Current PhD Students

Sustained Attention, Vigilance, Cognitive Workload, Applied Neuroimaging, fNIRs, Human Performance, Human-Automation Interaction

Allie Thompson is a Ph.D. student in Human Factors and Applied Cognition at George Mason University. Her research focuses on sustained attention, vigilance decrement, cognitive workload, and the mechanisms underlying human performance over time. She is particularly interested in how task demands, attentional control, mind wandering, and cognitive resource allocation influence performance in applied settings. Her current work uses behavioral methods and functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to examine cognitive workload and attentional engagement during sustained-attention tasks. Broadly, her research aims to improve the assessment and support of human operators in high-demand environments, including military, defense, and human-automation contexts.