Evolved psychological biases and dissemination of political information in social network

Many political news stories reach citizens via a two-step process, transmitted to them indirectly via their social networks. Yet, why do some news stories “go viral” and become transmitted heavily in citizens’ social networks with strong impact on their political pinions while others go by almost unnoticed?

A Researcher in 2019

In light of the new tools for researchers to conduct and communicate their research, we organized a workshop to discuss essential elements for a researcher in 2019. Morning session speakers (Dr. Franck Ramus, Élodie Chabrol, and Judith Lenglet) will advise researchers on how to communicate their research to their peers and the general public (e.g. blogs, twitter, graphical presentation), while afternoon speakers (Dr. Guillaume Dumas, Georgia Loukatou, Sacha Altay, and Dr. Camila Scaff) will showcase crucial tools (e.g.

CANCELLED - Deliberate ignorance: The curious choice not to know

Western history of thought abounds with claims that knowledge is valued and sought. Yet people often choose not to know. We call the conscious choice not to seek or use knowledge (or information) deliberate ignorance. Using examples from a wide range of domains, we demonstrate that deliberate ignorance has important functions. We systematize types of deliberate ignorance, describe their functions, discuss their normative desirability, and consider how they can be modeled. We conclude that the desire not to know is no anomaly.

Metacontrol of reinforcement learning

Modern theories of reinforcement learning posit two systems competing for control of behavior: a "model-free" or "habitual" system that learns cached state-action values, and a "model-based" or  "goal-directed" system that learns a world model which is then used to plan actions. I will argue that humans can adaptively invoke model-based computation when its benefits outweigh its costs. A simple meta-control learning rule can capture the dynamics of this cost-benefit analysis. Neuroimaging evidence points to the role of cognitive control regions in this computation.