Adam Hockley
@adhockley.bsky.social
Research Scientist in the Hamm Lab at the Nathan Kline Institute.
My general interests cover auditory neuroscience, neural circuits, predictive coding, schizophrenia, tinnitus and cycling
My general interests cover auditory neuroscience, neural circuits, predictive coding, schizophrenia, tinnitus and cycling
Pinned
Cortical deviance detection represents a canonical difference signal
Context modulates neural processing of sensory stimuli. Neural responses are suppressed to stimuli that are typical in their context and augmented to stimuli that deviate from their context. The latte...
www.biorxiv.org
Our new preprint is out!
We show that deviance detection in auditory cortex conveys the theorised comparison of internal prediction to sensory input. Our data confirm this key assumtion that links theoretical models of sensory processing to experimental data.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
We show that deviance detection in auditory cortex conveys the theorised comparison of internal prediction to sensory input. Our data confirm this key assumtion that links theoretical models of sensory processing to experimental data.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Same sound, different perception: Do expectations change what you hear?👂🧠
We paired faces w topics and played the same ambiguous speech w different faces. The brain sharpened sensory signals toward predictions and showed gated prediction errors at higher levels.
Read @plosbiology.org. Blueprint👇
We paired faces w topics and played the same ambiguous speech w different faces. The brain sharpened sensory signals toward predictions and showed gated prediction errors at higher levels.
Read @plosbiology.org. Blueprint👇
Sensory sharpening and semantic prediction errors unify competing models of predictive processing in human speech comprehension
Speech comprehension relies on predictive mechanisms, but models disagree on whether the brain prioritizes expected or unexpected information. This study shows that sharpening of sensory representatio...
dx.plos.org
January 12, 2026 at 10:34 AM
Same sound, different perception: Do expectations change what you hear?👂🧠
We paired faces w topics and played the same ambiguous speech w different faces. The brain sharpened sensory signals toward predictions and showed gated prediction errors at higher levels.
Read @plosbiology.org. Blueprint👇
We paired faces w topics and played the same ambiguous speech w different faces. The brain sharpened sensory signals toward predictions and showed gated prediction errors at higher levels.
Read @plosbiology.org. Blueprint👇
Reposted by Adam Hockley
In the #cochlear nucleus, the size of inputs from #auditory #nerve fibers is variable. This study shows that variable input strength enhances rate coding at the expense of temporal precision, potentially creating diverse information streams for #sensory encoding @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/3YCaLMU
January 14, 2026 at 8:55 AM
In the #cochlear nucleus, the size of inputs from #auditory #nerve fibers is variable. This study shows that variable input strength enhances rate coding at the expense of temporal precision, potentially creating diverse information streams for #sensory encoding @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/3YCaLMU
It's been great working with the
@your.neighborhoodscientist.org
team on this article!
YNS aim to improve public understanding of science, science policy and scientists, by fostering community conversations.
If you can, help them out with a donation! neighborhoodscientist.org/donate.html
@your.neighborhoodscientist.org
team on this article!
YNS aim to improve public understanding of science, science policy and scientists, by fostering community conversations.
If you can, help them out with a donation! neighborhoodscientist.org/donate.html
This week, our neighborhood scientist is Dr. Adam Hockley @adhockley.bsky.social ! In his article, he details the road from basic science to clinical outcomes–and why sometimes it’s not quite as linear as you might think. Read his piece below: neighborhoodscientist.org/posts/2026/o...
An ode to basic science - but why does translation take so long? – Your Neighborhood Scientist
science news for everyone
neighborhoodscientist.org
January 9, 2026 at 1:18 PM
It's been great working with the
@your.neighborhoodscientist.org
team on this article!
YNS aim to improve public understanding of science, science policy and scientists, by fostering community conversations.
If you can, help them out with a donation! neighborhoodscientist.org/donate.html
@your.neighborhoodscientist.org
team on this article!
YNS aim to improve public understanding of science, science policy and scientists, by fostering community conversations.
If you can, help them out with a donation! neighborhoodscientist.org/donate.html
Reposted by Adam Hockley
if you want a long read that involves udders, a hot air balloon, and some extremely dubious data on egg prices, the story I’ve been working on for the last few months where I tried to single-handedly take on every government function myself is now online! www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...
I Tried to Be the Government. It Did Not Go Well.
