Social Mind and Body

Our research aims at understanding perception, action, and cognition in the context of social interaction. Traditionally, experimental psychologists and cognitive neuroscientists have studied these processes by investigating individual performance and by focusing on single minds and brains. However, being human means living a social life. It seems likely that the need to act together with others in various ways has shaped the way we perceive, act, and think as individuals.

Thus, our research has two aims: On the one hand, we want to better understand perception, action, and cognition by investigating how these processes are modulated by social interaction. For example, what can we learn about action planning by studying how two people perform a task together? On the other hand, we hope to find out more about social interaction by specifying how processes of perception, action, and cognition contribute to social skills needed for joint attention, joint action, imitation, and communication.