CogOnt Seminar: Y. Kenett/M. Viola

Part of our ongoing online seminar series.  See the full list of talks here.

Register using this link: https://pitt.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_KMNKu4fmQ9Wh5ZjvXJ3qQA

Please note, registration will be for the entire seminar series.

Yoed Kenett (University of Pennsylvania), “Developing a Neurally Informed Ontology of Creativity Measurement”

Co-Authors:  David J. M. Kraemer (Dartmouth College), Katherine L. Alfred (Dartmouth College), Griffin A. Colaizzi (Georgetown University), Robert A. Cortes (Georgetown University), & Adam E. Green (Georgetown University)

ABSTRACT:

A central challenge for creativity research is to establish a mapping between constructs and measures. A related challenge is the lack of consistency of measures used by different researchers, which hinders progress toward shared understanding of cognitive and neural components of creativity. New resources for aggregating neuroimaging data, and the emergence of methods for identifying structure in multivariate data, present the potential for new approaches to address these challenges. Identifying meta-analytic structure (i.e., similarity) in neural activity associated with creativity tasks might enable identification of a set of tasks that best reflects the similarity among a set of creativity-relevant constructs. Here, we demonstrated initial proof-of-concept for such an approach. We surveyed creativity researchers to build a model of similarity between creativity-relevant constructs. Next, we used NeuroSynth meta-analytic software to generate maps of neural activity robustly associated with tasks intended to measure the same set of creativity-relevant constructs. A representational similarity analysis-based approach revealed that the fit between these models was stronger for some constructs and weaker for others. Critically, we identified particular constructs—and particular tasks measuring those constructs—that positively or negatively impacted the model fit. 

Marco Viola (University of Turin), “A Neural-based Assessment of Basic Emotion Theory: Accept, Reject, or Revise and Resubmit?”

ABSTRACT:

After decades of disagreement on psychological grounds, the debate over the existence of Basic Emotions has moved to neuroscience. While it is generally agreed that Basic Emotions cannot be mapped on to dedicated neural regions, they do seem to correlate with sets of regions. Some researchers argue that this latter kind of mapping vindicates the existence of Basic Emotions, others (such as psychological constructionists) argue for their elimination from our mental ontology. 

In my talk, I propose that this disagreement is due to different attitudes towards how we should approach brain-based reforms of cognitive ontology: researchers friendly to Basic Emotions are ‘conservatives’, i.e. they use brain data to validate psychological categories we already have, while psychological constructionists advocate a ‘radical’ approach, where neural data are seen as a mean to refurnish the cognitive ontology. I discuss some shortcomings of both positions. 

With this diagnosis in place, I unpack the macro-question “does the neural evidence support Basic Emotions?” into two smaller questions, namely “is Basic Emotion Theory a viable research program?” and “are the six categories proposed by Ekman vindicated?”. By responding “yes” and “no”, respectively, I endorse a ‘moderate’ approach to revisions of our cognitive ontology of emotions.