Multidimensional Semantics for Concrete and Abstract Concepts
2025-09-29 11:00 - 12:00 (Europe/Paris) | Salle des voûtes, St Charles, 3 place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13001, France
Penny M. Pexman
Western University, Canada

Multiple representation theories posit that concepts are represented via a combination of properties derived from sensorimotor, affective, linguistic, and other experiences. One advantage of this approach is that it helps address the challenge of abstract meanings, like wisdom and friendship, which are central to our mental and social lives and yet cannot be directly experienced through the senses. I will describe a series of studies in which my colleagues and I have tested predictions of multiple representation theories for acquisition and processing of concrete and abstract word meanings, exploring the roles of sensorimotor, interoceptive, and social experience. The development of large-scale word norms and behavioural megastudies has enabled consideration of multiple lexical and semantic dimensions and exploration of the possibility that these dimensions have simultaneous and interacting effects on behaviour. Using these “big data” I will consider how these multiple factors might be mapped in semantic space.

BIO: Penny Pexman is Vice-President (Research) and Professor of Psychology at Western University She joined Western in 2023, having previously spent 25 years at the University of Calgary, where she served in a number of research leadership roles including Associate Dean (Research) in the Faculty of Arts and Associate Vice-President (Research). Penny was Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology and Associate Editor of the Journal of Memory and Language. She is past President of the Canadian Society for Brain, Behaviour and Cognitive Science, past Governing Board Chair for the Psychonomic Society, a current member of Governing Board of the Cognitive Science Society, and co-founder of Women in Cognitive Science – Canada.
Penny’s research expertise is in cognitive development, psycholinguistics, and cognitive neuroscience. In broad terms, she is interested in how we derive meaning from language, and how those processes are changed by experience. She has published more than 150 journal articles on those topics. For over 2 decades her work has been continuously funded by two of Canada’s federal funding organizations (SSHRC and NSERC), including NSERC’s prestigious Discovery Accelerator Supplement. She is an elected fellow of the Canadian Psychological Association and the Association for Psychological Science and has been honoured with 9 awards for mentorship and teaching excellence.

The Role of Social Experience in the Grounding of Abstract Concepts
2025-09-30 09:30 - 12:00 | B011 LPL, 5 avenue Pasteur, Aix-en-Provence, 13100, France
Thesis defense of
Daria Goriachun
Under the direction of de Johannes Ziegler (CRPN) et Núria Gala (LPL)
Jury :
Johannes Ziegler – Directeur de thèse
Núria Gala – Co-directrice de thèse
Anna Borghi – Rapporteure
Penny Pexman – Rapporteure
Gabriella Vigliocco – Présidente du jury
Kristof Strijkers – Examinateur
Abstract :
Understanding abstract concepts like justice or freedom, which do not refer to physical objects, poses a challenge for theories of language processing. This thesis investigates how social experience—both the degree to which words are socially relevant (their socialness) and the social context of communication—affects their processing. Across several experiments, participants processed abstract and concrete words, alone or in pairs. Results show that the social dimension of words affects processing, particularly when participants cooperate. Social interaction thus modulates the way abstract concepts are understood, suggesting that our social experiences can provide grounding for concepts not directly linked to perception or action.

What self-supervised speech models know about animal sounds: Deep transfer learning and the evolution of acoustic communication across species
2025-10-02 14:00 - 18:00 | FRUMAM, 3 place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13001, France
Thesis defense of Jules Cauzinille
Thesis supervisors : Benoit Favre (directeur de thèse), Arnaud Rey, Ricard Marxer

Jury :
Benjamin Lecouteux (président du jury)
Nicolas Farrugia (rapporteur)
Marie Tahon (rapporteur)
Emmanuel Chemla (examinateur)

Abstract:
This thesis introduces a novel approach to the study of vocal communication and its evolution across species through the use of deep transfer learning. We ask whether, and how, self-supervised models trained on speech data may provide suitable representations of bioacoustic information. Our initial focus is on non-human primates and is motivated by the apparent gap between state-of-the-art speech processing methods and the way the vocalizations of our closest living relatives are handled in recent computer science literature. We present experiments centred around transferring knowledge from speech to gibbon songs and propose a set of hypotheses on the evolution of acoustic communication and its phylogenetic ties. A second set of experiments aims at challenging initial hypotheses by extending the experimental framework across a broader range of species and tasks where we explore speech models’ latent representations through innovative probing strategies. We conclude on theoretical perspectives related to the convergent evolution of vocal communication across species, while advocating for the integration of speech in future research aimed at developing general bioacoustic foundation models.

