Oakyoon Cha

Education

• 2014–2017 Ph.D. in Cognitive Science, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea.
  Advisor: Sang Chul Chong
• 2009–2011 Ph.D. in Cognitive Science, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea.
  Advisor: Sang Chul Chong
• 2000–2009 B.A. in Psychology & Cognitive Science, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea.

Research Experience

• 2025– Assistant Professor, Sogang University, Seoul, Korea.
• 2021–2025 Assistant Professor, Sungshin Women's University, Seoul, Korea.
• 2018–2021 Postdoctoral Researcher, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
  Advisors: Randolph Blake & Isabel Gauthier

Work Experience

• 2005–2006 Researcher/Developer, Communications Lab, SK Communications.
• 2003–2005 Developer, E-commerce Platform, Danal.

Grants

• 3/1/2023–2/28/2033 “Neural Oscillation Model of Visual Awarenes”
  National Research Foundation of Korea (No. RS-2023-00211668)
  Annual Direct Costs: approx. $70,000 (1st year), $110,000 (2nd year–)
  Total Direct Costs: approx. $1,060,000
• 3/1/2022–12/31/2023 “Masked-Face Perception and Masked-People Perception”
  National Research Foundation of Korea (No. 2022R1C1C1008628)
  Annual Direct Costs: approx. $125,000 (1st year), $76,000 (2nd year)
  Total Direct Costs: approx. $201,000

Awards

• 2021 Bob Fox Award of Excellence in Post-Doctoral Research, Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University.
• 2020 Elsevier/Vision Research Travel Award, Annual Meeting of the Vision Sciences Society.
• 2017 Distinguished Thesis, Yonsei University.
• 2017 Student Travel Award, Annual Meeting of the Korean Society for Brain and Neural Science.
• 2016 Grand Prize, SK Creative Challenge, HCI Korea 2016.
• 2016 Student Travel Award, Annual Meeting of the Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology.
• 2015 Student Travel Award, Annual Meeting of the Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology.
• 2011 Merited Thesis, Yonsei University.

Publications

• Cha, O., & Blake, R., (2024). Procedure for extracting temporal structure embedded within psychophysical data. Behavior Research Methods, 56(6), 5482–5500. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-023-02282-3
• Chang, T.-Y., Cha, O., & Gauthier, I. (2024). A general ability for judging simple and complex ensembles. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 153(6), 1517–1536. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0001582
• Chang, T.-Y., Cha, O., McGugin, R., Tomarken, A., & Gauthier, I. (2024). How general is ensemble perception? Psychological Research, 88(3), 695–708. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-023-01883-z
• Kacin, M., Cha, O., & Gauthier, I. (2023). The relation between ensemble coding of length and orientation does not depend on spatial attention. Vision, 7(1), 3. https://doi.org/10.3390/vision7010003
• Gauthier, I., Cha, O., & Chang, T.-Y. (2022). Mini Review: Individual differences and domain-general mechanisms in object recognition. Frontiers in Cognition, 1, 1040994. https://doi.org/10.3389/fcogn.2022.1040994
• Cha, O., Blake, R., & Gauthier, I. (2022). Contribution of a common ability in average and variability judgments. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 29(1), 108–115. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-021-01982-1
• Kacin, M., Gauthier, I., & Cha, O. (2021). Ensemble coding of average length and average orientation are correlated. Vision Research, 187, 94–101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.visres.2021.04.010
• Cha, O., Blake, R., & Gauthier, I. (2021). The role of category- and exemplar-specific experience in ensemble processing of objects. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 83(3), 1080–1093. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13414-020-02162-4
• Cha, O., Son, G., Chong, S. C., Tovar, D. A., & Blake, R. (2019). Novel procedure for generating continuous flash suppression: Seurat meets Mondrian. Journal of Vision, 19(14), 1. https://doi.org/10.1167/19.14.1
• Cha, O., & Blake, R. (2019). Evidence for neural rhythms embedded within binocular rivalry. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 116(30), 14811–14812. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1905174116
• Cha, O., Blake, R., & Chong, S. C. (2018). Composite binocular perception from dichoptic stimulus arrays with similar ensemble information. Scientific Reports, 8, 8263. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-26679-9
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2018). Perceived average orientation reflects effective gist of the surface. Psychological Science, 29(3), 319–327. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797617735533
• Eo, K., Cha, O., Chong, S. C., & Kang, M. S. (2016). Less is more: Semantic information survives interocular suppression when attention is diverted. Journal of Neuroscience, 36(20), 5489–5497. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3018-15.2016
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2014). The background is remapped across saccades. Experimental Brain Research, 232(2), 609–618. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-013-3769-9
• Baek, Y., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2012). Characteristics of the filled-in surface at the blind spot. Vision Research, 58, 33–44. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.visres.2012.01.020
• Park, K. M., Cha, O., Kim, S., Im, H. Y., & Chong, S. C. (2007). The influence of depth context on blind spot filling-in. Korean Journal of Cognitive Science, 18(4), 351–370. https://doi.org/10.19066/cogsci.2007.18.4.002

