JSMF Opportunity Awards

Overview

<p>JSMF is internationally known for supporting research on cognition and behavior, and currently does so through its Understanding Human Cognition (UHC) program. In 2020, JSMF announced priorities for the foundation’s support for the fields of cognitive science, cognitive psychology and developmental science with the intent of launching a funding initiative that would be forward looking and responsive to contemporary questions, while building on JSMF’s history. The Opportunity Awards were initiated because the foundation believes the time is right to advance the understanding of human cognition and behavior using a developmental science approach.</p> <p>Much of the current understanding of behavior is derived from experimental laboratory work that makes substantive conceptual and methodological assumptions during task selection and data acquisition. Cognitive psychology and cognitive neuroscience experiments are typically pursued in artificial environments with subjects drawn from narrowly defined populations performing tasks assumed to be valid proxies for real cognition and behavior. As a result, these experiments may not reflect the naturally occurring, free-flowing behaviors humans engage in their everyday lives. It is reasonable to ask how much has been missed or ignored because researchers’ experimental designs are based on pre-selected and specific aspects of cognition and behavior deemed to be of interest prior to the study? What more might be learned by challenging preconceived notions and common assumptions about cognition and behavior by advancing new theories and by using methods where it is possible to observe what behavior looks like in every day, real-world, dynamic contexts? With the Opportunity Awards, JSMF is seeking to fund projects leading to new conceptual and empirical studies of cognition and behavior that:</p> <ul> <li>recognize the dynamic nature of cognition and behavior,</li> <li>are situated in real world contexts,</li> <li>cross levels of analysis,</li> <li>unite traditionally separate domains of inquiry (e.g. vision and speech),</li> <li>embrace complexity, and</li> <li>consider how behavior is influenced by interactions among individuals.</li> </ul> <p>JSMF is encouraging researchers to pursue new questions using conceptual and methodological approaches that take seriously the trajectories, biological and experiential, and contribute to the ongoing development of cognition and behavior occurring across the lifespan. Individual projects need not cover the full human life span but the reasons for focusing on specific age ranges for study should be fully articulated. <em>Research plans that only propose to document task performance of subjects at different ages (e.g., comparing 15-year-old subjects to 60-year-old subjects) are not responsive to the call for proposals.</em></p>