The speakers1. Emilie Caspar: NeuropsychologyAffiliation: Associate Professor at Ghent University (Belgium) Website: https://emiliecaspar.home.blog/dr-emilie-a-caspar/ Title: Applying Neuroscience to Post-Genocide Contexts: Participation in Violence, Intergroup Biases, and Trauma Abstract: Post-genocide societies face enduring psychological, social, and cognitive challenges that shape individual behavior and collective reconstruction. In recent years, neuroscience has increasingly been used to inform our understanding of participation in mass violence, intergroup bias, and their long-term psychological and cognitive consequences. First, this talk reviews neuroscientific findings related to participation in collective violence, highlighting neural mechanisms associated with (dis)obedience among former genocide perpetrators and rescuers in Rwanda. Second, it addresses intergroup biases by demonstrating the persistence of various intergroup biases (such as empathy and prosociality) among victims and perpetrators, as well as their offspring. Third, it considers the lasting consequences of genocide exposure on brain functioning in victims, perpetrators, and subsequent generations in Rwanda and Cambodia. Taken together, the objective of this talk is to illustrate how neuroscience can be used in these highly sensitive contexts, what it can contribute to the existing literature, and how field-based neuroscientific research, rather than traditional laboratory studies conducted with university student samples, can open new avenues for understanding broader societal issues.
2. Themis Apostolidis: Social psychologyAffiliation: Psychology Professor at Aix-Marseille University Website: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Themis-Apostolidis-2 Title: Health, Illness, and Society: A Social Representation Perspective Abstract: Health and illness are complex psychosocial phenomena, multifaceted and determined by the dynamics of biological, psychological, relational, and social factors. We will explore the value of the social representations approach for studying the construction of these phenomena from a comprehensive, contextual, and sociocognitive perspective. We will draw on an analysis of the representations and risks associated with COVID-19 to illustrate our points. We will discuss health and illness as revealing elements of the principles that govern individuals' relationships with others, the world, and the social order.
3. Corinne Dano: Addiction specialist, Occupational medicineAffiliation: Hospital practitioner in the occupational psychopathology department of the Angers University Hospital Website: https://www.linkedin.com/in/corinne-dano-32307a13/ Title: Social cognition deficit in alcohol use disorder in clinical practice Abstract: Emotional and relational struggling are at the heart of addictive disorders and often fall within the realm of social cognition. They contribute to a vulnerability to stress for the these individuals, as well as to a maintenance and relapse of their pathology.
4. Louise Kirsch: Cognitive neurosciencesAffiliation: Associate Professor at Université Paris Cité, as a Researcher at the Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center (INCC) Website: https://louisekirsch.wixsite.com/louisekirsch Title: The interplay between social touch and stress Abstract: Social touch has been shown to be crucial for development and well-being. While tactile interactions have decreased drastically these past decades with the increase of people suffering from social isolation, and stress, there is a real need to better understand the variation of tactile perception depending on individual factors. In this talk, I will put together the results of recent studies shedding some lights on: (i) the impact of observed vicarious touch on stress levels, (ii) how individual factors such as anxiety are mediating the pleasantness of vicarious touch and (iii) the ontogeny of social touch perception. Overall, anxiety seems to be a strong mediator of social touch perception; partially explaining why some individuals are or are not attracted towards social touch, and why observing positive social interactions may benefit more to some individuals. Altogether, these studies highlight the necessity for future studies to better investigate the underlying mechanisms of vicarious social touch by taking into account individual differences. This is particularly important in order to understand to what extent vicarious social touch via observation could be used to reduce stress.
5. Magalie Ochs: Computer sciences, Artificial IntelligenceAffiliation: Associate Professor in Computer Science at Aix-Marseille University, Computer Science and Systems Laboratory Website: https://pageperso.lis-lab.fr/magalie.ochs/ Title: From the user to embodied AI: analysis and automatic generation of multimodal socio-affective behaviors for human-machine interaction Abstract: One of the major challenges in the field of human-computer interaction is designing models that allow for the automatic generation of multimodal behaviors in humanoid interactive systems (virtual characters or humanoid robots) during a conversation with one or more users. In artificial intelligence, a research stream focuses particularly on simulating the socio-affective behaviors of these interactive systems. Beyond simple facial expressions of emotion, the aim is to model and simulate social attitudes such as engagement, cold anger, or appreciation. These behaviors stem from the expression of multimodal signals but also depend on the signals expressed by the user during the interaction. Today, several approaches are proposed to build models that can both automatically analyze users' multimodal signals and generate appropriate behaviors in interactive systems, combining machine learning approaches on data corpora with procedural approaches. The aim of this presentation is to introduce the various research projects we are conducting to design, implement and evaluate models for the automatic generation of socio-affective behaviors in human-computer interaction. Several application frameworks will be presented with a particular focus on the use of such methods to combat social discrimination.
6. Sylvie Thirion: NeurobiologyAffiliation: PhD, Associate Professor in Physiology/Neurosciences at Aix-Marseille University Website: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sylvie-thirion-900417b/ Title: Stress, allostatic load, and social cognition: neurobiological bases of vulnerability and resilience Abstract: Activation of the stress axis is an essential adaptive physiological response for survival. However, when prolonged or excessive, the increased allostatic load can become detrimental, even toxic, to the organism. Brain-body interactions, and in particular the dynamic communication between the nervous, endocrine, and immune systems, play a central role in these processes.
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