Invited Talks

• May, 2024 “How effective are low-frequency events in shaping perception?”
  Randolph Blake Festschrift, Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University.
• Oct., 2019 “Finding evidence for neural rhythms in behavioral data.”
  CCN Brown Bag Seminar, Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University.
• Oct., 2018 “Ensemble as lossy compression rather than dumb averaging.”
  CCN Brown Bag Seminar, Department of Psychology, Vanderbilt University.
• Nov., 2017 “Ensemble information reflects effective gist of a visual scene.”
  Center for Cognitive Science, Yonsei University.
• Mar., 2016 “The background is remapped across saccades.”
  Center for Neuroscience Imaging Research, Institute for Basic Science.

Conference Presentations

• Cha, O. (2025, February 12–14). Sampling rate of visual awareness [Symposium]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Gwangju, Korea.
• Kim, N. [Nayoung], & Cha, O. (2025, February 12–14). Relational scene understanding relies on cortical processing evidenced by dichoptic presentation [Poster presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Gwangju, Korea.
• Kim, S. [Suyeon], & Cha, O. (2025, February 12–14). How does task-irrelevant variability influence ensemble judgments? [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Gwangju, Korea.
• Cha, O. (2024, May 17–22). Theta- and alpha-band frequency advantages for sensory gating [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.24.10.470
• Gauthier, I., Chang, T.-Y., & Cha, O. (2024, May 17–22). A general ability for simple and complex ensemble judgments [Oral presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.24.10.329
• Kim, H. [Hyerim], Kim, N. [Nayoung], Kim, H. [Hyunu], & Cha, O. (2024, May 17–22). Masked-face recognition leads to learning of new perceptual abilities [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.24.10.503
• Kim, S. [Suyeon], & Cha, O. (2024, May 17–22). Multiplicative effect of task-irrelevant feature variability on variability judgments [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.24.10.505
• Kim, H. [Hyerim], Kim, N. [Nayoung], Kim, H. [Hyunu], & Cha, O. Masked-face recognition leads to learning of new perceptual abilities [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Seoul, Korea.
• Kim, S [Suyeon], & Cha, O. (2024, February 1–3). Multiplicative effect of task-irrelevant feature variability on variability judgments [Poster presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Seoul, Korea.
• Cha, O. (2023, May 19–24). Contribution of a common ability in judgments for the mode of object identities [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.23.9.4741
• Gauthier, I., & Cha, O. (2023, May 19–24). Faces are not processed holistically in ensemble judgments [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.23.9.4583
• Kim, S. [Suyeon], & Cha, O. (2023, May 19–24). Diversity of items within attentional window explains “cost-free” diversity judgments [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.23.9.4718
• Kim, S. J., & Cha, O. (2023, May 19–24). Face recognition plays a role in ensemble judgments of facial features [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.23.9.5217
• Lee, J. [Jumi], & Cha, O. (2023, May 19–24). Multitasking without task switching [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.23.9.5203
• Kim, S. [Suyeon], & Cha, O. (2023, February 16–17). Diversity of items within attentional window explains “cost-free” diversity judgments [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Seoul, Korea.
• Kim, S. J., & Cha, O. (2023, February 16–17). Face recognition plays a role in ensemble judgments of facial features [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Seoul, Korea.
• Lee, J. [Jumi], & Cha, O. (2023, February 16–17). Multitasking without task switching [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Seoul, Korea.
• Chang, T.-Y., Cha, O., McGugin, R. W., Tomarken, A. J., & Gauthier, I. (2022, May 12–18). A general ability for ensemble perception [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.22.14.4013
• Cha, O. (2021, July 15–16). Common and feature-specific mechanisms of ensemble perception [Symposium]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology.
• Cha, O., & Blake, R. (2021, May 21–26). Extracting evidence for neural rhythms from behavioral measurements [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.21.9.1958
• Cha, O., Blake, R., & Gauthier, I. (2020, June 19–24). Judgments of average and variance within object ensembles rely on a common ability [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL. https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.20.11.841