My five-month quest to monitor the weather, track inflation, and inspect milk for harmful microorganisms
www.theatlantic.com
January 8, 2026 at 8:41 PM
if you want a long read that involves udders, a hot air balloon, and some extremely dubious data on egg prices, the story I’ve been working on for the last few months where I tried to single-handedly take on every government function myself is now online! www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Excited to share our preprint! We show that primary visual cortex is modulated by global predictability. This effect depended on higher level brain region (area ACa), and better explained classic oddball paradigms better than “local” context effects (i.e., recent stimulus history). 1/3
Global context rapidly shapes sensory responses in V1 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.07.698143v1
January 8, 2026 at 7:26 PM
Excited to share our preprint! We show that primary visual cortex is modulated by global predictability. This effect depended on higher level brain region (area ACa), and better explained classic oddball paradigms better than “local” context effects (i.e., recent stimulus history). 1/3
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Our paper is out now in J Neuroscience (currently in "accepted paper" form). We directly record single neurons in human insula, as well as primary auditory cortex, while participants passively listen to simple sounds. @sfnjournals.bsky.social www.jneurosci.org/content/earl... (1/5) 🧠📈🧵👇
The human insula reimagined: Single neurons respond to simple sounds during passive listening
The insula is critical for integrating sensory information from the body with that arising from the environment. Although previous studies suggested that posterior insula is sensitive to sounds, these...
www.jneurosci.org
December 11, 2025 at 2:25 PM
Our paper is out now in J Neuroscience (currently in "accepted paper" form). We directly record single neurons in human insula, as well as primary auditory cortex, while participants passively listen to simple sounds. @sfnjournals.bsky.social www.jneurosci.org/content/earl... (1/5) 🧠📈🧵👇
Our new preprint is out!
We show that deviance detection in auditory cortex conveys the theorised comparison of internal prediction to sensory input. Our data confirm this key assumtion that links theoretical models of sensory processing to experimental data.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
We show that deviance detection in auditory cortex conveys the theorised comparison of internal prediction to sensory input. Our data confirm this key assumtion that links theoretical models of sensory processing to experimental data.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Cortical deviance detection represents a canonical difference signal
Context modulates neural processing of sensory stimuli. Neural responses are suppressed to stimuli that are typical in their context and augmented to stimuli that deviate from their context. The latte...
www.biorxiv.org
January 7, 2026 at 4:30 PM
Our new preprint is out!
We show that deviance detection in auditory cortex conveys the theorised comparison of internal prediction to sensory input. Our data confirm this key assumtion that links theoretical models of sensory processing to experimental data.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
We show that deviance detection in auditory cortex conveys the theorised comparison of internal prediction to sensory input. Our data confirm this key assumtion that links theoretical models of sensory processing to experimental data.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
My nonprofit @your.neighborhoodscientist.org is looking for scientists to share their stories with us in 2026! Is your New Year's resolution to communicate & interface more with your community as a scientist? Send us a pitch at audrey@neighborhoodscientist.org ! 🧪🧠🇺🇸
December 29, 2025 at 3:46 PM
My nonprofit @your.neighborhoodscientist.org is looking for scientists to share their stories with us in 2026! Is your New Year's resolution to communicate & interface more with your community as a scientist? Send us a pitch at audrey@neighborhoodscientist.org ! 🧪🧠🇺🇸
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Just published my review of neuroscience in 2025, on The Spike.
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
2025: A Review of the Year in Neuroscience
Enlightening the brain
medium.com
December 30, 2025 at 3:52 PM
Just published my review of neuroscience in 2025, on The Spike.
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Does predictive coding work in SPACE or in TIME? Most neuroscientists assume TIME, i.e. neurons predict their future sensory inputs. We show that in visual cortex predictive coding actually works across SPACE, just like the original Rao+Ballard theory #neuroscience
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...
September 22, 2025 at 7:09 PM
Does predictive coding work in SPACE or in TIME? Most neuroscientists assume TIME, i.e. neurons predict their future sensory inputs. We show that in visual cortex predictive coding actually works across SPACE, just like the original Rao+Ballard theory #neuroscience
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Long time in the making: our preprint of survey study on the diversity with how people seem to experience #mentalimagery. Suggests #aphantasia should be redefined as absence of depictive thought, not merely "not seeing". Some more take home msg:
#psychskysci #neuroscience
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
#psychskysci #neuroscience
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
October 2, 2025 at 6:10 PM
Long time in the making: our preprint of survey study on the diversity with how people seem to experience #mentalimagery. Suggests #aphantasia should be redefined as absence of depictive thought, not merely "not seeing". Some more take home msg:
#psychskysci #neuroscience
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
#psychskysci #neuroscience
doi.org/10.1101/2025...
"Silent neurons individually carry little information... however, we observed that combining the silence of one neuron with temporal firing patterns or firing rate of the other neuron in a pair led to comparable synergy to combining the spiking activity of both neurons"
doi.org/10.1002/advs...
doi.org/10.1002/advs...
