Marc Malmdorf Andersen

Shaping bodily self-awareness through thermosensory signals Skin temperature and the ability to perceive warm and cold thermal stimuli (i.e., thermoception) are fundamental to human survival, influencing both our evolutionary history and early individual development. Interestingly, recent research has also started to uncover the role of these thermosensory signals in cognition. Such signals may contribute to the construction of our bodily self-awareness, and specifically the sense of body ownership, which is defined as the feeling that the body and its parts belong to us. This review examines how thermosensory signals travel from the skin to the brain and their impact on body ownership in both healthy and clinical populations. Furthermore, we propose mechanisms that may underlie this interaction and highlight potential clinical and societal applications.

Online Now: Shaping bodily self-awareness through thermosensory signals

Beyond the Adult Mind: A Developmental Framework for Predictive Processing in Infancy In this paper, we argue that Predictive Processing cannot be a unifying account of cognition until it can explain infant development. We show why development is crucial for understanding human cognit...

New paper alert: Beyond the Adult Mind: A Developmental Framework for Predictive Processing in Infancy!

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

#PsychSciSky #DevPsyc #CogPsyc #neuroskyence

Not only many adults, but the vast majority of children too, from infancy through the teenage years, enjoy “recreational fear”—activities that are both scary and fun—new Danish study finds, with the nature and context of the activities evolving with age:

buff.ly/AAfh2mt

Assistant Professor, Associate Professor or Full Professor of Cognitive Science - Vacancy at Aarhus University Vacancy at School of Communication and Culture - Linguistics, Cognitive Science and Semiotics, Dept. of, Aarhus University

Come join the wonderful CogSci dep at Aarhus Uni, Denmark! Fantastic students, wonderful colleagues, and great work/life balance! We are looking for applicants with teaching experience in the field of computational modelling of cognitive and/or social processes.
international.au.dk/about/profil...

Vicarious body maps bridge vision and touch in the human brain - Nature A mode of brain organization that connects visual and bodily reference frames may translate raw sensory impressions into more abstract formats that are useful for action, social cognition and semantic...

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Come join the workshop on Recreational Fear at @aiasdk.bsky.social, @au.dk!

** Recruiting a postdoc ** We are looking for a postdoc to work on emotion, mental health, and interoception, based in London at @ucl.ac.uk in my lab (Clinical and Affective Neuroscience). Part of a large Wellcome Grant (co-led with the brilliant @camillanord.bsky.social)

🎃👻 When Fear Is Fun 2025 🎃👻
Our 5th annual workshop on recreational fear is happening in Aarhus on Dec 12!

Free participation, registration required.
🔗 Speakers + program: cc.au.dk/en/recreatio...
🔗 Register: event.au.dk/events/when-...

In need of horror-based scholarship? I re-FEAR you to the workshop below....

@felixthehauskat.bsky.social

The Recreational Fear Workshop explores why humans sometimes enjoy fear—and what it does to our minds and bodies.

This year, we have a fantastic lineup of speakers, covering everything from PTSD, psychopaths, true crime consumption and the Paradox of Horror.

Come join us at @aiasdk.bsky.social !

🎃👻 When Fear Is Fun 2025 🎃👻
Our 5th annual workshop on recreational fear is happening in Aarhus on Dec 12!

Free participation, registration required.
🔗 Speakers + program: cc.au.dk/en/recreatio...
🔗 Register: event.au.dk/events/when-...

‘Change course now’: humanity has missed 1.5C climate target, says UN head Exclusive: ‘Devastating consequences’ now inevitable but emissions cuts still vital, says António Guterres in sole interview before Cop30

Everything is a distraction from this.

Happy to share that our BBS target article has been accepted: “Core Perception”: Re-imagining Precocious Reasoning as Sophisticated Perceiving
With Alon Hafri, @veroniqueizard.bsky.social, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & Brent Strickland
Read it here: doi.org/10.1017/S014...
A short thread [1/5]👇

Hospital says toy MRI scanner helps save £150k Children can play with the Kitten Scanner to prepare them for a real scan.

www.bbc.com/news/article...

