Joy Hirsch
Joy Hirsch, a neuroscientist at Yale, studies interpersonal interactions between people in natural environments using novel brain imaging technology (near infrared spectroscopy) that acquires brain signals using head mounted detectors (instead of a scanner) and enables simultaneous functional imaging of two or more communicating partners. This extends conventional neuroscience to investigate natural interactions such as eye-to-eye contact, real dialogue, communication of emotion, and conflict resolution. Insights that emerge from this new approach unify interacting brains into single dynamic systems. This groundbreaking approach links individual brains and blurs the boundary between “self” and others in the context of social connections. Dr. Hirsch will address the grand challenge of the new neuroscience of interconnected neural responses between communicating brains and the concept of “self.”