The course of Introduction to Cognitive Sciences is part of the program in Communication Studies (Bachelor’s degree course) and it is included among the complementary training activities. The course aims to provide students with a historical, conceptual and methodological introduction to cognitive science. This is the study of the mind through the synthesis of contributions coming from research fields such as philosophy, artificial intelligence, linguistics, neuroscience, psychology and social sciences.
After completing the course of Introduction to Cognitive Science the student should:
- know the diversity of viewpoints, the controversies and the areas of nascent consensus in the field of cognitive science;
- appreciate the contribution of each of the constituent disciplines;
- know multiple definitions of the foundational concepts of computation and representation and be able to discuss them from multiple points of view;
- have an overview of how perception, memory, language, motor control, and so forth come together to produce behavior.
teacher profile teaching materials
Programme
The course aims to provide students with a historical-conceptual and methodological introduction to cognitive science. This is the study of the mind through the effort of synthesizing contributions from research fields such as philosophy, artificial intelligence, linguistics, neuroscience, psychology and social sciences. Its intellectual origins date back to the mid-1950s, when researchers from different disciplinary fields began to develop theories of mind based on the notions of representation and computation. Its institutional origins date back to the 1970s, when the Cognitive Science Society was founded and the publication of the journal Cognitive Science began. Since then more than one hundred universities in the United States, Europe, Asia, and Australia have established cognitive science programs, and many more have established cognitive science courses.Core Documentation
J. Bermudez, Cognitive Science. An Introduction to the Science of the Mind. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2023 (4th edition).Type of delivery of the course
Face-to-face lessons.Type of evaluation
Multiple-choice questionnaire.