Summer School (ISSAS)

Speakers

 

International Summer School in Affective Sciences (ISSAS)

 

Emotions & Well-being

July 7-15, 2022 
Chateau de bossey, Switzerland

 

Keynote speakers

 

Profil

Prof. Meike Bartels

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Website
Happiness and well-being have emerged as important study subjects within and across many fields of research. A major driving force behind this is the association with physical and mental health and its pivotal role in socioeconomic issues and economic development. With the increased interest in the importance of wellbeing it is critically important to understand and reveal sources of individual differences. Prof Meike Bartels will present her work on genetic and environmental influences on wellbeing and the wellbeing spectrum.
She will present behavioral and molecular genetic findings and results of an exposome-wide association study. She will furthermore explain the importance of her findings for individuals and the society at large. Meike Bartels (1973) is University Research Chair Professor in Genetics and Wellbeing at the Department of Biological Psychology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
She is the President of the International Positive Psychology Association and the Past-Presidents of the Behavior Genetics Association. She combines research with teaching and is the Director of the Research Master Genes in Behaviour and Health, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.
 
Profil

Prof. Michael Bishop

Florida State University
Website
I am Professor of Philosophy at Florida State University. My research focuses on two main issues that are central to how people live their lives. The first is how we ought to reason about the world. JD Trout and I wrote Epistemology and the Psychology of Human Judgment (Oxford 2005).
I’m currently working on a project to figure out whether it’s possible to teach people to be more rational in their reasoning a year (or more) after training is over. (It is.) The second focus of my research is happiness and well-being. I wrote The Good Life: Unifying the Philosophy and Psychology of Well-Being (Oxford 2015).
I defend the view that your life is going well for you when the good things in your life today have a settled tendency to bring you more good things tomorrow.
 
Profil

Dr. Hayley Dorfman

Harvard University
Website
Hayley Dorfman is a National Science Foundation SBE Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University working with Elizabeth Phelps. She completed her Ph.D. with Sam Gershman in the Computational Cognitive Neuroscience Lab.
Her research investigates the computational, behavioral, and neural mechanisms underlying how people make inferences about unknowable or uncertain things, and how these inferences influence learning.
Some of her work focuses on how people make inferences about things such as their control over the environment, their own feelings, and the valence of the outcomes they receive. The ultimate goal of her research is to determine how individual differences in reinforcement learning contribute to psychopathology.
 
Profil

Prof. Antti Kauppinen

University of Helsinski
Website
I'm Professor of Practical Philosophy at the University of Helsinki. I finished my PhD there almost 15 years ago, and spent the next ten or so years abroad at the universities of St Andrews, Amsterdam, and Trinity College Dublin, before returning to my home country.
I've worked on too many issues in and around ethics, including moral sentimentalism, various moral emotions, well-being, meaning in life, happiness, and lately the relationship between epistemic and moral norms. I'm currently writing a monograph defending a new perfectionist theory of well-being and discussing its implications. Its working title is The Shape of a Good Life: Agency, Meaning, and Well-Being.
 
Profil

Prof. Dacher Keltner

University of California, Berkeley
Website
Dacher Keltner is a professor of Psychology at UC Berkeley and faculty director of the Greater Good Science Center (greatergood.berkeley.edu). Born in Mexico and raised by a literature professor (Mother) and artist (Father), Dacher’s research focuses on the biological and evolutionary origins of compassion, awe, love, beauty, and humility, as well as power, social class, and inequality.
Dacher is the author of several hundred scientific articles, several books, including Born to Be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life, The Compassionate Instinct, The Power Paradox: How We Gain and Lose Influence, and AWE (to be published January 3, 2023), and has written for popular outlets like the New York Times.
He has consulted for Apple, Pinterest, Google, the Sierra Club, and was a scientific consultant for Pixar’s Inside Out and Soul and for the Center for Constitutional Rights in its work to outlaw solitary confinement.
 
Profil

Prof. Patricia Lockwood

University of Birmingham
Website
Dr. Patricia Lockwood is a Sir Henry Dale Fellow and Jacobs Foundation Research Fellow at the University of Birmingham. Her lab investigates social learning and decision-making across the lifespan and in neurological and psychiatric disorders using a mixture of computational modelling, behavioural measures, self-report, patient studies and neuroimaging.
You can read more about the work in the lab here: www.sdn-lab.org.
 
Profil

Prof. Stefano Palminteri

Ecole normale supérieure (Paris)
Website
I am head of the Human Reinforcement Learning team, which is part of the Laboratoire de Neurosciences Cognitives et Computationelles (Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale & École Normale Supérieure, Paris). I am current a editorial board member of Communication Biology, PLoS Computational Biology and Computational Psychiatry. I am a member of European Laboratory of Learning and Ingeligent Systems (ELLIS) Society.
My goal is to understand how humans learn to make decisions at the behavioral, computational, and neural levels. I am mainly (but not only!) interested in situations when decisions are based on past experience (a.k.a. reinforcement learning).
My modus operandi consists in modifying reinforcement learning models so that they can account for human behavior. In my spare time, I enjoy questioning the epistemological and methodological foundations of decision-making research and neuroeconomics.
 