Fête de la science
2025-10-03 - 2025-10-13 | Parc de Bagatelle, 125 Rue du commandant rolland, Marseille, 13008, France
Programme

ILCB’s Annual welcome back party
2025-10-10 | B011 LPL, 5 avenue Pasteur, Aix-en-Provence, 13100, France
9:30 Acceuil café
10:00 Introduction
10:10 Olga Kepinska : Multilingualism and Linguistic Diversity as a window into prenatal language acquisition
11:10 Philippe Albouy : Brain oscillations and cross-frequency coupling as markers of auditory working memory functions
12:00 Lunch

Towards a Comparative Approach to Interactional Systems: Cross-disciplinary Contributions from Ethology and Linguistics
2025-11-28 14:30 - 17:00 | Espace Pouillon, 3 place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13003
Thesis defense of Lise Habib-Dassetto
Supervisors:
Marie MONTANT, Maîtresse de Conférences – Aix-Marseille Université
Cristel PORTES, Professeure – Aix-Marseille Université
Alban LEMASSON, Professeur – Université de Rennes 1

Les membres du Jury:
Thibaud GRUBER, Rapporteur, Associate Professor – Université de Genève
Elise HUCHARD, Rapporteur(se), Directrice de Recherche – CNRS
Maël LEROUX, Examinateur, Maître de Conférences – Université de Rennes 1
Roxane Bertrand, Présidente du jury, Directrice de Recherche – CNRS

Abstract:
Animal communication research often focuses on the search for meaning and structural rules within signals produced by an emitter, drawing comparisons to human language. Most studies examine only a single communicative modality (vocal, visual, or tactile). This thesis takes a complementary approach by considering communication, in both humans and non-humans, as an interactive social act. It draws on Levinson’s Interaction Engine theory, which posits that humans possess universal predispositions for coordinated interaction, providing evolutionary foundations for language. Human interactions are organized, cooperative, and governed by conventions, such as turn-taking and repair mechanisms. They are also mediated through multimodal communication. To investigate these mechanisms in animals, we adopt principles of ethology, treating communication as a biological trait shaped by evolutionary processes. The thesis is structured along three axes: theoretical, methodological, and empirical. Theoretically, we propose comparing the interactional systems of different species to highlight general properties as well as species-specific patterns. We also advocate integrating all communicative modalities and examining how species’ social and ecological environments shape interactions. Methodologically, we introduce Multi-Interaction, a new framework and open-access tool applicable across species, designed to process multi-agent and multimodal communicative sequences. This method makes it possible to study communicative signals as well as actions produced during exchanges. For the first time, it systematically incorporates intra- and inter-individual overlaps, i.e., the simultaneous production of gestures, vocalizations, facial expressions, and actions, rather than treating these elements sequentially. This approach aims to minimize information loss. It also provides new quantitative measures to describe these sequences. Empirically, we implement these theoretical and methodological approaches in two studies of a captive group of Guinea baboons and in a comparative study across four primate species. Our results show that Guinea baboon interactions are flexible and adapt to social contexts. Individuals contribute in varying proportions depending on their sex and the centrality of their partner. Two interactants also produce inter-individual overlaps in varying proportions according to their sex and the frequency of their exchanges. These results suggest that interactions serve to maintain and negotiate social, hierarchical, and reproductive relationships. We show that, compared to actions, ritualized communicative signals streamline temporal coordination between interactants. Moreover, the size of the interactional repertoire decreases with social experience, indicating that repetition fosters efficiency and conventionalization. Finally, our comparative study of Guinea baboons, chimpanzees, red-capped mangabeys and human infants, highlights different uses of multimodal and multi-component communication, consistent with the social and ecological environments of each species. These results support the Social Complexity Hypothesis (which links the complexity of communication to the constraints of group living) as well as ecological efficacy-based hypotheses (which explains the use of multimodality as an adaptation to ecological constraints). This thesis argues that interactional behaviors across species should be seen as flexible and adaptive biological traits, shaped by conventions as well as by social and ecological pressures.

Keywords: animal communication, social interaction, multimodal communication, evolution, sociality, ecology, primates

Neuroimaging Meeting (RMN)
2025-12-11 10:00 - 12:00 | Amphithéâtre de CERIMED, 27 Boulevard Jean Moulin, Marseille, 13005
We’re looking forward to two presentations on ongoing local projects.

– Mattia Cazzolla (INT) : “Processing and Analysis of Fetal Diffusion MRI” (with O. Coulon, G. Auzias, F. Rousseau, J. Sein, N. Girard, B. Leroux).
– Camilla Di Pasquasio (INT) : “Using fMRI to assess the social competence of an autonomous conversational robot” (results from Convers1 and project Convers2, with T. Chaminade, M. Cavazza, B. Bigi, B. Nazarian).