Neural Response Reliability as a Marker of the Transition of Neural Codes along Auditory Pathways
Decoding sound from neural activity in mice reveals a striking shift in how the brain encodes sound: from precise but redundant timing codes in early auditory areas to efficient, synergistic rate-bas....
doi.org
October 9, 2025 at 11:57 PM
"Silent neurons individually carry little information... however, we observed that combining the silence of one neuron with temporal firing patterns or firing rate of the other neuron in a pair led to comparable synergy to combining the spiking activity of both neurons"
doi.org/10.1002/advs...
doi.org/10.1002/advs...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Early unilateral auditory deprivation can cause lasting spatial #hearing deficits. @anbuhlk.bsky.social &co show that unilateral #HearingLoss during development (but not adult-onset) impairs binaural #brainstem function & spatial hearing acuity in guinea pigs @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/46njw1P
September 8, 2025 at 4:27 PM
Early unilateral auditory deprivation can cause lasting spatial #hearing deficits. @anbuhlk.bsky.social &co show that unilateral #HearingLoss during development (but not adult-onset) impairs binaural #brainstem function & spatial hearing acuity in guinea pigs @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/46njw1P
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Sad day for peope who still believe brain areas are the primary organizational units of function in the brain.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A brain-wide map of neural activity during complex behaviour - Nature
The International Brain Laboratory presents a brain-wide electrophysiological map obtained from pooling data from 12 laboratories that performed the same standardized perceptual decision-making task i...
www.nature.com
September 4, 2025 at 11:17 AM
Sad day for peope who still believe brain areas are the primary organizational units of function in the brain.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
music lessons don't make kids smarter, but many people have assumed that music lessons would have near-transfer effects, e.g. improving aspects of auditory perception
big new study led by Andrew Oxenham says "nope".
music lessons make kids better at music & that's good enough reason to do 'em !
big new study led by Andrew Oxenham says "nope".
music lessons make kids better at music & that's good enough reason to do 'em !
Large-scale multi-site study shows no association between musical training and early auditory neural sound encoding - Nature Communications
Widely cited studies have claimed that musical training is associated with enhanced neural encoding for sound at early stages of the auditory system. Results from this large-scale multisite study do n...
www.nature.com
August 9, 2025 at 1:01 AM
music lessons don't make kids smarter, but many people have assumed that music lessons would have near-transfer effects, e.g. improving aspects of auditory perception
big new study led by Andrew Oxenham says "nope".
music lessons make kids better at music & that's good enough reason to do 'em !
big new study led by Andrew Oxenham says "nope".
music lessons make kids better at music & that's good enough reason to do 'em !
Reposted by Adam Hockley
First lab outing since the move to NYC.... feeling so lucky to have such a talented and fun group! with Lital Rachmany, @adhockley.bsky.social, me, Molly Hornick, Fumiyasu Imai, and @cgalli-io.bsky.social
August 5, 2025 at 5:08 PM
First lab outing since the move to NYC.... feeling so lucky to have such a talented and fun group! with Lital Rachmany, @adhockley.bsky.social, me, Molly Hornick, Fumiyasu Imai, and @cgalli-io.bsky.social
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Are predictions computed hierarchically, or can they be computed locally? Check out our paper! Congrats, Toshitake Asabuki and @colleenjg.bsky.social !
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
www.pnas.org
July 2, 2025 at 8:31 AM
Are predictions computed hierarchically, or can they be computed locally? Check out our paper! Congrats, Toshitake Asabuki and @colleenjg.bsky.social !
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
#ICYMI Areas of the brain that help a person differentiate between what is real and what is imaginary have been uncovered in a new study led by @uclpals.bsky.social and @uclqsion.bsky.social researchers.
Brain mechanisms that distinguish imagination from reality discovered
Areas of the brain that help a person differentiate between what is real and what is imaginary have been uncovered in a new study led by UCL researchers.
buff.ly
June 29, 2025 at 10:08 AM
#ICYMI Areas of the brain that help a person differentiate between what is real and what is imaginary have been uncovered in a new study led by @uclpals.bsky.social and @uclqsion.bsky.social researchers.
Reposted by Adam Hockley
📣New study in Neuron, featuring modeling insights: "Cell-Specific Dendritic Integration in Cortical GABAergic Interneurons"! It reveals PV & SST interneurons compute differently. This highlights how distinct dendrites enable specialized brain computations!
