New Preprint! We gave neural networks infant-like curiosity and let them free to explore. They grew brain-like architecture, followed human synaptic development, and even started to display compositional thought. So we think curiosity doesn't just come from a complex mind... it helps us build one 👇

A few days left to apply for two fully funded 4-year PhD positions in my group at the University of Amsterdam The PhD candidates will work on the @erc.europa.eu funded project EMODEV: The emergence of distinct emotions in human development. Application deadline: 3 May

I am excited to share that we are opening two fully funded 4-year PhD positions in my group at the University of Amsterdam The PhD candidates will work on the @erc.europa.eu funded project EMODEV: The emergence of distinct emotions in human development. Application deadline: 3 May

Gentle reminder! The deadline for submitting a candidacy for the Early Career Award is approaching (NEW DEADLINE: February 15). 🏆 The award includes a $1,000 prize, an invited talk at ISRE 2026 (with waived registration) and more. For more details: www.isre.org/page/isre-ec...

A few weeks left to apply for the @isreorg.bsky.social Early Career Award

Our lab at the University of Amsterdam is hiring a Postdoctoral Researcher to examine how young children’s emotions develop across cultures. This position is part of our @erc.europa.eu project on the emergence of distinct emotions in human development. werkenbij.uva.nl/en/vacancies...

BBC article on our work showing that having deep conversations with their parents can make children feel more loved. "Rather than just talking about leisure and work, the parents and kids spoke about topics that really matter." www.bbc.com/future/artic...

I am very excited to start a new research program on the emergence of distinct emotions in early decelopment, funded by the European Research Council Starting grant! A huge thank you to my mentors, collaborators, colleagues, coaches, advisors, and my husband for supporting me along the way!

🧠 Call for Participation: Social Dynamics 2025 🗓️ 20-21 November 2025 📍Utrecht University, The Netherlands 🔗 socialdynamics2025.sites.uu.nl ft @antoniahamilton.bsky.social @escross.bsky.social @suzannedikker.bsky.social @milicanikolic.bsky.social, @dcrafa.bsky.social + many more

Our workshop series starts next week! Monday: Discovering Statistics; Tuesday: State-of-the-art meta-analysis; Wednesday: Machine learning without tears Thursday & Friday: Bayesian hypothesis testing Attend one or all of them, in person or online jasp-stats.org/2025/06/27/l...

🚨 Postdoc Opportunity!!! The Toronto Early Cognition Lab (@UofT) is hiring a postdoc to study early optimism in infants & young children. Work w/ multi-method approach, amazing undergrads & grads. Start: Fall 2025 or later. Details: [email protected] RTs appreciated 💫

Very excited that the next @isreorg.bsky.social conference will take place in Brisbane, Australia. Join us for a week of exciting research on emotion!

A stellar line-up at this @royalsociety.org event on the Self, 19-20 May : Garfinkel, Wykowska, Prescott, Verschure, Zavahi, Schectman, , Li, Southgate, Lanillos, Brugger, Addis,Vogeley, Preller,Tsakiris, Blanke. Join us! royalsociety.org/science-even...

I am delighted to announce the speakers for our summer school on emotion, taking place June 30 – July 4 in Amsterdam, including Agneta Fischer, Bert Bakker, @gijsschumacher.bsky.social, Disa Sauter, Ute Frevert, Marie Rosenkrantz Lindegaard, Elisa Militaru, Ilya Veer, Laura Keesman and myself.

Welcome to ISRE's Bluesky account!

We have two upcoming special issues at Developmental Psychology with open calls for letters of intent. Please do submit, as we are excited to continue providing leading and lively science in the pages of the journal. www.apa.org/pubs/journal... The two calls: 1/3 @apajournals.bsky.social

Excited to share a new paper! The development of emotion contagion- out in #DevSci We used the cool method of infra-red thermal imaging to examine #EmotionContagion in #infants using a #crosscultural sample from Uganda and UK @durhampsych.bsky.social onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

This story is another great example of why we can’t just extrapolate what we know about neuroscience in the developed brain to neuroscience in the developing brain. www.jneurosci.org/content/44/4...

Happy New Year! 🎉 Are you considering learning a new data science skills as part of your New Year’s resolution? Here is a collection of free courses covering a variety of topics, including #Python, #RStats, #statistics, #math, #machinelearning, #deeplearning, etc. www.linkedin.com/pulse/curate...

I am delighted to announce that Disa Sauter and I are organizing a summer school, Emotion: An Interdisciplinary Perspective, at the University of Amsterdam 30 June - 4 July 2025. We are also excited to offer four full scholarships through our faculty. summerschool.uva.nl/content/summ...

A clever study probing infants’ false beliefs

Give yourself (and your future readers) an early present and read every word of this blog post on scientific writing by @dingdingpeng.the100.ci ...

