Social Development of human infant: its model and disorders

1. "Social development by being expected to be social" - Hisashi Ishihara
Robots may become social by being expected to be social. Our group has investigated how human caregivers’ expectation for their infants as social agents develops infants’ sociality. We focused on a kind of possible perceptual bias, what we call “auto-mirroring bias,” that we interpret the other’s behaviors more like ones we expected. Our simulation results indicate this kind of caregiver’s biases guide infant’s behavior toward expected one, when the infant learns relationship between infant’s own behaviors and caregiver’s through mutually imitative interaction. I will talk about the simulation taking vowel development as an example and the possibility of applying this developmental mechanism to other developments.

About the Speaker : Hisashi Ishihara is a Ph.D. student in Emergent Robotics Laboratory (Osaka university, Japan) and researching in cognitive developmental robotics. He has been collaborating on my research activities with JST ERATO Asada Synergistic Intelligence Project (JEAP) from 2006 and is working as a research fellow of Japan Society of for the Promotion of Science (JSPS). His research interests are in intersubjective interaction and internal development of the subjects through their interaction.

2. "Considering social aspects of mind and behavior research: An Autism Spectrum Disorders case" - Jin Higashijima
The science of mind and behavior is a field that is widely anticipated to make a big contribution to human society. Meanwhile, there are serious concerns that the knowledge produced by the science of mind and behavior, which is closely connected to humans’ social values, and in particular individuals and/or social groups, could have a disastrous effect on society. Forcible sterilizations and euthanasia based on eugenic social policy are typical examples of these concerns. Hoping never to repeat such tragedies, the necessity of paying attention and taking the social aspects of each study in the field of science of mind and behavior into consideration has been recognized on a global level.

In this presentation, I would like to focus on the relationship between research on Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and society. ASD is a group of neurodevelopmental disorders that is currently diagnosed through the observation of core behavioral symptoms. It is one of the representative disorders in mind and behavior science, resulting from 1) a large, increasing population of patients and their relatives, and 2) great advancement in mind and behavior research in terms of the biological aspects of ASD, especially in the fields of neuro- and genome science. Differences between people with and without ASD in their communication and social relationships have been represented as biological information. Treatment and therapy for the differences from various perspectives, and a detection system for such differences, have also emerged.

The question remains: How do the situations surrounding ASD research affect people with ASD and their families, and people who might be defined as having ASD in the near future? How and what kind of examination and consideration of the social implications of ASD research are necessary? The answers to these questions depend on the time and place. In my presentation, I would like to show you a part of our research that is focusing on the opinions and knowledge of parents of child(ren) with ASD about research on the biological aspects of ASD. The main topics I will cover will be their (1) impressions and opinions of information on brain-related as well as genome-related differences between people with and without ASD, and (2) perspectives on therapies and treatments for characteristics of ASD that is mainly shown as differences in cognitive functions such as communication and social skills.

About the Speaker :  Jin Higashijima graduated from Keio University and is currently with Kato laboratory in Kyoto University, Japan. Her major interest is about social aspects of mind and behaviors, though it traverses across broad fields.