Prix et Conférences Jean Nicod 2014

Chris et Uta FRITH

Uta Frith est Professeur émérite en psychologie développementale cognitive à l’Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience à University College London et Professeur invitée à l’université d’Aarhus. Uta est l’une des pionnières de la recherche sur l’autisme d’un point de vue cognitif. Elle a proposé une analyse systématique des déficits sous-jacents afin de mieux comprendre les symptômes majeurs de l’autisme, à savoir l’absence d’interaction sociale réciproque associée à des capacités perceptives inhabituelles. Elle fut aussi parmi les premières à proposer une théorie neuro-cognitive de la dyslexie en étudiant les processus impliqués dans la lecture et l’écriture. Ces derniers temps, elle s’est intéressée aux applications possibles de certaines théories neuroscientifiques pour l’éducation. Elle est aussi une fervente avocate du rôle des femmes dans la recherche. Uta a reçu de nombreux titres honorifiques dans des universités européennes et est membre de la British Academy et de la Royal Society.

Chris Frith est Professeur émérite en neuropsychologie au Wellcome Centre for Neuroimaging à University College London et Professeur invité à l’université d’Aarhus. Il a joué un rôle clé dans le développement  des études en imagerie cérébrale fonctionnelle pour mieux comprendre  les fonctions cognitives et leurs relations au cerveau. Sa recherche a porté en particulier sur le sentiment d’agentivité, qu’il a analysé à partir des modèles computationnels du système moteur et de ses perturbations dans la schizophrénie. Il s’intéresse en outre aux mécanismes implicites et explicites mis en jeu dans la cognition sociale. Il travaille en ce moment sur la distinction entre le mode personnel et le mode sub-personnel de la cognition, s’inscrivant dans un cadre théorique bayésien. Chris a reçu de nombreux titres honorifiques dans des universités européennes et est membre de la British Academy et de la Royal Society.


Conférences Jean-Nicod 2014

"WHAT MAKES US SOCIAL?"
 

Programme - Brochure
 

Vendredi 14 novembre 2014 de 14h30 à 16h30
Enregistrement Audio et Vidéo
Ecole normale supérieure, 45, rue d'Ulm 75005 Paris. Salle Dussane
Uta Frith
What is innate and what is acquired in social cognition?

Résumé :
Cognitive mechanisms that underlie human social interactions encompass many primary capacities, including emotion contagion, learning by observation, and conformity. How do these engines develop in a child and how does nurture shape the development? I propose that the brain at birth comes equipped with start-up kits that enable fast track learning. I will use so-called ‘explicit mentalising’ as an example of a culturally acquired ability and contrast it with ‘implicit mentalising’, an innate capacity. I also speculate that there are culturally diverse cognitive ‘apps’ that are installed from the outside, by instruction. Once installed, they can trickle down into the unconscious part of the social mind and can control implicit processes. Thus, tensions between different innate mechanisms can be resolved. This can explain how human beings create normative rules for acceptable and unacceptable social behaviour, which regulate selfishness and altruism.

Chris et Uta Frith recevront le Prix Jean-Nicod après la conférence.

Mardi 18 novembre 2014 de 14h30 à 16h30
Enregistrement Audio et Video
Ecole normale supérieure, 29, rue d’Ulm, 75005 Paris. Salle Jules Ferry.
Chris Frith
Mechanisms of social interaction

Résumé :
The brain is often described as a Bayesian machine that makes inferences about the state of the world. The mechanisms of perception by which such inferences are updated via prediction errors are well understood. These same mechanisms enable us to learn about the world of objects and agents by observing the behaviour of others. However, of equal importance are the mechanisms of action by which the state of the world is updated in response to prediction errors. The interplay of perception and action is critical for joint action and for learning about and exploring the world of groups and ideas through experience and communication. Simple rules linking perception and action can create complex interactions in groups such shoaling in fish and pack hunting in wolves. In the same way simple rules governing communicative interactions can lead to the emergence of groups such as institutions, and concepts such as meaning.

Jeudi 20 novembre 2014 de 14h30 à 16h30
Enregistrement Audio et Video
Ecole normale supérieure, 29, rue d’Ulm, 75005 Paris. Salle Jules Ferry.
Uta Frith
Lessons for social cognition from atypical development

Résumé :
Many neurodevelopmental disorders, in addition to autism, affect social communication, over and above other cognitive processes. Does this show that social communication is the most complex and hence most fragile of cognitive accomplishments that will show down-stream effects of interruptions that can happen during neural migration and/or pruning? Not necessarily. Not all neuro-developmental disorders affect social interaction. Another possibility is that human beings at all ages are extremely sensitive, and consequently unforgiving, when detecting a failure of social abilities, and this might conceivably be a reason for the frequent diagnosis of social impairments. Already at a young age children can spot another child who does not attempt to conform.

Vendredi 21 novembre 2014 de 14h30 à 16h30
Enregistrement Audio et Video
Ecole normale supérieure, 29, rue d’Ulm, 75005 Paris. Salle Jules Ferry.
Chris Frith
Explicit metacognition: the person-culture loop

Résumé :
Many neurodevelopmental disorders, in addition to autism, affect social communication, over and above other cognitive processes. Does this show that social communication is the most complex and hence most fragile of cognitive accomplishments that will show down-stream effects of interruptions that can happen during neural migration and/or pruning? Not necessarily. Not all neuro-developmental disorders affect social interaction. Another possibility is that human beings at all ages are extremely sensitive, and consequently unforgiving, when detecting a failure of social abilities, and this might conceivably be a reason for the frequent diagnosis of social impairments. Already at a young age children can spot another child who does not attempt to conform.

Sélection bibliographique
 

2014  N. J. Shea, A. Boldt, D. Bang, N. Yeung, C. Heyes & C. D. Frith. Supra-Personal Cognitive Control and Metacognition. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 18(4): 186-193.
2014  C. D Frith. How the brain creates culture. Nova Acta Leopoldina. In press.
2013  U. Frith. Autism and Dyslexia: A Glance Over 25 Years of Research. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 8 (6), 670-672
2012 C. Frith & U. Frith. Mechanisms of Social Cognition. Annual Review of Psychology, 63, 287-313.
1992  C. D. Frith. The Cognitive Neuropsychology Of Schizophrenia. Erlbaum: Hove.
2012  U. Frith. Why we need cognitive explanations of autism. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 65(11): 2073-2092.
2007 C. D. Frith. Making up the Mind: How the Brain Creates Our Mental World. MA: Blackwell.
(en français Comment le cerveau crée notre univers mental. Paris : Odile Jacob, 2010)
2010  U. Frith & C. Frith. The social brain: allowing humans to boldly go where no other species has been. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 365(1537):165-176.
2008 C.D. Frith & U. Frith. Implicit and explicit processes in social cognition. Neuron, 60(3): 503-510.
2007 J. M. Kilner, K. J. Friston & C. D. Frith. The mirror system: a Bayesian perspective. Neuroreport, 18, 619-623.
2006  C.D. Frith & U. Frith. The neural basis of mentalizing. Neuron, 50(4) 531-4.
2005  U. Frith, with S.-J. Blakemore. The Learning Brain: Lessons for Education. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
2003  U. Frith. Autism: Explaining the Enigma. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
(en français L'Énigme de l'autisme. Paris : Odile Jacob, 2e édition 2006)
1999  U. Frith & C. Frith. Interacting minds - A biological basis. Science, 286, 1692-1695.