Journée ILCB

CLAIRE KABDEBON

Title: The origins of human cognition: insights from the infant brain

Abstract: Our human-unique cognitive abilities to process speech, compose music or write fictions do not suddenly emerge in adulthood, but are rather deeply rooted in early development. A major discovery of the past decades is that infants come into the world equipped with a set of initial competencies coupled with powerful learning mechanisms that pave the way for later high-level cognitive achievements. However, the exact nature of this initial knowledge and learning algorithms remains largely unknown. In this talk, I will present some of my work that aims at leveraging the development of non-invasive neuroimaging techniques and signal processing tools to reveal these early abilities: from early auditory processing to the beginnings of language acquisition.