Profil

Prof. Gilles Pourtois

Ghent University
Website
I am professor of psychology at Ghent University, Belgium, where I founded in 2016 and have led ever since the Cognitive & Affective Psychophysiology Laboratory (CAPLAB).
CAPLAB's research primarily focuses on emotional and motivational influences on cognition, with a focus on selective attention and performance monitoring. To address this question, we use standard behavioral and psychophysiological (e.g. EEG) methods in human adult subjects, who are tested in well-controlled laboratory conditions. After an initial focus on negative emotions, anxiety and defensive motivation, we recently have started to explore and better characterize modulatory effects of positive emotions on attention and performance monitoring.
These research efforts show that selective attention and performance monitoring are not encapsulated, but they are readily shaped by emotion and motivation to foster goal adaptive behavior. Ultimately, this research could also serve to improve the diagnosis and treatment of patients with specific affective disorders, including anxiety and depression.
Profil

Prof. Wolfram Schultz

University of Cambridge
Website
Wolfram Schultz is a graduate in medicine from the University of Heidelberg. After postdoctoral stays in Germany, USA and Sweden, and a faculty position in Switzerland, he works currently at the University of Cambridge as Wellcome Principal Research Fellow and Professor of Neuroscience; he is a Fellow of Churchill College and the Royal Society (FRS).
He combines behavioural, neurophysiological and neuroimaging techniques to investigate the neural mechanisms of reward, learning and economic decision making. He uses behavioural concepts from animal learning theory and economic decision theory to study the neurophysiology and neuroimaging of reward and risk in individual neurons and in specific brain regions, including the dopamine system, striatum, orbitofrontal cortex and amygdala.
 
Profil

Prof. Giorgia Silani

University of Vienna
Website
I obtained my PhD in cognitive neuroscience at the University of Milano in 2006. Between 2004 and 2006 I worked at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, London, under the supervision of Prof. Uta Frith and in 2007 at the Center for Social Neuroscience and Neuroeconomics, University of Zurich, as a post doc under Prof. Tania Singer.
In 2010 I moved to the Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati, Trieste, as independent group leader.
Since 2014 I joined the University of Vienna where I lead the Clinical Social Neuroscience (CSN) Unit. My major research focus lies in the neurobiological basis of social cognition, emotions, and behaviors.
 
Profil

Prof. Anita Tusche

Queen's University
Website
I am an assistant professor at Queen’s University in Canada. My research program is part of an exciting, newly emerging field called neuroeconomics. My lab studies human decision-making in various domains (altruism, dietary choice, consumer behavior). I am particularly interested in the processes that drive differences in decisions across people, context, and time.
What processes explain our remarkable ability to understand others (e.g., empathy)? How do our thoughts and emotions shape behaviors that involve other people (e.g., altruistic behavior, our ability to navigate social groups successfully)?
To address these questions, we employ various techniques (ranging from computer experiments and measures of eye movements to imaging of brain structure and function) together with computational modeling approaches.
 
Profil

Prof. Patty Van Cappellen

Duke University
Website
Dr. Van Cappellen earned her Ph.D. in Social Psychology in 2012 from UCLouvain, Belgium. She then moved to do a postdoc with Barbara Fredrickson on positive emotions and psychophysiology at UNC-Chapel Hill. She is now an Assistant Research Professor at the Social Science Research Institute at Duke University.
Her research expertise is in the psychology of religion, spirituality, and associated behaviors (e.g., meditation, rituals). Specifically, her research has shed new light on the psychological determinants of health, maintenance of health behaviors, understanding of positive emotions and “flourishing,” and intergroup processes.
Overall, her research offers insight into the real-world effects of religion such as religious extremism, intergroup relations, emerging forms of spirituality and meditation, and decision-making regarding health behaviors.
 
Profil

Prof. Carmelo Vazquez

Complutense University
Website
Full professor of Psychopathology at the Complutense University of Madrid. Carmelo has been a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Northwestern University, and Visiting Professor at the University of California San Diego, San Diego State University, and Harvard University.
He was President of the International Positive Psychology Association (IPPA) (2013-2015). Interested in cognition and psychopathology, he has studied the role of positive emotions in the onset and maintenance of emotional disorders as well as the efficacy of positive interventions (including mindfulness and compassion) in reducing distress and increasing well-being.
Carmelo was one of the founders of the ‘Psychosocial Unit’ of Médecins sans frontières- Barcelona (Spain) to assist teams and staff in critical incidents. He is a member of scientific panels in several agencies (European Research Council (ERC), Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), etc.) and, since June 2018, is President of the Psychology Area of the Spanish State Research Agency (AEI).
 

