The Department of Psychology and the Cognitive Behavioral Sciences (CBS) Colloquium Series will present a talk, titled “What Your Moves Say About You: Action-Perception Dynamics and Mental Health” with Benoît G. Bardy on Monday, September 18, at 2 p.m. in 255 McCormick Hall. Bardy is a professor of health and movement science at EuroMov, a research center of the University of Montpellier.

Abstract

In this presentation, Bardy will emphasize the informational nature of human coordination, together with its consequences for the understanding of how the way we move reveals who we are. The notion of individual motor signature (IMS) will be presented, reducing to one low-dimensional variable the interaction of multiple degrees of freedom at various levels of the human body.

A novel way to evaluate how these signatures are influenced, when interacting in a dyad or in a group, by physical and movement similarity, social competences and mental deficits, will be introduced. Bardy will present a recently developed digital architecture that modulates IMS in real time during social interaction with artificial agents (avatars and robots) and will show how this architecture can be used for the rehabilitation of patients suffering from mental and social disorders.

CBS Colloquium Series

The CBS Colloquium Series brings high-caliber researchers to the Illinois State University campus to share their work with the local academic community. Individual faculty members invite speakers to campus based on their interests. The Department of Psychology also invites alumni to speak in the series in an effort to maintain strong connections with former students and provide them with a chance to pass on their knowledge to current students. The series provides both faculty and students with a variety of professional development opportunities and allows students to network with professionals in their field of study.

This speaker series is sponsored by the Department of Psychology, School of Kinesiology and Recreation, and the College of Arts & Sciences. To support the Department of Psychology and help enhance its educational mission with advanced teaching methods, guest speakers, and more opportunities for students to learn through research experiences, please consider making a gift to the department through the Illinois State University Foundation.

If you need a special accommodation to participate in this program, call the Department of Psychology at (309) 439-8651. Please allow sufficient time to arrange the accommodation.