Joint Action

Expert performance of many techniques requires learning precise motor plans, sophisticated control of the timing and trajectory of …

There is no one way to learn a technique; their acquisition depends on the specifics of the learning context. Such demands speak to our capacity to successfully transmit vital know-how by flexibly adapting to local contingencies. Cognitive accounts of cultural learning have yet to explain this flexibility. Here, we argue that a key feature of cultural learning is that both the expert(s) and novice(s) recruit cognitive mechanisms of action coordination modulating their behavior contingently on the behavior of their partner, generating a process of mutual adaptation supporting the successful transmission of technical skills in diverse and fluctuating learning environments.

Expert performance of many techniques requires learning precise motor plans, sophisticated control of the timing and trajectory of …

Copying has been a productive paradigm for the study cultural learning. Copying is about information transmission, the success of which …

The cultural transmission of technical know-how has proven vital to the success of our species. The broad diversity of learning …

People have a drive towards maximising the efficiency of their individual actions, but are also willing to sacrifice their own efficiency to maximise joint utility. One thing that could potentially interfere with this drive towards maximising efficiency is a motivation towards fairness - what happens when the most overall efficient option in a joint action requires an unfair task distribution from the two people involved? In two experiments, we find that people reliably prioritise efficiency over fairness, which supports action planning accounts for joint actions that emphasise rationality.

Developing an individual skill is a daunting undertaking. Take learning a musical instrument: when a person first picks up a guitar, …

Owning an object makes it special to us, and people identify objects they own faster than objects they do not; this has typically been assumed to be a general feature of object processing—that is, an object that belongs to you will be subject to a general advantage in processing by virtue of its ownership status. We show that, contrary to this assumption, this general processing advantage depends heavily on where the object appears; owned objects are not processed faster if they appear outside one’s own space. This gives important insights into how ownership and self-relevance, which are usually studied in simplified laboratory environments, might operate differently in more complex real-world environments where space itself can be owned.

How do people acquire complex skills and techniques through social learning?