 

speakers

 

Profil

Prof. Guido Bondolfi

University of Geneva
Website
Guido Bondolfi is currently Full Professor of Psychiatry at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Geneva and is the Chief Medical Officer of the Psychiatric Liaison and Crisis Intervention Service at the Department of Psychiatry of the University Hospitals of Geneva.
His clinical and research interests include cognitive psychotherapy, the applications of mindfulness based interventions in clinical practice and the interindividual differences in brain activity as a function of affective inclinations in healthy subjects and in patients with clinically unexplained and functional symptoms.
 
Profil

Prof. Julien Deonna

University of Geneva
Website
Prof. Julien A. Deonna works in the philosophy of mind, in particular the philosophy of emotions, on moral emotions and moral psychology.
His work reflects the ambition of taking seriously the phenomenological, ordinary language and empirical dimensions of the emotions in the various philosophical discussions in which they are central.
In addition to many articles in the area, he is the co-author of In Defense of Shame (OUP, 2011) and The Emotions: a Philosophical Introduction (Routledge, 2012).
He is also very interested in the role of emotions, especially negative emotions, in well-being.
 
Profil

Prof. Thibaud Gruber

University of Geneva
Website
I am a primatologist with broad interests ranging from cognitive anthropology and developmental science to behavioural ecology. I use different approaches in the field and the lab (observational, experimental, neuroimaging) to tackle the question of the evolution of culture and language in humans and great apes.
After joining the University of Geneva, I have also developed a strong interest for affective sciences, and particularly the way affect influences social learning processes. I have also a strong interest for animal conservation and animal welfare and well-being, and I teach a Master course on animal emotions at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences.
 
Profil

Dr. Markus Kneer

University of Zurich
Website
Markus Kneer (BA Oxford, PhD ENS Paris) is an experimental philosopher working at the University of Zurich, where he currently leads the SNF-funded Guilty Minds Lab. His work focuses on mind, language, law, artificial intelligence and well-being. As regards the latter, he currently explores the folk concepts of happiness and well-being in joint work with Dan Haybron (see e.g. here: https://bit.ly/3y8zPyA).
 
Profil

Dr. Mael Lebreton

University of Geneva
Website
My main focus is the investigation of the computational and biological (neural, genetic) basis of economic phenotypes and behavior (choices, preferences, socio-economic status) - a recent disciplinary field called Neuroeconomics.
I try to combine at best my rudimental knowledge in (cognitive) neurosciences, (behavioral) economics, and (reinforcement) learning to provide new hints about our (often irrational) behavior, by associating (behavioral) experiments, (computational) models and (functional) neuroimaging.
 
Profil

Dr. Sandra Penic

University of Geneva
Website
 
Profil

Prof. Fabienne Picard

Geneva University Hospitals
Website
Prof. Fabienne Picard is a neurologist. She is currently Senior consultant in the EEG and Epilepsy Unit of the Neurology Department at the University Hospital of Geneva. She holds a physician MD degree in medical studies in Neurology as well as a Diploma of Advanced Studies (DEA) in Cellular and Molecular Biology, with a major in neurobiology, from the Faculty of Medicine of Strasbourg, France.
In 1995 she joined the University Hospitals of Geneva in 1995. An intense research activity besides her clinical activity enabled her to obtain a title of privat-docente and senior lecturer at the Faculty of Medicine of Geneva. She is internationally renowned in the field of epilepsy genetics.
Over the last ten years, her research has focused on the role of the insula in self-awareness through the study of “ecstatic” epilepsy, whose symptoms show similarities with states of consciousness reached in meditation. She has published around 100 articles in peer-reviewed journals.
 
Profil

Dr. Eva Pool

University of Geneva
Website
My research focuses on the development of a deeper understanding of the psychological and neural mechanisms underlying reward-seeking behavior. More particularly, I am interested in gaining insights into how and why the human brain is vulnerable to situations where choice behavior is hijacked in service of outcomes that are no longer valued by the individual.
To address these questions, I use a large variety of experimental procedures as well as meta-analyses and systematic literature reviews. In my research, I try to develop methods that combine theoretical frameworks and experimental paradigms developed through the study of animal behavior with psychophysiological techniques and fMRI protocols in healthy human volunteers.
 
Profil

Prof. Fabrice Teroni

University of Geneva
Website
Fabrice Teroni is Professor in philosophy at the University of Geneva and project leader at CISA, the Swiss Centre for Affective Sciences. He works in the philosophy of mind and epistemology.
His background is in the philosophy of memory, of perception and of affective states. He has published several articles and monographs on the general theory of emotions (The Emotions: A Philosophical Introduction, Routledge), on shame (In Defense of Shame: The Faces of an Emotion, Oxford) and on memory.
He is also interested in the nature of emotions elicited by fiction, in the involvement of the self in emotions as well as in the phenomenology and epistemology of memory.