We're launching Devstart, a website to help anyone getting started with developmental science methods and programming. Here's the website with the first tutorials: tommasoghilardi.github.io/DevStart/ Please share widely! 1/4

Excited to share our new work exploring how people learn from acceptance and rejection: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... We find that the brain's 'social rejection' network tracks changes in how others value us—separate from reward learning about positive outcomes. See Begum’s thread below for more!

So many parents want to know when social media may be safe for their child. The American Psychological Association and Common Sense Media teamed up to make this free resource! Hope it is useful!!! www.commonsensemedia.org/articles/qui...

An interesting observational study of elephants’ behaviours at the Berlin zoo. Can elephants be envious? www.science.org/content/arti...

New to BlueSky? Interested in Psychology? Click on this post and scroll up for a thread of 40 starter packs containing experts in different areas of psychology. #Psychology #AcademicSky #EduSky 🧪

🚨 Funded PhD position in my lab 👶🧠 @kinderstudien.bsky.social @univie.ac.at We are looking for a PhD student to work on an FWF-funded project on "Selective Neural Entrainment and Dynamic Attention in Infants" jobs.univie.ac.at/job/Project-...

Come join us as a post-doc on NWO project 'Multimodal Signalling in Face-to-Face Communication' 😃 at the Donders Centre for Cognition. Deadline 8th December! Dutch language proficiency required. ru.varbi.com/what:job/job...

Gentle reminder: The deadline to apply for this position is this Friday. cheers!

For decades, developmental psychologists have noticed that optimism declines with age. Why does this presumably good thing decrease across development? In this Nature Reviews Psych article, @jessicas.bsky.social and I draw from prior hypotheses to offer an integrated account.

"It is as though we give ourselves permission to acknowledge the power of adolescent love in stories, but cannot acknowledge it publicly about ourselves." My article about teenage love now online www.theguardian.com/science/2024...

Nature How your brain detects patterns in the everyday: without conscious thought www.nature.com/articles/d41...

I am delighted to talk about our recent study on the neural substrates of blushing at the Royal Society Publishing Behind the Paper webinar today at 11 a.m. CET cassyni.com/events/SQTus...

Here we go - PhD position #2 Development of social cognition across cultures 🇰🇪🇹🇷🇩🇪 * Comparative longitudinal project * Focus on individual differences * Fully funded for 4 years (75% E13, teaching optional) @volkswagenstiftung.bsky.social more info👇 www.leuphana.de/en/universit...

PhD opportunity at the Donders Institute: Are you fascinated by the connection between adapting communication and managing emotions? do apply! www.ru.nl/en/working-a...

This must be one of the funniest posts ever

A very nice discussion by Shaun Gallagher on the question whether the minimal self is embodied or could exists dis-embodied, without sensation. www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles... #philosophy #philsci #neuroskyence

👶​🧠​📈​ A workshop on "Advances in infant neuroscience" is being organized as part of the Budapest CEU Conference on Cognitive Development on the morning of Jan. 4 and it's possible to attend online for free !! 😀​ Please register via the dedicated website infant-neuroscience.github.io/getting-star...

New paper from @thaliawheatley.bsky.social, me, @stolkarjen.bsky.social & @lukejchang.bsky.social at Perspectives on Psychological Science! "The Emerging Science of Interacting Minds" Read about why we think that this is an auspicious moment for interaction science! Link: doi.org/10.1177/1745...

Super happy that our Open Science application fNIRS4all was funded by NWO! Looking forward working with @milicanikolic.bsky.social @geertjanwill.bsky.social Félice van Nunspeet, and Jim Maarseveen to create an open resource for the use of fNIRS in research and teaching across universities!

A reminder this holiday season … “If you do not shop local there will be no local shops”

BREAKING: Today Amsterdam introduced 30 kmh (20 mph) maximum speed limits on most streets, citing increased road safety, reduced pollution, lower noise levels, and fewer injuries/casualties. 20-30% fewer accidents, predicts the Vice Mayor. Via @copenhenken #Amsterdam #Dutch

Cool paper on mirror self-recognition mechanisms in mice: “visual self-image may be developed through social experience and mirror habituation and stored in a subset of vCA1 neurons” www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...

Yet another paper on gender imbalance in EU academia. Although women and men are similarly graduating from a PhD, the academic positions beyond the PhD level are gender imbalanced across all disciplines (75-25 ratio) www.nature.com/articles/s41...

A study in the Netherlands finds that male PhD candidates are almost twice as likely as females to get cum laude distinction and this gap increases when the committee is all-male 😱 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Nature Human Behaviour LLMs differ from human cognition because they are not embodied www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Very interesting trial of randomising grant allocation among high quality proposals! Is the Dutch Research Council following this #NWO?

You can apply till this Sunday (19 November)! #AcademicSky #socialpsyc 🧠🟦 #cogpsyc #PsychSciSky #devpsy