app01 Thu, 25 Jun 2026 08:54:41 +0000 Fireside (https://fireside.fm) The It's Innate! Podcast - Episodes Tagged with “Cognitive Science” https://itsinnate.fireside.fm/tags/cognitive%20science Tue, 09 Jun 2026 12:00:00 -0400 Two opinionated developmental cognitive scientists wax theoretical about how infants and children acquire knowledge! en-us episodic A podcast by two developmental cognitive scientists Deon Benton & Jenny Wang Two opinionated developmental cognitive scientists wax theoretical about how infants and children acquire knowledge! no cognitive development, developmental psychology, cognitive science, nature vs. nurture, psychology, social science, science Deon Benton & Jenny Wang theitsinnatepodcast@gmail.com Episode 40: Mind o̶v̶e̶r̶ Matter? (with Shari Liu) https://itsinnate.fireside.fm/40 81557e18-de10-4162-ad78-e765942cd026 Tue, 09 Jun 2026 12:00:00 -0400 Deon Benton & Jenny Wang full Deon Benton & Jenny Wang 2:07:03 no <p>In this episode, we were joined by none other than the inimitable Dr. Shari Liu. We chatted with Shari about her recent paper in <em>Nature Reviews Psychology</em> entitled <em>How Physical Information Is Used to Make Sense of the Psychological World</em>.</p> <p>In both the paper and the episode, Shari makes the case that infants and children make sense of other people's minds by considering the physical world in which those minds are embedded. Shari argues that this is achieved via two separate, but interacting, domain-specific systems: naive physics and naive psychology. Along the way, Deon and Jenny pepper Shari with questions about how her account differs from other nativist approaches to cognitive development and whether various "deflationary" findings pose challenges for the existence of these systems, but Shari handles them with great aplomb.</p> <p><strong>Links</strong></p> <p>Liu, S., Karakose-Akbiyik, S., Outa, J., &amp; Kim, M. J. (2026). <em>How physical information is used to make sense of the psychological world</em>. <em>Nature Reviews Psychology, 5</em>(1), 59–73. <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0956797620920360" rel="nofollow noopener">Link</a> Special Guest: Shari Liu.</p> domain-general vs. domain-specific, cognition, cognitive development, cognitive science In this episode, we were joined by none other than the inimitable Dr. Shari Liu. We chatted with Shari about her recent paper in Nature Reviews Psychology entitled How Physical Information Is Used to Make Sense of the Psychological World.

In both the paper and the episode, Shari makes the case that infants and children make sense of other people's minds by considering the physical world in which those minds are embedded. Shari argues that this is achieved via two separate, but interacting, domain-specific systems: naive physics and naive psychology. Along the way, Deon and Jenny pepper Shari with questions about how her account differs from other nativist approaches to cognitive development and whether various "deflationary" findings pose challenges for the existence of these systems, but Shari handles them with great aplomb.

Links

Liu, S., Karakose-Akbiyik, S., Outa, J., & Kim, M. J. (2026). How physical information is used to make sense of the psychological world. Nature Reviews Psychology, 5(1), 59–73. Link

Special Guest: Shari Liu.

]]> In this episode, we were joined by none other than the inimitable Dr. Shari Liu. We chatted with Shari about her recent paper in Nature Reviews Psychology entitled How Physical Information Is Used to Make Sense of the Psychological World.

In both the paper and the episode, Shari makes the case that infants and children make sense of other people's minds by considering the physical world in which those minds are embedded. Shari argues that this is achieved via two separate, but interacting, domain-specific systems: naive physics and naive psychology. Along the way, Deon and Jenny pepper Shari with questions about how her account differs from other nativist approaches to cognitive development and whether various "deflationary" findings pose challenges for the existence of these systems, but Shari handles them with great aplomb.

Links

Liu, S., Karakose-Akbiyik, S., Outa, J., & Kim, M. J. (2026). How physical information is used to make sense of the psychological world. Nature Reviews Psychology, 5(1), 59–73. Link

Special Guest: Shari Liu.

]]> Episode 25: Something to pique your curiosity (with Gert Westermann) https://itsinnate.fireside.fm/25 5bf4c99d-a44f-4999-93fd-0709e2f7a1e3 Sun, 16 Mar 2025 08:00:00 -0400 Deon Benton & Jenny Wang full Deon Benton & Jenny Wang 1:49:34 no <p>In the first half of this episode, Jenny and I chat with Dr. Gert Westermann about his rather circuitous journey in cognitive science as well as about the role of modeling in the cognitive sciences and an early encounter with nativism in a language class. In the second half, we talk about how curiosity might develop. We center the discussion on a somewhat recent paper, which was led by his then postdoc Dr. Katie Twomey, in which they propose a theory of how curiosity works mechanstically. He talks about how when this proposal was implemented in a computational model, it was able to account for existing infant categorization data. This episode was such a joy to record.</p> <p><strong>Links</strong></p> <p>Twomey, K. E., &amp; Westermann, G. (2018). Curiosity‐based learning in infants: A neurocomputational approach. Developmental science, 21(4), e12629. <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/desc.12629" rel="nofollow noopener">Link</a> Special Guest: Gert Westermann.</p> curiosity, developmental mechanism, development science, cognitive science In the first half of this episode, Jenny and I chat with Dr. Gert Westermann about his rather circuitous journey in cognitive science as well as about the role of modeling in the cognitive sciences and an early encounter with nativism in a language class. In the second half, we talk about how curiosity might develop. We center the discussion on a somewhat recent paper, which was led by his then postdoc Dr. Katie Twomey, in which they propose a theory of how curiosity works mechanstically. He talks about how when this proposal was implemented in a computational model, it was able to account for existing infant categorization data. This episode was such a joy to record.

Links

Twomey, K. E., & Westermann, G. (2018). Curiosity‐based learning in infants: A neurocomputational approach. Developmental science, 21(4), e12629. Link

Special Guest: Gert Westermann.

]]> In the first half of this episode, Jenny and I chat with Dr. Gert Westermann about his rather circuitous journey in cognitive science as well as about the role of modeling in the cognitive sciences and an early encounter with nativism in a language class. In the second half, we talk about how curiosity might develop. We center the discussion on a somewhat recent paper, which was led by his then postdoc Dr. Katie Twomey, in which they propose a theory of how curiosity works mechanstically. He talks about how when this proposal was implemented in a computational model, it was able to account for existing infant categorization data. This episode was such a joy to record.

Links

Twomey, K. E., & Westermann, G. (2018). Curiosity‐based learning in infants: A neurocomputational approach. Developmental science, 21(4), e12629. Link

Special Guest: Gert Westermann.

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