Cognitive Science

Field Description

Cognitive science focuses on the nature and representation of knowledge. Among the many topics examined are logic and the justification of belief; the nature of mind and action; knowledge representation; knowledge acquisition; the knowledge, use, and acquisition of language; perception; concepts and conceptual change; artificial intelligence and parallel distributed processing; and the neurobiology of cognition.

The cognitive science minor is open to students who have elected a major field in which the minor can be appropriately included. Field members offer guidance to students in setting up and carrying out an integrated program of interdisciplinary study in conjunction with their major field. Major fields include (but are not limited to) computer science, human development, information science, linguistics, management, mathematics, neurobiology and behavior, philosophy, and psychology.

All cognitive science graduate minor students must take at least two 6,000-level courses: some 4,000-level courses will be allowed with the approval of your minor committee member.  One course should be taught outside your discipline (in another cognitive science affiliated department); the other is the required COGST 6101: Cognitive Science Proseminar (spring). This course surveys the study of how the mind/brain works, drawing primarily from six disciplines: philosophy, psychology, developmental science, neuroscience, linguistics, and computer science. Although at least two courses are required, we encourage you to take more courses offered by the program.

Please email the program manager (cogst@cornell.edu) with your course choices for approval.

The field sponsors a series of lectures and colloquia by internationally recognized scholars. Students are encouraged to meet with the speakers for informal discussion during their visits.

Each spring the program hosts Sprocket, the Cognitive Science Film Series in conjunction with COGST 1101. The evening, complete with pizza and conversation, is free and open to the Cornell community.

Travel funding for conferences and workshops is available to minor students.

The Annual Grad Convo/Info Blitz lunch is held each May in order for students to share their research with peers and faculty.

This is a minor field. Application for admission is made only to the major fields. After matriculation, a student may select minor subjects from the major or minor fields.

 

Contact Information

Website: https://as.cornell.edu/cognitive-science-minor
Email: cogst@cornell.edu
Phone: 607 255-6431

278A Uris Hall
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY 14853-7601

 

Subject and Degrees

Concentrations by Subject

Cognitive Science

• cognitive studies (minor)

Faculty

Adam Keith Anderson

• Campus: Ithaca - (Minor Member)
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: examination of the psychology and neuroscience of emotion and its influence on attention, memory and cognition

Helena Aparicio Terrasa

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: Theoretical, Experimental and Computational Semantics/Pragmatics

Kaushik Basu

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies

Lawrence Edward Blume

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: economics

Charles Brainerd

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development

Claire T Cardie

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Daniel Casasanto

• Campus: Ithaca - (Minor Member)
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: experience and cognitive lab

Marianella Casasola

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development

Stephen John Ceci

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development

Tanzeem Choudhury

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: machine learning, mobile systems, activity recognition, mobile health, computer science

Morten H Christiansen

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Thomas A. Cleland

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: active sensation and construction of sensory representations; olfactory processing; generalization and perception; learning and memory; computational systems neurophysiology; mouse behavioral phenotyping; neural circuit structure and function

Abigail C Cohn

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: linguistics

Miloje Despic

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: Syntax, Morphology, Semantics, Interfaces...Slavic, Turkic, Algonquian

Timothy John Devoogd

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Molly E Diesing

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: linguistics

John M. Doris

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: Cognitive science, moral psychology, and philosophical ethics*

Laurent Dubreuil

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: literary theory; cognitive sciences

David Alan Easley

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: economics

Shimon Edelman

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

David James Field

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Thomas Dashiff Gilovich

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Jesse H. Goldberg

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: neurobiology, neuroscience, cognitive science

Michael H. Goldstein

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Joseph Yehuda Halpern

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Haym Hirsh

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science; information science

Thorsten Joachims

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Lillian Lee

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Christiane Linster

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: neurobiology and behavior

Michael Walton Macy

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: sociology

David Mimno

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Sarah E. Murray

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: formal semantics and pragmatics; dynamic semantics; cognitive science and philosophy of language; fieldwork; Cheyenne and other understudied languages

Anil Nerode

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: mathematics

Shaun B. Nichols

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: moral psychology and philosophy of the mind

Laura Niemi

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: Applied moral psychology

Alexander Ophir

• Campus: Ithaca - (Minor Member)
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: influences on social behavior, individual variations in genes, brain and behavior, monogamy and social attachment, social and spatial memory, animal communication

Carlotta Pavese

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: Epistemology, action theory, philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, linguistics

Derk Pereboom

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: free will and moral responsibility; philosophy of psychology; history of 17th- and 18th-century philosophy of religion

David A. Pizarro

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Hudson Kern Reeve

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: neurobiology and behavior

Valerie Reyna

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development

Mats Rooth

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: linguistics

Dawn Ellen Schrader

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: education

Bart Selman

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Nicholas Silins

• Campus: Ithaca - (Minor Member)
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: epistemology, philosophy of mind

W. Starr

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: language, philosophy

Robert J. Sternberg

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development, psychology

Khena Swallow

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psychology

Samuel Tilsen

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: speech; rhythm; gestures

Marten van Schijndel

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: psycholinguistics, computational linguistics, syntax, and semantics

Qi Wang

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development

John Bradford Whitman

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: linguistics; Asian studies

Wendy Williams

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: human development

Ramin Zabih

• Campus: Cornell Tech (NYC)
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: computer science

Vivian Zayas

• Campus: Ithaca
• Concentrations: Cognitive Science: cognitive studies
• Research Interests: social cognition; human attachment; self-regulation; unconscious cognition