Julene Johnson, PhD

Prof of Cognitive Neuroscience
N_IHA Operations
[email protected]
+1 415 476-1106

Julene K Johnson, PhD is a Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at the UCSF Institute for Health & Aging. She is the Principal Investigator of the NIH/NIA U24 "Music & Dementia Research Network" and is the UCSF site principal investigator for the National Science Foundation-funded AccelNet. She is a long-standing faculty mentor in the UCSF Center for Aging in Diverse Communities (a NIA-funded Resource Center for Minority Aging Research). Dr. Johnson obtained her PhD in cognitive neuroscience at the University of Texas at Dallas and completed postdoctoral training at the University of California, Irvine's Institute for Brain Aging and Dementia (now called the MIND Institute). Her undergraduate degree is in music.

Dr. Johnson's research program focuses on two primary themes: 1) developing and testing music-based interventions (MBIs) to promote health and well-being among older adults with and without cognitive impairment, and 2) understanding brain and cognitive function among diverse older adults. Her research on community-engaged health promotion involves racial/ethnically and socioeconomically diverse older adults. In 2010, she was a Fulbright scholar in Finland where she studied how singing in a community choir influences quality of life and well-being among older adults.

Dr. Johnson served as the Associate Dean for Research for the UCSF School of Nursing (2017-2023) and the UCSF representative and Chair of the Advisory Committee for the University of California Humanities Research Institute (2013-2016). She also was the Principal Investigator of the National Endowment for the Arts-funded "Sound Health Network" (2000-2025)

Publications

Sensitivity of revised diagnostic criteria for the behavioural variant of frontotemporal dementia.

Brain : a journal of neurology

Rascovsky K, Hodges JR, Knopman D, Mendez MF, Kramer JH, Neuhaus J, van Swieten JC, Seelaar H, Dopper EG, Onyike CU, Hillis AE, Josephs KA, Boeve BF, Kertesz A, Seeley WW, Rankin KP, Johnson JK, Gorno-Tempini ML, Rosen H, Prioleau-Latham CE, Lee A, Kipps CM, Lillo P, Piguet O, Rohrer JD, Rossor MN, Warren JD, Fox NC, Galasko D, Salmon DP, Black SE, Mesulam M, Weintraub S, Dickerson BC, Diehl-Schmid J, Pasquier F, Deramecourt V, Lebert F, Pijnenburg Y, Chow TW, Manes F, Grafman J, Cappa SF, Freedman M, Grossman M, Miller BL