Workshop Information
This is the second time this workshop is organised by Dr. Ori Ossmy and is funded by the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development (CBCD) at Birkbeck, University of London. The workshop will be held at the University of London campus in the district of Bloomsbury.
The first day of the workshop will focus on training attendees to record natural human behaviour. This training includes two practical sessions by experts in the field. Attendees will be provided with the materials and can use them in their own research.
After the training sessions and a short break, we will have an evening “Posters & Drinks” session where attendees will have the opportunity to present their posters. Researchers from Birkbeck and UCL will come to this session which will include drinks and nibbles.
The second day of the workshop will include training on analysing and visualising naturalistic behaviour, flash talks by attendees and smaller group discussions on the potential of using a naturalistic approach.
Speakers & Panelists:
Prof. Sam Wass (University of East London) is a developmental
cognitive neuroscientist who leads the BabyDevLab at the University of East London. His research examines the early development of attention
and stress. He tries to do this based entirely on naturalistic real-world
Prof. Natasha Kirkham (Birkbeck, University of London) is an
internationally renowned developmental researcher, the President-
Elecof the International Congress of Infant Studies, and the Chair of
Ethics for the School of Science at Birkbeck. Natasha's research
is focused on early learning and the environment, specifically on how
learning occurs in the middle of everything, with a specific interest in the role of noise and home chaos on attention. Current projects from her lab are investigating the impact of noise, distraction and rhythm on infants' and children's perception and attention.
Prof. Jamie Ward (Goldsmith, University of London) is an expert in
wearable computing, social neuroscience, and theatre. His work is
broadly concerned with how we can best use wearable sensing and
machine learning as tools to help us capture, model, and understand
real-world human activity and behaviour. As part of this effort, he draws on methods from theatre and performance as a way of obtaining close-to-real-world data, developing the idea of using theatre as a laboratory will talk about practicalities – what sensors to use, how to build them, and what data they provide.
Prof. Rebecca Gordon (University College London) is a Chartered
Member and Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society and
Director of the Motor Executive Cognitive Interaction (MECI) Lab. In
addition, she is a member of the Management Committee for
the Centre for Educational Neuroscience (CEN) and chair of the Faculty
Education Forum for UCL Institute of Education. Her research focuses on working memory/executive function as it relates to academic outcomes such as reading and mathematics. She is also interested in the relationships between executive functions and dyslexia in children and adults.
Prof. Aldo Faisal (Imperial College London) is a Professor of AI &
Neuroscience who leads the Brain & Behaviour Lab that combines
cross-disciplinary computational and experimental approaches to
investigate how the brain and behaviour evolved to learn and control
goal-directed behaviour. The neuroscientific findings enable the targeted development of novel technology for clinical and research applications for a variety of neurological/motor disorders and amputees. Key techniques on the computational side include data-driven methods from machine learning & stochastic modelling techniques, and on the experimental side he uses sensorimotor experiments, eyetracking & kinematics (full-body, hands), non-invasive electrophysiology (EEG, fNIRS), robotics (hand & arm robots).
Dr. Ori Ossmy (Birkbeck, University of London) is a developmental psychologist, cognitive neuroscientist, and computer scientist who is using a unique integration of theory and methods drawn from these fields. He studies how changes that occur over relatively long time
periods—changes due to learning, development, injury, and rehabilitation—emerge from micro, real-time experiences, and how these real-time experiences play out in an interactive system of perceptual, neural, cognitive, and motor processes. Ori will talk about how to analyse and visualise naturalistic data, and specifically how to identify behavioural structures over time.
Schedule:
Day 1: Thursday, September 21st:
09:30 - 10:15: Gathering & Breakfast
10:15 - 10:45: Welcome & Overview
10:45- 13:00 Training session 1 - why is naturalistic experimentation important?
13:00 - 14:00: Lunch
14:00 - 15:00: Flash talks
15:00 - 15:15: Coffee break
15:15 - 16:00: Group work (breakout rooms) - what is naturalistic experimentation?
16:00 - 17:45: Panelists' presentations & discussion
18:00 - 21:00: Beer & Food poster session
Day 2: Friday, September 22nd:
9:30 - 10:30: Gathering & Breakfast
10:30 - 12:30: Training session 2 - the engineering of naturalistic experimentation
12:30 - 13:30: Lunch
13:30 - 15:30: Training session 3 - analysing naturalistic data
15:30 - 15:45: Coffee break
15:45 - 17:15: Group work (breakout rooms) - Theory-driven vs. Data-driven
17:15 - 17:45: Closing remarks and feedback
Fees:
The cost of the workshop is £75 and includes food & drinks. There are no application fees.
Key Dates:
Application deadline: July 24, 2023
Notification of acceptance: August 11, 2023
Workshop dates: September 21-22, 2023
Location:
Birkbeck, University of London
Birkbeck Main Building, Malet Street
London WC1E 7HX
