Laura Zapparoli

BRIEF BIO

I am a psychologist (Master’s degree in 2010) with a solid expertise in Psychobiology and Cognitive Neuroscience (PhD in 2016). I also hold a second Master’s degree in Biostatistics (2018).

I am Associate Professor at the Department of Psychology at the University of Milano-Bicocca. I am also Co-Director of the Neuropsychology and fMRI Unit at the Galeazzi-Sant’Ambrogio hospital in Milan. These academic and professional experiences have allowed me to develop strong expertise and extensive hands-on experience in the design of experiments within the fields of cognitive neuroscience and neuropsychology, as well as in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of both behavioural and instrumental data (fMRI, EEG, TMS).

I lead a dynamic research group currently comprising several postdoctoral fellows, PhD students, research assistants, and master’s students.

MAIN SCIENTIFIC INTERESTS AND ACHIEVEMENTS

My main research interest is the cognitive neuroscience of action from the more cognitive aspects (e.g., motor imagery, intentionality, volition, sense of agency), down to explicit motor execution and the ensuing motor awareness. I’ve explored these topics in healthy subjects, with particular attention to the changes associated with the adult life-span and the physiological processes of aging (Zapparoli et al., 2013, 2014, 2016b, 2019a, 2020b, 2022a, Mariano,…,Zapparoli, 2024a), but also in neurological (Zapparoli et al., 2015, 2016a, 2017b, 2019b, 2020d, 2024a) and psychiatric populations (Mariano,…,Zapparoli 2024b, Rossetti,…,Zapparoli 2024, 2025). Recently, I’ve oriented my research to the study of motivated behaviours (Zapparoli et al., 2022b, 2024b, 2025; Devoto,…,Zapparoli, 2022,2023,2024). These topics were studied with behavioural, fMRI, EEG, TMS, tDCS and meta-analytical techniques.

Since 2013, I’ve published 53 papers, 34 as first/last and corresponding author (21 as first and 13 as last author) in high-impact journals, such as Science Advances, PNAS, Current Biology, Cerebral Cortex, Human Brain Mapping, Brain Communications, Trends in Cognitive Science.

 POSSIBLE PhD PROJECTS

• Cognitive and neural bases of motor cognition in healthy and pathological populations (sense of agency, motor intentionality, motor imagery).
• Cognitive and neural bases of food perception in healthy and pathological populations.
• Cognitive and neural bases of substance addiction.