Benjamin Ultan Cowley is an Associate Professor for AI in Learning and Education, and a Docent (adjunct professor) of cognitive science. He obtained a Bachelors in ICT from Trinity College Dublin in 2003, and defended his PhD in Computer Science at the University of Ulster, Northern Ireland, in 2009. In 2015 Cowley obtained the title of Docent from the Cognitive Science unit,University of Helsinki, and remains affiliated there and with the Cognitive Brain Research Unit.

Over the course of four post-doctoral projects, Cowley has: investigated psychophysiology and learning in serious games; coordinated a clinical trial on neurofeedback therapy for attentional disorder; studied the cognitive neuroscience of attention and collaboration in human-computer interaction. Ongoing research interests centre on high performance cognition.