Mauri Kaipainen

Musical Timbre : Similarity Ratings Correlate With Computational Feature Space Distances

Abstract Tarahe paper compares mappings of a set of synthetic timbre stimuli on a Kohonen self‐organizing topology and the distance matrix derived from subjects’ similarity ratings concerning the same stimuli. Significant correlation is reported between the two domains. This result is interpreted to provide support for a more general hypothesis implicit in many current connectionist studies, namely that to represent is to project complexes of multidimensional environmental‐perceptual conditions onto less dimensionally defined, ordered neural‐mental responses.

Enactive cinema paves way for understanding complex real-time social interaction in neuroimaging experiments.

We outline general theoretical and practical implications of what we promote as enactive cinema for the neuroscientific study of online socio-emotional interaction. In a real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging (rt-fMRI) setting, participants are immersed in cinematic experiences that simulate social situations. While viewing, their physiological reactions—including brain responses—are tracked, representing implicit and unconscious experiences of the on-going social situations. These reactions, in turn, are analyzed in real-time and fed back to modify the cinematic sequences they are viewing while being scanned. Due to the engaging cinematic content, the proposed setting focuses on living-by in terms of shared psycho-physiological epiphenomena of experience rather than active coping in terms of goal-oriented motor actions. It constitutes a means to parametrically modify stimuli that depict social situations and their broader environmental contexts. As an alternative to studying the variation of brain responses as a function of a priori fixed stimuli, this method can be applied to survey the range of stimuli that evoke similar responses across participants at particular brain regions of interest.

Soft ontologies and similarity cluster tools to facilitate exploration and discovery of cultural heritage resources

We describe a system and tools that we are creating and that allows us to produce similarity (SC) cluster representations of the contents of our Culture Heritage (CH) Forum. The motivation for introducing these types of technologies in the context of cultural heritage materials is to allow the use of spatial vector-based computational techniques that result in similarity mapping. We propose that similarity mappings can be used to build navigation tools that enable users to explore these types of materials without knowing the search parameters in advance. Also, this method of access to cultural heritage materials might be less dependent on a priori determined ontologies than conventional curatorial practices. This is in line with our final objective of developing representation methods and visualization tools that describe cultural heritage material while at the same time allowing the user freedom to interpret the material, i.e. the open interpretation approach.

Period detection and representation by recurrent oscillatory self-organizing map

Whether or not periodicity is a property of the environment, for a cognitive system a period is always a dynamical mental construct. This study suggests a dynamical implementation of this hypothesis using recurrent oscillatory self-organizing map of the feature space of such streams. The mapping allows the system to assign identity and class-membership to each stream point, represented by a locus on a two-dimensional map. The model is shown to detect periodicities of various regular and behavior-originated, single- and multi-channel wave patterns, and to reproduce such signals, relying solely on the oscillating activation of the units.

Model of Narrative Nowness for Neurocinematic Experiments

Cognitive neurosciences have made significant progress in learning about brain activity in situatedcognition, thanks to adopting stimuli that simulate immersion in naturalistic conditions insteadof ...

Theoretical framework of the iCampFolio - new approach to comparison and selection of systems and tools for learning purposes

We argue that current selection methods and comparison approaches of tools for learning purposes do not fit with the concept of e-learning 2.0 and Web 2.0 applications for creating personal learning environments. Available comparison methods being mainly as black-and-white check lists hinder to see the properties of various Web 2.0 applications. We propose a theoretical framework for designing a support tool for learners as well as for facilitators in order to facilitate the choice of learning/teaching tools from heterogeneous technological landscapes. Our theoretical framework is based on soft ontological approach enabling to compare systems and tools from multidimensional perspectives taking into account users best practices. We focus on elements of learning activities mediated by technology with respect to the concept of affordances and activity theory in combination of Alexanders pattern approach and IMS LD case descriptions.

Recurrent Oscillatory Self-organizing Map: Adapting to Complex Environmental Periodicities

Recurrent oscillatory self-organizing map : Adapting to complex environmental periodicities

Much more to it: The relation between facebook usage and self-esteem

The aim of this study was to examine closer the conflicting results from previous studies concerning the relationship between Facebook use and self-esteem using the Facebook Intensity Scale and Rosenbergs Self-Esteem Scale (N = 107). In line with some previous studies, our data confirmed that there is a relationship between Facebook usage and self-esteem, but the applied scales allowed a more refined assessment of it. The results showed, after controlling for demographic variables, that participants with low Facebook intensity reported on average higher self-esteem than those who did not use Facebook or those with high Facebook intensity, while those with medium Facebook intensity had significantly higher self-esteem compared to the participants with high Facebook intensity. Future studies should address the underlying causal relations using a time-bound observation method.

From naturalistic neuroscience to modeling radical embodiment with narrative enactive systems

Mainstream cognitive neuroscience has begun to accept the idea of embodied mind, which assumes that the human mind is fundamentally constituted by the dynamical interactions of the brain, body, and the environment. In today’s paradigm of naturalistic neurosciences, subjects are exposed to rich contexts, such as video sequences or entire films, under relatively controlled conditions, against which researchers can interpret changes in neural responses within a time window. However, from the point of view of radical embodied cognitive neuroscience, the increasing complexity alone will not suffice as the explanatory apparatus for dynamical embodiment and situatedness of the mind. We suggest that narrative enactive systems with dynamically adaptive content as stimuli, may serve better to account for the embodied mind engaged with the surrounding world. Among the ensuing challenges for neuroimaging studies is how to interpret brain data against broad temporal contexts of previous experiences that condition the unfolding experience of nowness. We propose means to tackle this issue, as well as ways to limit the exponentially growing combinatoria of narrative paths to a controllable number.

A Perspectivist Approach to Conceptual Spaces

It is a part of everyday life that objects appear different from each perspective they are seen from. Ordinary language has plenty of expressions referring to abstract issues “from my point of view” or “your perspective”. In this article, we argue for a perspectivist approach to conceptual spaces, that is, an approach to concepts as entities whose definition depends on the perspective from which they are considered. We propose an interpretation of Gardenfors’s conceptual space in terms of two components: a highly multi-dimensional ontospace whose simultaneous grasp is beyond or near the edge of human cognitive capabilities, and a lower-dimensional representational space that supports conceptualization of the ontospace in the manner Gardenfors has suggested, however allowing several alternative conceptualizations, not just one. We suggest that a given ontospace is only accessible to the cognition by means of the epistemic work of exploring alternative perspectives. Further, we suggest that the overall understanding of a domain that emerges from seeing it from multiple perspectives is on a higher abstraction level than any particular single perspective. We stress that perspectives to the ontospace are individual and vary as a function of interest, situational contexts and various temporal factors. On the other hand, they are communicable, allowing interpersonally shared conceptualization.