NLP & Cognition: Exploring the Interfaces
2025-12-12 | FRUMAM, 3 place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13001, France
The NLP & Cognition working group (GT) of the GDR TAL – CNRS is pleased to announce its upcoming meeting:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PKVes0OPHQ5kJUkYroZV85sAKtKe2eSfnM1JbwBgGxw/edit?tab=t.0#heading=h.h07fvminzexw

Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Social Cognition and Stress
2026-01-19 | Le CAMPUS SAINT CHARLES, place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13003
Campus Saint Charles, Amphithéatre Charve
Date : Monday January 19th 2026 9h-17H
PROGRAM
9h-9h50 Emilie Caspar , Université de Ghent
Applying Neuroscience to Post-Genocide Contexts: Participation in Violence, Intergroup Biases, and Trauma
09h50 Themis Apostolidis – Aix Marseille Université
Health, Illness and Society: The Social Representations Perspective
10h40 Pause café
11h10 Corinne Dano, CHU d’Anger
Social Cognition Deficit in Alcohol Use Disorder in Clinical Practice
12h Déjeuner (salle des voutes)
13h30-14h20 Louise Kirsch, Université Paris Cité
The Interplay Between Social Touch and Stress
14h20-15h10 Magalie Ochs, Aix Marseille Université
From User to Embodied AI: Automatic Analysis and Generation of Multimodal Socio-Affective Behaviors for Human-Machine Interaction
15h10 Pause café
15h40 Sylvie Thirion, Aix Marseille Université
Stress, Allostatic Load and Social Cognition: Neurobiological Bases of Vulnerability and Resilience
16h30 Final remarks
*NB some presentations will be in French

WHERE
Hybrid – attend in person at Campus Saint-Charles (Charves Amphitheater) or join online
REGISTRATION
Free but mandatory here.. https://drivenbyothers.sciencesconf.org/

BRAINNHACK
2026-01-28 - 2026-01-30
Programm

Restitution des projets Ingénierie Cognitive MASCO 2026
2026-01-30 | B011 LPL, 5 avenue Pasteur, Aix-en-Provence, 13100, France
UE IngéCo -20Jan_2026

Adaptation to a bilingual input and variability in early language acquisition
2026-02-06 10:30 - 12:00 | B011 LPL, 5 avenue Pasteur, Aix-en-Provence, 13100, France
Prof. Laura Bosch from Barcelona University

Abstract:
Infants and children growing up in bilingual/multilingual environments should no longer be considered as exceptions to the norm, even for those living in monolingual societies. But bilingualism is a broad construct, covering a diversity of dual language exposure contexts, modulated by differential properties of socio-educational environments and language typologies. Adequately addressing the heterogeneous nature of bilingual language acquisition remains challenging. Research developed in the last twenty-five years, reflects important changes in the type of questions that have been addressed: from an initial focus on early language differentiation issues, to more recent studies focusing on the identification of adaptive mechanisms, understanding variability in acquisition, and getting more nuanced views on the processes that lead to building separate but interconnected language systems from a dual language input. In this talk, I will first summarize studies based on infants simultaneously exposed to close language pairs (e.g., Spanish and Catalan), and I will then contrast these studies with data obtained from populations exposed to more distant languages. Language proximity stands out as a factor likely to modulate acquisition in such domains as phonological, lexical, and morphosyntactic acquisition. The talk will successively cover two separate but interconnected areas: the early building of native language phonetic/phonological categories, and word-learning strategies in dual vocabulary building. This narrow focus might contribute to identify research questions that remain open for future studies on early bilingualism.

Workshop organized by the ILCB docs&post-docs
2026-03-20 | FRUMAM, 3 place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13001, France
The annual workshop organized by ILCB docs&postdocs will take place on March 20 in Marseille, St Charles, and is open to all researchers and students within the ILCB community. The main objective of the workshop is to foster interactions and exchanges among students and researchers from the different ILCB labs, and we therefore strongly encourage all ILCB members to attend.
The program will include short talks by PhD students, postdocs, and researchers, a keynote lecture by our ILCB Iméra fellow Philippe Albouy, and a poster session. New this year: all registered participants may present a poster (upon notification, for organizational purposes).
Reminder: all PhD students and postdocs within the ILCB perimeter are warmly invited to join the Docs&Postdocs group. For further information, please contact elin.runnqvist@univ-amu.fr and nadera.bureau@univ-amu.fr.

Seminars
2026-04-10 10:00 - 12:00 | FRUMAM, 3 place Victor Hugo, Marseille, 13001, France
Usha Goswami :Centre for Neuroscience in Education, University of Cambridge
Dyslexia, Rhythm, Language and the Developing Brain
Recent insights from auditory neuroscience provide a new perspective on how the brain encodes speech. Using these recent insights, I will provide an overview of key factors underpinning individual differences in children’s development of language and phonology, providing a context for exploring atypical reading development (dyslexia). Children with dyslexia are relatively insensitive to acoustic cues related to speech rhythm patterns. This lack of rhythmic sensitivity is related to the atypical neural encoding of rhythm patterns in speech by the brain. I will describe our recent data from infants as well as children, demonstrating developmental continuity in the key neural variables.

Martin Pickering : University of Edinburgh
An augmented psychology of language

8th Annual Meeting of the Society for the Cognitive Science of Culture
2026-04-22 - 2026-04-24 | Théâtre Antoine Vitez, 29 Av. Robert Schuman, Aix-en-Provence, 13100, France
8thAnnual Meeting of the Society for the Cognitive Science of Culture. The Society aims to promote research into the role of culture on cognition, with a particular focus on extending research beyond WEIRD populations.
The meeting will take place from 22nd to 24th April 2026 at Aix-Marseille University in Aix-en-Provence, France.
This year, we are honoured to welcome four outstanding keynote speakers.
Prof. Usha Goswami, University of Cambridge
Brain Beats: Cognitive Science and Cognitive Neuroscience of Rhythmic Language
Prof. Helmut Leder, University of Vienna
Beauty as sensory pleasure?
Prof. Patrick Lemaire, Aix-Marseille University
Mathematics across cultures: What can we learn about the role of culture on cognition?
Dr. Daniele Schön, Aix-Marseille University
Music as window into language processing and rehabilitation
We invite abstract submissions for 20-minute talks and posters from the full spectrum of research interested in the relationship between cognition and culture in its many forms across domains including psychology, neuroscience, behaviour, linguistics and literature, visual art and music.
Please visit the submission website for further information: https://culturalcogsci.org/AnnualMeeting.html
Submission Deadline: January 31st 2026
Early bird registration: Until February 28th 2026
The SCSC 2026 Organizing Committee

dedicated to “Quantitative imaging and its applications.”
2026-05-04 | Amphithéâtre de CERIMED, 27 Boulevard Jean Moulin, Marseille, 13005

Integrating Neural Noise and Neuroinflammatory Hypotheses: Exploring the Comorbidity of Dyslexia, Depression, and Stress
2026-05-22 12:00 - 13:00
Fumiko Hoeft
Recent advancements in our understanding of dyslexia have highlighted the complex interplay between neurobiological mechanisms and comorbid conditions such as depression and stress. The Neural Noise Hypothesis (NNH) of dyslexia proposes that dysregulated neural activity, characterized by excessive glutamatergic neurotransmission, leads to the disrupted auditory and visual processing that typifies this learning disorder. Concurrently, emerging research suggests that these neural irregularities may overlap with pathways involved in stress and depression, pointing to a shared neurobiological foundation. This presentation explores the synthesis of the NNH with recent findings on the role of neuroinflammation in dyslexia and its comorbidities. Building on our foundational work (Hancock, Pugh, and Hoeft, TiCS. 2017), and integrating recent insights into stress and mood disorders from neuroimaging studies, we propose a model where dyslexia-related neural noise may exacerbate susceptibility to depression through neuroinflammatory pathways. This model is supported by recent research by Lasnick and Hoeft (Front Hum Neurosci. 2023), which provides compelling evidence of altered neural connectivity in regions critical for emotional and stress regulation in individuals with dyslexia. Furthermore, this talk will delve into how environmental stressors and individual resilience factors contribute to the variability in dyslexia presentations, particularly focusing on how these elements interact with neurobiological mechanisms to influence the severity and range of comorbid symptoms. By bridging gaps between disparate research domains, we aim to foster a more comprehensive understanding of dyslexia that acknowledges its potential as a multisystem disorder with significant neurobiological and psychosocial dimensions. This integrated approach sets the stage for discussing potential interventions that target these overlapping pathways, offering hope for more effective treatments that address both the core symptoms of dyslexia and its common comorbidities.

Dr. Katarzyna PISANSKI
2026-06-05 12:00 - 13:00 | B011 LPL, 5 avenue Pasteur, Aix-en-Provence, 13100, France

Spectacle
2026-09-16 18:00 - 20:00, 2026-09-17 18:00 | Friche la Belle de Mai — GMEM, 41 Rue Jobin, Marseille, 13003
