I joined the BLL in Geneva, Switzerland, in the Fall of 2020, as a post doc neurolinguist. I work with behaviour, as well as structural and functional neuroimaging, to uncover the nature of individual differences in language and musical aptitude. Music and language are my main interests, as I spend my time between the Lab and the Conservatory!At the BLL my main project is centered around the NCCR Evolving Language: here I participate in the organisation, implementation, and analysis of a large behaviour, brain and genetic data collection initiative, the Language Aptitude Work Package, within the NCCR.
Concurrently, I collaborate with research groups at the Universities of Vienna, Graz and Heidelberg to analyse a large longitudinal sample of children’s brains undergoing musical training (‘To Each Child, an Instrument‘) along the healthy-developmental disorder continuum.
I’m also a decent cook, like many Italians, but I’d let my invitees-reviewers judge that, and I usually keep my concerts secret, which defeats their very purpose, but if I bump into you I’ll buy you a drink afterwards.
Email: Alessandra [dot] Rampinini [at] unige [dot] ch
Education
2007-2010 BA in Linguistics, University of Pisa, Italy
2010-2012 MA in Linguistics, University of Pisa, Italy
2011 Intern, Harvard University Department of Psychology & Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, University of Trento, Italy
2012-2016 PhD in Psychobiology & Psychophysiology, University of Pisa, Italy
Previous Positions
2015-2016 Research fellow, Laboratory of Clinical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Pisa University Hospital, Italy
2017-2020 Postdoctoral fellow and Lecturer of Basic Neurolinguistics, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy
Publications:
Journal publications:
Rampinini, A. C., Handjaras, G., Leo, A., Cecchetti, L., Betta, M., Ricciardi, E., Marotta, G., & Pietrini, P. (2019). Formant space reconstruction from brain activity in frontal and temporal regions coding for heard vowels. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 13, 32.
Rampinini, A. C., Handjaras, G., Leo, A., Cecchetti, L., Ricciardi, E., Marotta, G., & Pietrini, P. (2017). Functional and spatial segregation within the inferior frontal and superior temporal cortices during listening, articulation imagery, and production of vowels. Scientific reports, 7(1), 17029.
Rampinini, A. C., & Ricciardi, E. (2017). In favor of the phonemic principle: a review of neurophysiological and neuroimaging explorations into the neural correlates of phonological competence. Studi e Saggi Linguistici, 55(1), 95-123.
Papale P., Chiesi L., Rampinini A.C., Pietrini P., Ricciardi E. (2016) When neuroscience ‘touches’ architecture: from hapticity to a supramodal functioning of the human brain. Frontiers in Psychology, 7, 866
Papale, P., Betta, M., Handjaras, G., Malfatti, G., Cecchetti, L., Rampinini, A., … & Leo, A. (2019). Common spatiotemporal processing of visual features shapes object representation. Scientific reports, 9(1), 7601.
Leo A., Handjaras G., Rampinini A., Ricciardi E., Pietrini P. (2013) Il ruolo dell’esperienza sensoriale nelle rappresentazioni semantiche. In “Parlare Senza Vedere”. Eds. G. Marotta, L. Meini, M. Donati. Pisa: ETS. pp. 35-50
Romagno D., Rampinini A., Handjaras G., Leo A., Caramazza A., Pietrini P., Ricciardi E. (manuscript in preparation). Psycholinguistic variables modulate word class representation.
Congress papers & posters:
Rampinini, A., Kepinska, O., Balboni, I., Farrés-Franch, M., Zatorre, R. & Golestani, N. (Jan. 8-12, 2023). A game of Song Scramble: exploring the brain’s music network. Poster presented at the Alpine Brain Imaging Meeting, Champery, Switzerland.
Balboni I, Rampinini A, Kepinska O, Dalboni da Rocha JL, Berthele R, Golestani N (2021) New Perspectives on the Relationship Between Language Aptitude, Behaviour and the Brain, Society for the Neurobiology of Language, Annual Meeting, virtual edition 2021
Rampinini, A. C., Handjaras, G., Leo, A., Cecchetti, L., Betta, M., Ricciardi, E., Marotta, G., Pietrini, P. (2019). Formant model reconstruction from vowel listening brain activity in the pars triangularis. 25th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping, Rome, Italy.
Betta, M., Handjaras, G., Papale, P., Rampinini, A., Malfatti, G., Pietrini, P., … & Leo, A. (2018). MEG spectro-temporal patterns underlying semantic processing. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 131, S71.
Betta, M., Handjaras, G., Rampinini, Malfatti, G., A., Papale, P., Pietrini, P., Turella, L., Leo, A., Ricciardi, E. (2018). Modality-independent spectro-temporal patterns revealed by a multivariate MEG study. 24th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping, Singapore.
Rampinini A., Cecchetti L., Marani A., Ricciardi E., Pietrini, P. (2016) Memory mistake or wilful deception? An ALE meta-analysis of fMRI studies. 22th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping, Geneva, Switzerland
Rampinini A., Handjaras G., Leo A., Cecchetti L., Ricciardi E., Marotta G., Pietrini P. (2015). Decoding speech: Multivariate classification of the Italian vocalic system through fMRI. Proceedings of the Italian Society of Psychophysiology. Neuropsych. Trends 18/2015
Romagno D., Rampinini A., Handjaras G., Leo A., Caramazza A., Ricciardi E., Pietrini P. (2015) The representation of word classes in the brain: an MVPA study. Proceedings of the Italian Society of Psychophysiology. Neuropsych. Trends 18/2015
Cecchetti L., Rampinini A., Marani A., Ricciardi E., Pietrini P. (2015). Disentangling Deceiving from False Belief: an ALE meta-analysis of fMRI studies. Proceedings of the Italian Society of Psychophysiology. Neuropsych. Trends 18/2015
Romagno D, Rampinini A, Handjaras G, Leo A, Caramazza A, Pietrini P, Ricciardi E (2015) MVPA reveals the cortical signature of verbs, adjectives and nouns. 21th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping, Honolulu, Hawaii
Rampinini A, Handjaras G, Leo A, Cecchetti L, Ricciardi E, Marotta G, Pietrini P (2015). Cortical signature of vowels in listening, covert & overt articulation. 21th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping, Honolulu, Hawaii
PhD Thesis: Rampinini A.C. (2016), The functional neuroanatomy of the speech network: a shared phonological neural code for heard, imagined and spoken phonemes. Dissertation submitted to the University of Pisa in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Clinical Pathophysiology, sector M-PSI/02 – Psychobiology & Psychophysiology.
Invited talks:
NCCR Evolving Language round table, 2 September 2020
Words and the Mind. How language makes us human. Brain Awareness Week, IMT School for Advanced Studies, Lucca, Italy, March 2020.
Univariate and Multivariate methods for the study of phonological and semantic information in the brain. Italian National Council of Research (CNR), Institute of Computational Linguistics, Pisa, Italy, January 2020.
Neurofunctional correlates of abstract concepts: perspectives. Department of Philology, Literature and Linguistics, University of Pisa, Italy, 2018
Cognitive approaches to Neuroaesthetics: where and why the brain appreciates beauty. Faculty of Architecture, University of Florence, June 2015