Gordon Shulman

Who they are: Gordon Shulman is a professor of neurology and radiology at Washington University in St. Louis, where his research uses brain imaging to study the networks that control human attention.

The concept HaELM draws from: With Maurizio Corbetta, Shulman helped define the brain’s two attention networks: a dorsal network for deliberate, goal-directed attention and a ventral network that automatically reorients attention toward unexpected or salient stimuli. Decode uses this framework to explain why some parts of an ad require the viewer to be actively looking for something, while other parts hijack attention regardless of intent.

Decode articles where their thinking appears: Spider-Man Took Over Times Square. It Didn’t Need to Say Anything Else.

Source: Washington University in St. Louis Department of Neurology faculty profile, “Gordon L. Shulman.”