Mindreading Lab

The Mindreading Lab at VUW conducts research on children’s and adults’ cognitive abilities to reason about how someone’s mental state (like belief) can cause and rationalize behavior. Our experimental work is informed by the exciting new theory that human beings have not one but (at least) two mindreading systems for tracking and ascribing belief. We are currently testing whether, and to what extent, our fast belief-tracking system interacts with our motor processes to facilitate the way we observe and perform actions. We also engage in collaborative research on mindreading in diverse groups and populations, and on the social and cognitive capacities of non-human animals.