From 2021 to 2023, [Dr Ryutaro Uchiyama] was a Research Fellow with the Centre for Lifelong Learning and Individualised Cognition (CLIC). CLIC is a research programme hosted by CARES and a collaboration between the University of Cambridge and Nanyang Technological University (NTU) that works at the intersection of neuroscience, lifespan development, and cognitive training.
My role mainly focused on studying cognitive flexibility — the ability to flexibly switch between attentional states — in Singaporean secondary school students. Much of this work was conducted with people at the National Institute of Education, an institute within NTU that trains all teachers in Singapore and is a global powerhouse in education research. Toward the end of my time with CLIC, I also developed a particular interest in the measurement of creativity.
I’m from Japan, but obtained degrees in Canada (BSc), the US (MA), and UK (PhD) before settling in Singapore. I originally came here for family reasons but was excited to discover that CLIC had just launched near the time I was completing my PhD thesis.
CLIC turned out to be a fantastic opportunity, where I was surrounded by brilliant mentors and colleagues from who I learned so much. During my PhD in at the London School of Economics, my research team comprised just me and my supervisor (I was his first PhD student). In contrast, CLIC was a massive team effort on a scale that you might find in genomics or physics, but rarely in my field of cognitive and behavioural sciences.
The experience helped me learn about team management, coordination with external actors (schools, government agencies, etc.), the local research ecosystem, and the ethos of translational research. Because I joined the group while Covid-19 restrictions were underway, there were various challenges in the beginning related to data collection and the inability to meet colleagues face-to-face. As the pandemic subsided, I got to know the CLIC members much better, and I remain friends with many of them to this day.
Dr Uchiyama (right) with other CLIC Research Fellows in Cambridge during one of their writing bootcamps. CLIC’s Senior Scientific Advisor, Prof Trevor Robbins, is in the top right.
I moved to Tübingen, Germany in 2023 to work on a research project that would bridge the work I was doing in CLIC (cognition) with the work from my PhD (cultural evolution) within an AI research centre.
The birth of our first child brought me back to Singapore, and just this week I joined the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) as an Assistant Professor in their Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences cluster. I’m excited to begin teaching at SUTD, and to pass on the insights I’ve picked up from my colleagues and mentors over the years.
CLIC is supported by the National Research Foundation, Prime Minister’s Office, Singapore, under its Campus for Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE) programme.
