Under the direction of Read Montague, PhD, the Computational Psychiatry Unit combines state-of-the-art technology with neuroscience, economics, and behavioral methods to understand the neural computations involved in human cognition and psychiatric illness.

The Computational Psychiatry Unit uses diverse and innovative approaches to illuminate human cognition through an understanding of brain algorithms and the circumstances that can lead to their disruption.

The Computational Psychiatry Unit is a key program of the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute, which integrates the life sciences with the physical, engineering, behavioral, and social sciences to develop new approaches to preventing, diagnosing, treating, and curing disease. The Institute’s research teams are led by scientists who are unconstrained by conventional disciplinary boundaries as they seek innovation and discovery in the service of health.

Coined by Dr. Montague, computational psychiatry is now also the focus of an official collaboration between the Max Planck Society and University College London, where Dr. Montague holds a faculty appointment. Their shared goal is to revolutionize the approach to understanding psychopathologies by combining functional neuroimaging with computational modeling.