JOIN US IN BALTIMORE!!
The annual conference of the Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology and Life Sciences will take place at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD, August 4-6.
Register Now!!!
Go to http://www.societyforchaostheory.org/conf2006
We have a very strong program lined up for you this year that includes keynote lectures by two leaders in the field of nonlinear dynamical systems science:
Robin Vallacher (Florida Atlantic University), well known for the two books he published with Andrej Novak on dynamical systems in social psychology, will speak on Saturday night immediately following the Banquet.
Steve Boker (University of Notre Dame), whose path-breaking work on the application of differential structural equation modeling techniques to interpersonal coordination analyzes some of the most central features of self-organizing behavior, will give a sunset keynote address on Friday evening to start us all off.
The abstracts of their presentations follow:
Finding Order in the Flow of Human Experience:
The Re-Emergence of Dynamical Social Psychology
Robin R. Vallacher
Florida Atlantic University
Abstract
Human experience qualifies as a complex system, in that any aspect of intrapersonal or interpersonal functioning can be analyzed with respect to myriad factors. Because these factors rarely operate as main effects but rather interact with one another over time to promote an ever-changing trajectory of experience, personal and interpersonal processes are open to investigation as nonlinear dynamical systems. The earliest formulations of social psychology were remarkably prescient in this regard. Such pioneers as William James, C. H. Cooley, George Herbert Mead, Kurt Lewin, and Solomon Asch all emphasized the multiplicity of interacting forces operating in individual minds and in social groups, the potential for sustained patterns of change resulting from such complexity, and the tendency for individuals and groups to strive for mental and interpersonal coherence. Despite this explicit focus on dynamics at the field’s inception, social psychology for much of the 20th century typically employed paradigms better suited to capture the static aspects of experience. This state of affairs has changed in recent years with novel adaptations of nonlinear dynamical systems to a host of personal and social processes at different levels of social reality. Though still in its infancy, dynamical social psychology shows signs of emerging as a major paradigm, with the promise of establishing coherence for a field that is currently highly fragmented.
Information Flow and Symmetry Breaking in Interpersonal Coordination
Steven M. Boker
University of Notre Dame
Abstract
The semantic content of conversation is accompanied by coordinated prosody, head movement, eye movements, eyebrow movement, smiles, and other facial changes. Coordination between conversants' movements and/or facial expressions can be observed when an action generated by one individual is predictive of a symmetric movement by another. Both spatial and spatiotemporal symmetry is commonly observed in conversation and may be linked to mirror neuron systems that organize
embodied coordination into a perception--action loop. Overt expressions of symmetry thus are likely to be indicative of mutually shared inner states. But the greater the symmetry between two individuals, the greater the redundancy in their embodied states.
The greater the redundancy, the less information is transferred in a nonverbal communications channel. Therefore, symmetry breaking must also be a component of coordination in conversation. High degrees of nonstationarity in dyadic coordination have been observed in a recent set of motion tracking experiments. Current methods for estimation of nonstationarity in the association between variables are discussed
and the results of application of these methods to motion tracked dyadic conversations are presented. These results suggest that the ongoing mutual estimation of affect that occurs during human interaction may be framed as a dynamical systems model, and that this step may help us better understand emotion regulation.
Sincerely,
Matthijs Koopmans, Ed. D.
President
Society for Chaos Theory and Life Sciences
http://www.societyforchaostheory.org
(917)385-1529 (Voice)
(718)581-0951 (Fax)