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Distinct dendritic integration strategies control dynamics of inhibition in the neocortex
Dendrites critically influence single-neuron computations, but their role in neocortical GABAergic interneurons (INs) remains poorly understood. We fo…
www.sciencedirect.com
July 3, 2025 at 10:12 AM
📣New study in Neuron, featuring modeling insights: "Cell-Specific Dendritic Integration in Cortical GABAergic Interneurons"! It reveals PV & SST interneurons compute differently. This highlights how distinct dendrites enable specialized brain computations!
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Here's our new #preprint on triggering of cortical Up states by deviants in the auditory oddball paradigm.
Up states are reliably evoked by deviants under anesthesia, explaining the long-latency deviant responses seen in previous studies.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Up states are reliably evoked by deviants under anesthesia, explaining the long-latency deviant responses seen in previous studies.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Auditory deviants evoke cortical state changes under anesthesia
Context-dependent sensory processing within the predictive coding framework relies on detecting mismatches between incoming stimuli and internal predictive models. Sensory deviants elicit prediction e...
www.biorxiv.org
July 3, 2025 at 4:00 PM
Here's our new #preprint on triggering of cortical Up states by deviants in the auditory oddball paradigm.
Up states are reliably evoked by deviants under anesthesia, explaining the long-latency deviant responses seen in previous studies.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Up states are reliably evoked by deviants under anesthesia, explaining the long-latency deviant responses seen in previous studies.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Reposted by Adam Hockley
🚀 We are excited to share that bombcell is now available in Python! 🐍 Automatically sort your units into good/MUA/noise/non-somatic using quality metrics and interpretable & adjustable classification thresholds.
pip install and play around with our toy dataset:
🔗 github.com/Julie-Fabre/...
pip install and play around with our toy dataset:
🔗 github.com/Julie-Fabre/...
GitHub - Julie-Fabre/bombcell: Automated quality control, curation and neuron classification of spike-sorted electrophysiology data
Automated quality control, curation and neuron classification of spike-sorted electrophysiology data - Julie-Fabre/bombcell
github.com
June 13, 2025 at 6:55 PM
🚀 We are excited to share that bombcell is now available in Python! 🐍 Automatically sort your units into good/MUA/noise/non-somatic using quality metrics and interpretable & adjustable classification thresholds.
pip install and play around with our toy dataset:
🔗 github.com/Julie-Fabre/...
pip install and play around with our toy dataset:
🔗 github.com/Julie-Fabre/...
A great catch up today in the Jono's @ Nottingham 🏰
June 12, 2025 at 11:58 PM
A great catch up today in the Jono's @ Nottingham 🏰
My final day at the @incyl.bsky.social today! I've met so many amazing people here and I'll miss everyone so much 🩵 next step is back to UK for a month of hiking, cycling and camping, then heading to @jordanhamm.bsky.social lab soon! 🗽
June 3, 2025 at 3:12 PM
My final day at the @incyl.bsky.social today! I've met so many amazing people here and I'll miss everyone so much 🩵 next step is back to UK for a month of hiking, cycling and camping, then heading to @jordanhamm.bsky.social lab soon! 🗽
Reposted by Adam Hockley
Excited to share my PhD paper! In it, we use targeted 2-photon optogenetic stimulation to determine how V1 activity is read-out in a detection task. We found that network influence, not visual coding properties, predicted the impact of ensembles on behavior - contradicting our expectations (1/5).
May 15, 2025 at 4:38 PM
Excited to share my PhD paper! In it, we use targeted 2-photon optogenetic stimulation to determine how V1 activity is read-out in a detection task. We found that network influence, not visual coding properties, predicted the impact of ensembles on behavior - contradicting our expectations (1/5).
Reposted by Adam Hockley
1/
Excited to share our new paper just out in Scientific Reports!
🧠🎧 Using intracranial EEG, we show how the human brain automatically encodes patterns in random sounds– without attention or explicit awareness.
🔗 doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Excited to share our new paper just out in Scientific Reports!
🧠🎧 Using intracranial EEG, we show how the human brain automatically encodes patterns in random sounds– without attention or explicit awareness.
🔗 doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Direct brain recordings reveal implicit encoding of structure in random auditory streams - Scientific Reports
Scientific Reports - Direct brain recordings reveal implicit encoding of structure in random auditory streams
doi.org
May 5, 2025 at 10:36 AM
1/
Excited to share our new paper just out in Scientific Reports!
🧠🎧 Using intracranial EEG, we show how the human brain automatically encodes patterns in random sounds– without attention or explicit awareness.
🔗 doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Excited to share our new paper just out in Scientific Reports!
🧠🎧 Using intracranial EEG, we show how the human brain automatically encodes patterns in random sounds– without attention or explicit awareness.
🔗 doi.org/10.1038/s415...