A fundamental and recurring question in cognitive science concerns the modularity of mind: to what degree are computations and the representations they operate upon encapsulated to particular cognitive domains such as language, vision, music or action?  An equally fundamental question for cognitive biology concerns species-specificity: what aspects of cognition in a species rely on species-specific versus clade-general computations?
In the past decade, major progress has been made in exploring both of these issues, much of it relying upon artificial grammar learning and related paradigms.  Current results suggest that certain computational processes are shared, at least between language and music, and thus constitute integrating "horizontal" or cross-domain aspects of human cognition.  While broadly characterized as "hierarchical processing" or "syntax", they include phenomena in a variety of subdomains including phonology and rhythm.  However, the picture remains murky with respect to nonhuman animals, with little evidence of human-like skills in other primates, but increasing evidence for repeated convergent evolution of analogous traits in birds and marine mammals.  

This conference provided a state-of-the-art update on this fast-moving field, and focussed on overlaps between evolution of spoken language and music, research employing artificial grammar learning, and comparative work in these areas with a wide range of animal species.

Prizes for best talk and best poster were awarded. The awards were presented to the winners at the after-conference party in the Natural History Museum Vienna.

The conference took place in Vienna April 17-19, over the Easter holiday, immediately following the International Evolution of Language Conference in Vienna. 

Schedule:

Thursday 17.04.2014 

Friday 18.04.2014

Saturday 19.04.2014

Venue

The conference was hosted and introduced by Prof. W. Tecumseh Fitch (Department of Cognitive Biology, University of Vienna)