• Blake, R., Cha, O., Son, G., & Chong, S. C. (2019, May 17–22). Novel procedure for generating continuous flash suppression: Seurat meets Mondrian [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL. https://doi.org/10.1167/19.10.63c
• Cha, O., Blake, R., & Gauthier, I. (2019, May 17–22). Stimulus-specific learning facilitates ensemble processing of cars [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL. https://doi.org/10.1167/19.10.32
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2018, May 18–23). Ensemble information is built with a bag of free-floating visual features [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL. https://doi.org/10.1167/18.10.317
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2017, August 30–31). Ensemble similarity between binocular images promotes binocular matching [Poster presentation]. Korean Society for Brain and Neural Science, Seoul, Korea.
• Cha, O., Blake, R., & Chong, S. C. (2017, May 19–24). Dissimilarity between feature ensembles triggers binocular rivalry without competing local features [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/17.10.1221
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2017, January 19–20). Effect of the skewness and peak of orientation distributions on the perceived average orientaion [Poster presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Busan, Korea.
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2016, May 13–18). Objects held in visual working memory compete for access to resources [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/16.12.1053
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2016, January 21–23). Objects held in visual working memory compete for access to resources [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Jeju, Korea.
• Eo, K. Y., Cha, O., Kang, M.-S., & Chong, S. C. (2015, May 15–20). Attending away makes semantic information available during rivalry [Oral presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/15.12.382
• Kang, K., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2015, May 15–20). Relational information decays faster than object features in visual working memory [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/15.12.535
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2015, January 14–16). Contour integration affects perceived mean orientations of Gabors [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Jeju, Korea.
• Eo, K. Y., Cha, O., Kang, K., & Chong, S. C. (2015, January 14–16). Influence of pupil size on brightness perception [Poster presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Jeju, Korea.
• Kang, K., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2015, January 14–16). Relational information decays faster than object features in visual working memory [Poster presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive and Biological Psychology, Jeju, Korea.
• Kang, M.-S., Eo, K. Y., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2014, November 15–19). Inattention opens door for unconscious processing during continuous flash suppression [Oral presentation]. Society for Neuroscience, Washington, DC, USA.
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2014, May 16–21). Contour integration affects perceived mean orientations of Gabors [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/14.10.1429
• Eo, K. Y., Cha, O., Jung, Y., & Chong, S. C. (2014, May 16–21). The relationship between vividness of visual imagery and indirect size-measurements of the visual cortex [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, St. Pete Beach, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/14.10.43
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2011, June 24). Analyzing electrophysiological signals using genetic algorithm [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive Science, Seoul, Korea.
• Baek, Y., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2011, June 24). Binocular rivalry and the perception at the blind spot [Oral presentation]. Korean Society for Cognitive Science, Seoul, Korea.
• Baek, Y., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2011, May 6–11). Temporal dynamics of binocular rivalry at the blind spot [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, Naples, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/11.11.304
• Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2010, May 7–-12). Background is remapped across saccades [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, Naples, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/10.7.516
• Baek, Y., Kim, J., Cha, O., & Chong, S. C. (2009, May 8–13). The quality of filled-in surface at the blind spot [Poster presentation]. Vision Sciences Society, Naples, FL, USA. https://doi.org/10.1167/9.8.1028