MTS is the department’s Mind, Technology, and Society speaker series. It is hosted by a different faculty member each semester. Founded by a generous gift from Professors Robert Glushko and Pamela Samuelson, MTS brings researchers and industry professionals from across the globe to present a variety of interdisciplinary work in cognitive science. See our UCMerced CogSci youtube channel for videos of past MTS talks!
CIS graduate students, faculty, and staff, and all who are interested are invited! Members of other departments at UC Merced as well as the general public are encouraged to attend. (Note: current CIS Ph.D. students are required to attend MTS each semester in residence, to fulfill their COGS 250 course requirement).
Dr. Stolk's talk "Building a Shared Conceptual Space" will be 3-4:30pm in COB 116.
Abstract: Intuitively, we might think humans understand one another because they share a common set of communicative signals, such as words and gestures. However, that intuition overlooks the extreme flexibility with which we use these signals in everyday interaction. Neither can it account for our evolutionarily rare ability to instantly reach joint meaning of entirely new signals. In this talk, I will present neuroscientific evidence converging on the notion that human communicators share not signals but a fleeting conceptual space. This shared conceptual space provides the context for selecting and interpreting signals, is jointly coordinated and updated as interactions unfold, and that coordinated updating appears to be altered in individuals with autism. Finally, I will present ongoing efforts that combine studies of live communication with intracranial recordings in neurosurgical patients, offering rare mechanistic insights into our core mutual understanding abilities.
Bio: Arjen Stolk is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Dartmouth College. His research investigates the cognitive and neural mechanisms that enable mutual understanding in human interaction. By combining controlled studies of live communication with neuroimaging and electrophysiology in both clinical and non-clinical populations, his lab aims to understand how interacting minds dynamically construct shared meaning in real time.
For more information or to sign up for email announcements, please contact the talk series organizer: cis-mts-lead@lists.ucmerced.edu.
