In their 2025 study published in Nature - Scientific Reports, Maack, Ostrowski, & Rose explore how the human brain encodes and retrieves the sequence order of multisensory information. Specifically, how the order of auditory and visual stimuli affects memory recognition.

When companies bring me in to review or teach neuro-based research methods, I can usually predict where the conversation will go. We’ll talk about EEG. GSR. Maybe eye tracking. Often the Implicit Association Test (IAT). There’s usually excitement about the potential of these tools. And rightly so, they can provide valuable insights when used well.

But there's one message I find myself repeating in every session, like a drum I can’t stop beating: humans are complicated.

When neuroscience intersects with consumer research, it promises an enticing frontier: uncovering what truly drives human behavior, often at a subconscious level. Yet as appealing as it sounds, this approach can run into a significant methodological pitfall—reverse inference.