Language Technologies and Digital Humanities

The course is fully adequate also for participants with no specific background in Psychology or Neuroscience. All topics will be introduced an explained within the course.

Providing knowledge about psychological neuroscience theoretical background and exploring the study of specific cognitive functions, such as learning, memory and attention in the face-to-face and digital contexts. In particular, the course aims to provide students with adequate tools to understand how cognitive functions such as learning and memory are influenced by the digital context. This competence will be useful for students to better understand the interaction between cognitive functions and the digital tools presented and discussed in other courses included in Language Technologies and Digital Humanities.

Providing a solid psychological neuroscience background as well as critical judgments on the topics presented. More specifically:

Students will be asked to recognize and explain the main neuroimaging techniques, as weel as the methododolies for studying behavioral data within the field of psychological neuroscience, especially when related to learning and memory. Students will need to understand and remember the interactions between the digital context, learning, and memory. By studying the materials presented in the course, students will familiarize themselves with the psychological neuroscience literature and, by the end of the course, they should be able to independently explore the basic psychological neuroscience literature. This will enable them to apply their knowledge of the human cognitive functions to the study of digital tools explored in other courses and in their thesis work.

• Psychological neuroscience: the theoretical background
• Main techniques for the study of the integrated mind-brain-body system
• Memory and attention in the face-to-face and digital contexts
• Explicit and implicit learning processes: what they are and how they can be investigated
• Learning in the digital context: pros and cons
• Exploring the concept of "presence" in the digital context
• A few notions about AI

Lectures in presence

Oral (verbalizing) exam.

The material for the exam consists of:

1. The slides presented in class (available on the course web page since the day of the lesson).

2. Two articles chosen from those presented in class (check 'Other suggested readings and bibliography' for some of the articles you can select).

In case course attendance is not possible, the material for the exam consists of:

- the slides of the course

- the 3 following articles:

1) Sarasso, P., Ronga, I., Del Fante, E., Barbieri, P., Lozzi, I., Rosaia, N., Cicerale, A., Neppi-Modona, M., & Sacco, K. (2022). Physical but not virtual presence of others potentiates implicit and explicit learning. Scientific reports, 12(1), 21205. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-25273-4

2) Sarasso, P., Ronga, I., Piovesan, F., Barbieri, P., Del Fante, E., De Luca, D., Bechis, L., Osello, A., & Sacco, K. (2024). Shared attention in virtual immersive reality enhances electrophysiological correlates of implicit sensory learning. Scientific reports, 14(1), 3767. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-53937-w

3) Shteynberg, G. (2010). A silent emergence of culture: The social tuning effect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 99(4), 683-;689. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0019573

Professor's reception time: please email me at irene.ronga@unito.it to schedule a meeting.

Students with specific learning disability should visit this page: https://en.unito.it/services/students-special-needs/students-specific-learning-disability-sld

To receive support during the exams, please visit the page: https://en.unito.it/services/students-special-needs/disabled-students/support-taking-exams-disabled-students

Here is a list of some of the articles you can select:

De Felice, S., Vigliocco, G., & Hamilton, A. (2021). Social interaction is a catalyst for adult human learning in online contexts. Current biology : CB, 31(21), 4853-;4859.e3. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.08.045

Sarasso, P., Ronga, I., Piovesan, F., Barbieri, P., Del Fante, E., De Luca, D., Bechis, L., Osello, A., & Sacco, K. (2024). Shared attention in virtual immersive reality enhances electrophysiological correlates of implicit sensory learning. Scientific reports, 14(1), 3767. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-53937-w

Sarasso, P., Ronga, I., Del Fante, E. et al. Physical but not virtual presence of others potentiates implicit and explicit learning. Sci Rep 12, 21205 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-25273-4

Shteynberg, G. (2010). A silent emergence of culture: The social tuning effect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 99(4), 683-;689. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0019573

Sarasso, P., Barbieri, P., Del Fante, E., Bechis, L., Neppi-Modona, M., Sacco, K., & Ronga, I. (2022). Preferred music listening is associated with perceptual learning enhancement at the expense of self-focused attention. Psychonomic bulletin & review, 29(6), 2108-;2121. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-022-02127-8

Sacco, K., Ronga, I., Perna, P., Cicerale, A., Del Fante, E., Sarasso, P., & Geminiani, G. C. (2022). A Virtual Navigation Training Promotes the Remapping of Space in Allocentric Coordinates: Evidence From Behavioral and Neuroimaging Data. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 16, 693968. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2022.693968

Barbieri, P., Sarasso, P., Lodico, F., Aliverti, A., Murayama, K., Sacco, K., & Ronga, I. (2024). The aesthetic valve: how aesthetic appreciation may switch emotional states from anxiety to curiosity. Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 379(1895), 20220413. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2022.0413

Dresler, M., Shirer, W. R., Konrad, B. N., Müller, N. C. J., Wagner, I. C., Fernández, G., Czisch, M., & Greicius, M. D. (2017). Mnemonic Training Reshapes Brain Networks to Support Superior Memory. Neuron, 93(5), 1227-;1235.e6. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2017.02.003

Sarasso, P., Ronga, I., Kobau, P., Bosso, T., Artusio, I., Ricci, R., & Neppi-Modona, M. (2020). Beauty in mind: Aesthetic appreciation correlates with perceptual facilitation and attentional amplification. Neuropsychologia, 136, 107282. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2019.107282

Lesson attendance is strongly advised, even not mandatory. In case attending the course is not possible, please refer to the program for non-attending students (I am always available via email in case of doubts).

It is advised for students to enroll in the course both on the course homepage and on Moodle in order to receive useful information via email.

The slides presented during lectures will be available from the day of the lecture on the course website, in the course materials section.

Recording of lectures will not be provided.

The module consists of 36 hours. The final grade is expressed on a scale of thirty.