Events
Participate and get involved with regular talks, workshops, and events by the department.
Participate and get involved with regular talks, workshops, and events by the department.
15th February 2025
Cognitive Science Symposium 2025 🧠✨
Join us at IIT Gandhinagar for an exciting, beginner-friendly journey into the world of Cognitive Science! No prior knowledge needed—just curiosity! 🤩
🔹 Engaging talks by expert faculty
🔹 Hands-on experiments to explore cognitive tools
🔹 Latest research insights in the field
📅 Date: 15th February 2025 (Saturday)
⏰ Time: 9:00 AM onwards
📍 Venue: Jibaben Auditorium, IIT Gandhinagarr
📝 Register by: 10th February 2025
Don’t miss this chance to explore the field of Cognitive Science.
Click here: https://sites.google.com/view/iitgncss2025/
27th January, 2025
IIT Gandhinagar recently hosted an enlightening Cognitive and Brain Sciences seminar featuring Prof. Veeky Baths from BITS Pilani, K.K. Birla Goa Campus. Prof. Baths delivered an insightful presentation titled “Virtual Reality and Mobile-based Goal-Oriented Games for Cognitive Assessment: Hope or Hype?” The discussion shed light on the potential of game-based cognitive assessments, highlighting their ability to surpass traditional methods in revealing real-world cognitive abilities. A pilot study involving 82 young participants was showcased, demonstrating the effectiveness of these innovative evaluation tools. The event fostered a productive conversation among attendees, and we appreciate everyone’s participation.
19th January 2025
IIT Gandhinagar conducted an Open House for its MSc Cognitive Science program, providing an opportunity for prospective students to learn about the program and its application process. The event allowed attendees to meet experts and gain insights into the work conducted at IIT Gandhinagar. The MSc program in Cognitive Science is an interdisciplinary field that covers a wide range of areas, including cognitive psychology, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence, with a strong emphasis on both coursework and research projects.
23rd December, 2024
The Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences at IIT Gandhinagar is proud to announce that our talented students, research staff, and faculty members presented their cutting-edge research at the Annual Conference of Cognitive Science (ACCS) and SAFAL 2024, held at IIT Bombay. This event provided an excellent platform for our team to showcase their innovative work and engage with experts and peers in the field of cognitive science.
Preethi R, a research assistant in our department, has received the Best Oral Presentation Award.
19th December, 2024
How do you know the size of your hand without looking at it? The brain relies on an internal body model — a sort of mental map that combines sensory inputs and stored information. For people who are blind, however, this map is built without visual cues. In a recent study, researchers at the Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences, IITGN have explored how congenitally blind individuals’ body model map differs from that of the sighted ones.
Like any map, our body model map also shows distortions. Now the question arises — what sensory modalities are responsible for building this distorted body model? The team measured the body models of blind and sighted subjects to assess the impact of visual input and its lack thereof. The participants were asked to identify landmarks on their hands, such as knuckles and fingertips. When the map of the hand was reconstructed, it was found that blind participants tended to have body models that were much more distorted than those with normal sight, thereby highlighting the critical role of visual input in shaping body representations. By mapping the body model in blind participants for the first time, the study opens new pathways to understanding how different maps in the brain shape human perception and navigation.
The study was conducted by former Masters student Srisai Rakesh Kottu and Prof Leslee Lazar, PhD Lazar in collaboration with the Blind People’s Association, Ahmedabad.
Read the paper here:https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010945224002697?via%3Dihub
18th November, 2024
Dr. Prakhar Godara delivered a talk titled “Studying Cognition in Bandit Tasks: Deviating from Optimal Learning and Planning.” He explored how biases like positivity and confirmation bias arise in decision-making and introduced the meta-Bayes Adaptive MDP framework to explain human planning under cognitive constraints. The session provided insights into deviations from optimal models in two-armed Bernoulli bandit tasks.
30th October, 2024
Dr. Sneha Shashidhara, a senior research fellow at the Centre for Social and Behaviour Change and a lecturer at Ashoka University, delivered a lecture on the brain’s multiple-demand (MD) network. She explained how this network manages diverse cognitive tasks and supports complex, goal-directed behavior by integrating features like time pressure and reward, with various regions collaborating as a unified system.
2nd October, 2024
At Amalthea 2024, IIT Gandhinagar, the Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences showcased a one-electrode EEG system by NeuroSky. Represented by Vishal Ubnare and a fellow researcher, the demonstration featured real-time EEG analysis through interactive graphs and games, with the electrode placed on the forebrain and a base on the ear lobe. The event introduced attendees to brain-computer interfacing and cognitive neuroscience.
19th September, 2024
A session by Dr. Rama Ratnam where he presented on “The neural basis for sensory perception of weak signals buried in noise.” His work explores how our brains are able to detect and identify subtle signals in the face of noise. His research sheds light on the remarkable complexity of our sensory systems.
13th September, 2024
Hannah Grace Jaison, a PhD student working with Prof. Meera Mary Sunny at the Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences presented her research work at the European Conference on Visual Perception 2024. The title of her poster was ‘Separating out distractor suppression from attentional guidance using predictability of feature and location’.
12th April, 2024
Dr. Supratim Ray, our esteemed speaker from the Centre for Neuroscience, IISc Bangalore, brought exceptional expertise and insight to the series. As a distinguished professor, Dr. Ray’s research on the “Effects of Meditation on the Brain” illuminated the profound relationship between meditation and gamma oscillations, offering valuable insights into cognitive health and neuroprotection.
12th March, 2024
Dr. Mewa Singh, Distinguished Professor (for Life) at the University of Mysore. Dr. Singh’s remarkable career in the ecology and behavior of wild mammals, particularly non-human primates, has earned him prestigious accolades, including two Ramanna Fellowships (DST), a JC Bose Fellowship, and his current role as a SERB Distinguished Fellow. He is also an esteemed Fellow of multiple academies, including the Indian Academy of Sciences Bangalore and the Indian National Science Academy New Delhi.
In his talk titled “Complex Environments Lead to the Emergence of Complex Skills in Monkeys,” Dr. Singh delved into the intriguing realm of urban ecology and its influence on animal behavior. Drawing from his extensive studies, he explored how exposure to different environments shapes the cognitive abilities and foraging skills of monkeys.
Jan 11, 2024
Dr. Shanmukha Aditya Upadhyayula, a renowned speaker in the field of cognitive and brain sciences, delivered a seminar at IIT Gandhinagar on the topic of “Visual experience through time: Characterising the role of scene semantics and grammatical structures in film and narrative comprehension”