16.3.2023 The schedule of our working group in Sociology Days!
The titles of presentations and a schedule of our working group on cognitive sociology can be found here: https://sosiologipaivat.fi/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Working-groups-schedule-and-rooms4.pdf
3.1.2023 Working group on cognitive sociology!
We are coordinating a working group on cognitive sociology at the Sociology Days (Sosiologipäivät) which will be held in Tampere on March 23.-24. More information can be found here:
https://sosiologipaivat.fi/annual-conference-2023/
21.-23.2022 ENPOSS conference in Malaga!
Tuukka and Matti participated in the European Network for the Philosophy of the Social Sciences conference in Malaga.
15.8.2022 Cognitive sociology sessions in the NSA2022 conference!
We just had two great sessions on cognitive sociology in the Nordic Sociology Association conference in Reykjavik. We were especially intrigued by Omar Lizardo and Giuseppe Alessandro Veltri’s presentations!
14.6.2022: “Schematic Narrative Templates in Collective Remembering: The Case of Russia” by Tuukka in culturecog blog!
Tuukka’s new blog post in the culturecog blog is now published! To read the whole text click here.
7.6.2022: Matti is defending his doctoral dissertation on 21 June!
Our group member Matti Sarkia is defending his doctoral dissertation “A model-based and mechanistic approach to social coordination” on 21 June. The event will take place at 10:00 in Siltavuorenpenger 3 A, Athena building, room 302.
More info: https://helsinginyliopisto.etapahtuma.fi/kalenteri/english.aspx#.Yp9cpoNBzrc
4.4.2022: “Cognitive Artifacts, Affordances, and External Representations: Implications for Cognitive Sociology” by Tuukka in culturecog blog!
Tuukka’s new blog post in the culturecog blog is now published! In it Tuukka argues that cognitive sociologists should pay more attention to cognitive artifacts and their affordances. To read the whole text click here.
27.3.2022: Session on cognitive sociology in Nordic Sociological Association’s conference (Update: Wrong date for abstract deadline)
We are coordinating a session on cognitive sociology in the 30th Nordic Sociological Association Conference which will be held in Reykjavik (10–12.8.2022). If your research interests relate to cognitive sociology, consider sending an abstract through the conference’s abstract submission system (deadline is 15th of April)! NOTE: We got the original date wrong. The actual deadline was on the 20th of March. However, you can still submit an abstract through the abstract submission system (at least for some time).
If you are planning on submitting an abstract and are unsure if you still can submit an abstract to our session (or the submission system does not work) don’t hesitate to contact us:
Tuukka Kaidesoja, University of Helsinki, tuukka.kaidesoja[at]helsinki.fi
Ronny Puustinen, University of Jyväskylä, ronny.y.puustinen[at]student.jyu.fi
Mikko Hyyryläinen, University of Helsinki, mikko.e.hyyrylainen[at]helsinki.fi
Description of the session:
There has been a growing interest to investigate the cognitive aspects of social and cultural phenomena within different research fields in sociology and other social sciences. This recent research at the intersection of cognitive sciences and social sciences has been diverse in its content and methodology. For instance, some sociologists have identified themselves as “cognitive social scientists” and aimed to integrate concepts and methods from the cognitive sciences to sociological research in order to understand and explain the microfoundations of various social and cultural phenomena. Another group of sociologists has aimed to complement cognitive scientific research by means of applying sociological concepts and interpretive methods to the social and cultural aspects of cognitive processes. This session is open to presentations that address the cognitive aspects of all kinds of social and cultural phenomena. This includes but is not limited to theoretical and empirical research on the cognitive aspects of the myths of the Nordic welfare states, political conflicts, social movements, face-to-face interaction, collective memory, climate change denial, markets, social media, moral judgements, ethnicity, identity, ideology and religion. Our session also welcomes research concerning the social and cultural aspects of basic cognitive processes ─ such as perceiving, classification, inferring, decision-making, remembering and imaging. Our assumption is that identification and characterization of various cognitive processes are important for the proper understanding of many social and cultural phenomena. We also believe that sociologists’ contributions are needed for the interdisciplinary research on human cognition to flourish. Since the nature and direction of cognitive sociology is still under debate, the session also welcomes presentations that address conceptual, methodological, ontological and institutional issues pertaining to the growing field of cognitive sociology. The language of the session is English.
11.3.2022: Two new publications!
Tuukka has a new published article on university rankings. Check it out: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/05390184221079470
Also an article on the two traditions of cognitive sociology co-authored by Tuukka, Mikko & Ronny is now available online: https://doi.org/10.1111/jtsb.12341
16.12.2021: Working group on cognitive sociology and cognitive social sciences at Sosiologipäivät!
We are arranging a working group on cognitive sociology and cognitive social sciences at Sosiologipäivät 2022.
We are inviting abstracts of papers for work-group presentations on the topic of Cognitive Sociology and Cognitive Social Sciences. If you would like to present your research in a working group at the Annual Sociology Conference 24.–25.3.2022, please contact us. You can send us an abstract of your research before 31.1.2022.
Group description
Nearly all sociologists make assumptions about human thinking and information processing (i.e. human cognition) in their research practices whether or not they explicate these assumptions. Many basic cognitive processes ─ such as perceiving, decision making, classifying, remembering and concept formation ─ involve social and cultural aspects that have been increasingly researched in the cognitive sciences during recent decades. Against this background, it is not surprising that there has been a growing interest in human cognition within different research fields in sociology and other social sciences.
For instance, sociologists have researched the cognitive aspects of political conflicts, social movements, face-to-face interaction, collective memory, climate change denial, markets, social media, moral judgements, ethnicity, identity, ideology and religion. Some of these sociologists identify themselves as “cognitive social scientists”, aiming to deepen our understanding of the cognitive microfoundations of social phenomena by employing the concepts and methods of the cognitive sciences. Other sociologists regard themselves as “sociologists of culture and cognition” and aim to complement cognitive scientific research by means of applying sociological concepts and interpretive methods to the social and cultural aspects of cognitive processes.
This session focuses on theoretical and empirical research on the cognitive aspects of social life. Although most empirical work in cognitive sociology has focused on the cognitive dimensions of culture, this session is open to presentations that address the cognitive aspects of all kinds of social phenomena. The assumption is that sociologists’ contributions are needed in interdisciplinary research on human cognition. Since the nature and direction of cognitive sociology is still under debate, the session also welcomes presentations that address conceptual, methodological, ontological and institutional issues pertaining to cognitive sociology. The aim is to bring together sociologists who are interested in the relations between the social, cultural and cognitive.
We welcome presentations in English and in Finnish.
Coordinators, Cognitive Sociology:
Ronny Puustinen, University of Jyväskylä, ronny.y.puustinen[at]student.jyu.fi
Mikko Hyyryläinen, University of Helsinki, mikko.e.hyyrylainen[at]helsinki.fi
Tuukka Kaidesoja, University of Helsinki, tuukka.kaidesoja[at]helsinki.fi
More about the conference: https://sosiologipaivat.fi/
14.12.2020: “Explaining social phenomena by multilevel mechanisms” in culturecog blog!
Matti and Tuukka wrote a blog post to the culturecog blog. The post is based on the article “Mechanistic explanations in the cognitive social sciences: Lessons from three case studies” which was published in Social Science Information 59:4. You can find the blog post here.
1.12.2019: “Four arguments for the cognitive social sciences” in culturecog blog!
Tuukka wrote a blog post to the culturecog blog. The post is based on the article “Four Arguments for the Cognitive Social Sciences” which was published in the Journal for the Theory of Social Behavior 49:4. You can find the blog post here.