 13(14):8, 1-13.
Jaywant, A., Shiffrar, M, Roy, S. & Cronin-Golomb, A. (2016). Impaired perception of biological motion in Parkinson’s Disease. Neuropsychology, 30(6), 720-730.
Joseph, C., LoBue, V., Rivera, L., Irving, J., Savoy, S., & Shiffrar, M. (2016). An attentional bias for thin bodies and its relation to body dissatisfaction. Body Image, 19, 216-223.
Gorman, J.L., Harber, K.D., Shiffrar, M., & Quigley, K.S. (2017). Ostracism, Resources, and the Perception of Human Motion. European Journal of Social Psychology, 47, 53-71. DOI: 10.1002/ejsp.2213
Shiffrar, M. (2017). The Aperture Problem: Illusions arising during the integration and segmentation of motion within and across apertures. In A. Shapiro & D. Todorovic (Eds.) The Oxford Compendium of Visual Illusions. Oxford University Press: London, 556-562.
Shiffrar, M. & Joseph, C. (2017). Paths of apparent human motion follow motor constraints. In A. Shapiro & D. Todorovic (Eds.) The Oxford Compendium of Visual Illusions. Oxford University Press: London, 563-568.