Mind wandering and meta-awareness

Dr. Jonathan Schooler
Professor of Psychology
University of California Santa Barbara

Historically, the mind has been viewed from a third-person perspective. This talk will explore insights that can be gained when the mind is considered from a first-person, i.e., inside out, perspective. Methodologically, this approach leads to the development and refinement of self-report measures that, when triangulated with behavioral and neuro-cognitive measures, provide valid insights into internal mental states. Conceptually, it reveals the importance of mind wandering, and has important implications for performance, default brain activity, and the nature of meta-awareness. Epistemologically, this approach suggests fundamental limitations to the current scientific approach that fails to account for what the first-person perspective reveals to be the most self-evident aspects of existence. Jonathan Schooler earned his doctorate from the University of Washington in 1987. Before accepting his current position, he held faculty positions at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of British Columbia where he was Canada Research Chair in Social Cognitive Science, and senior investigator at UBC's Brain Research Centre. Schooler's research focuses on consciousness, memory, the relationship between language and thought, problem solving, and decision making. He has written more than 100 scientific publications and edited (with J.C. Cohen) Scientific Approaches to Consciousness. His research has been funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the Office of Educational Research, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council, and the Institute for Health Research of Canada.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Dr. Jonathan Schooler
• Psychology
• Mizzou
• Distinguished Lecture Series
• scholar

[kevinmorais]

Is earth aware? watch?v=T0h03mr37Xs are we all one and earth has an awareness we are dangeriously missing