Striatal dopamine signals errors in prediction across different informational domains Dopamine reflects prediction errors not only about reward but also about valueless stimuli, challenging many current theories.

somehow I missed this!

Dopamine represents a domain-general teaching signal:

www.science.org/doi/full/10....

Academia.edu is changing its Terms and Conditions, and they're so outrageous (AI training; signing over ownership to them etc) I closed my account today.

A thread with some practical tips if you want to delete your account (5 steps):

Danish Media covers our recent study (article in danish):
videnskab.dk/kultur-samfu...

Does the culture you grow up in shape the way you see the world? In a new Psych Review paper, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & I tackle this centuries-old question using the Müller-Lyer illusion as a case study. Come think through one of history's mysteries with us🧵(1/13):

@profhelendodd.bsky.social

Expression of Interest in Serving as a PsyArXiv Moderator As you might have heard, PsyArXiv is having some issues with an increase in low-quality submissions, ranging from AI generated manuscripts to inflate citation metrics, incoherent or nonsensical docume...

PsyArXiv is seeking new moderators to help combat an increase in AI submissions! If you've ever posted a preprint to PsyArXiv, please consider joining. Minimum commitment 1h/month, there's a training session this Monday @ 1pm ET. More info here: forms.gle/9LB1rEtxHAeZ... #PsychSciSky

On the left is a rabbit. On the right is an elephant. But guess what: They’re the *same image*, rotated 90°!

In @currentbiology.bsky.social, @chazfirestone.bsky.social & I show how these images—known as “visual anagrams”—can help solve a longstanding problem in cognitive science. bit.ly/45BVnCZ

AI slop and the destruction of knowledge This week I was looking for info on what cognitive scientists mean when they speak of ‘domain-general’ cognition. I was curious, because the nuances are relevant for something I am researching at t…

AI slop and the destruction of knowledge irisvanrooijcogsci.com/2025/08/12/a...

🧟‍♂️🚨 Publication alert! 🚨🧟‍♀️

Holy moly, I'm thrilled to announce our new paper in Emotion! We explored how recreational fear, physiological synchrony, and social closeness interact in a high-intensity haunted house setting. 1/5 🧵

Link: psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?d...

Our results align with prior research showing that shared experiences can enhance physiological and emotional responses. Heart rate synchrony was higher among socially close individuals, though whether this reflects pre-existing alignment or emerges during shared fear remains unclear.

🧟‍♂️❤️🧟‍♀️

5/5🧵

We found that participants who synchronised their HRs with others in their group reported higher arousal. This synchrony was more pronounced among socially
close dyads, suggesting that social closeness may facilitate physiological alignment during shared emotional experiences of fear. 4/5🧵

Dystopia Entertainment i Vejle — Vi er eksperter i gys! Dystopia Entertainment i Vejle er passionerede eventdesignere, der står bag arrangementer som Dystopia Haunted House og Cirkus Dystopia.

We recruited 347 guests at Denmark's scariest haunted attraction (Dystopia.dk). People go through this haunted house in groups of 4–5, often combining friends and strangers.

Participants reported 1) who they knew and 2) who they felt emotionally close to. Everyone wore heart rate monitors.
3/5🧵

It’s curious that we seek out fear for fun - and even more curious that we almost always do it together. We watch horror films in groups, visit haunted houses with friends, and tell ghost stories around the campfire.

But how social dynamics shape our experience of fear remains largely unknown. 2/5🧵

🧟‍♂️🚨 Publication alert! 🚨🧟‍♀️

Holy moly, I'm thrilled to announce our new paper in Emotion! We explored how recreational fear, physiological synchrony, and social closeness interact in a high-intensity haunted house setting. 1/5 🧵

Link: psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?d...

<em>Child Development</em> | SRCD Journal | Wiley Online Library Cognitive development is associated with how predictable caregivers are, but the mechanisms driving this are unclear. One possibility is caregiver predictability initially shapes how infants gather i...

Happy to share "The Dynamics of Caregiver Unpredictability Shape Moment-to-Moment Infant Looking During Dyadic Interaction," out now in Child Development thanks to a large team of people I worked on this with! srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirec...