JAMMMIT Joint Action, Models of Music and Movement Interactions in Time
IPEM - Institute for Psychoacoustics and Electronic Music
Ghent University
12 - 13 June 2012, Ghent
Joint action denotes coordinated, synchronised actions performed by a number of individuals together, and is characterised by shared goals. Joint action is a crucial aspect of social interaction, given that it has been shown to promote a sense of connectedness and increased rapport between individuals in a group. Until recently, research in joint action and social interaction has focused on interpersonal synchrony and it has often been concerned with modelling the temporal aspects of interacting systems. A recent development is looking at joint action from an embodied cognition point of view, in which the action-perception cycle in behaviour is investigated, especially when the focus lies on how the sensory information that an individual can gather from the environment, including the behaviour of other individuals, impacts his or her behaviour.
A framework of joint action is emerging that can explain tightly related concepts such as action understanding, intention and social cognition. The recent developments in this field promise a fertile path for investigating music listening- and performance from both a joint action- and an embodied cognition perspective.
Playing music together as a group is the pinnacle of human cognitive capacities, demanding the full deployment of attentional mechanisms, fine spatio-temporal motor control, correct anticipation, movement synchronisation and social aspects as action understanding and group interaction. The purpose of this symposium is to bring out and discuss new ways of studying, i.e. measuring and modelling, the spatio-temporal aspects of music and movement with a special focus on the intentions of the people involved.
Topics covered will include: experience and meaning formation, haptic coupling as a model for joint action in music, entrainment, movement synchronisation, joint action, emotion, motivational aspects of music, intention, action understanding, social components of entrainment, and in a concert; polyrhythmic composition.
In 2007, the Flemish government allocated a substantial project funding to Professor Marc Leman, director of IPEM, to continue and expand on his groundbreaking work in Embodied Music Cognition. This symposium will also partly serve to present the project’s midway results to internationally leading experts. It will stimulate the development of international collaborative efforts and discussion on the most fruitful direction for the future research path. All invited researchers will present new and original work, which would form a multi-disciplinary state of the art in joint action research.
The number of participants is limited to 65 so please register here well in advance to ensure your seat.
Proceedings
The topics adressed in this workshop will be published as a special issue in Frontiers in Auditory Cognitive Science.
