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Benjamin Pitt

@benjaminpitt.bsky.social
155 followers 115 following 31 posts

Cognitive diversity, development, & dynamics. cognitiveconstructionlab.com

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Reposted by Benjamin Pitt
languagemit.bsky.social @languagemit.bsky.social · 20/06/2026
—— Open Mind is MIT Press’s Diamond Open Access Cognitive Science journal. We now have our first Impact Factor: 2.9 as of June 2026 Submit your papers to Open Mind direct.mit.edu/opmi
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Reposted by Benjamin Pitt
Science Magazine @science.org · 27/07/2026
Before entering a long decline that continues into the present, humanity may have spoken far more languages, experiencing a “golden age” of linguistic diversity, with tens of thousands of languages spoken worldwide only several thousand years ago, a new Science study finds. scim.ag/4b8zW0b
scim.ag
The rise and fall of language diversity through the Holocene
Characterizing the factors that have shaped linguistic diversity is fundamental for understanding human history, culture, and cognition. In this study, we combined statistical and social computational...
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Another cool study on children's algorithmic learning abilities!
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
This can help explain how people learn so much, so flexibly. The same mechanism that allowed our participants to induce arbitrary structure in novel patterns may also be what allows people to induce the systematic structure of their physical, social, and cultural environment, whatever it might be.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
This algorithm induction ability did not evolve in humans for decoding patterns of colored blocks. Rather, it may have evolved as a general-purpose learning mechanism for decoding almost any real-world pattern, whether it's how to play tag, use chopsticks, or build a canoe, just by watching.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
A generative Bayesian LOT model of children’s response patterns showed that they weren’t just learning simple associations among neighboring blocks. They were inducing algorithms that could explain the patterns we showed them, like scientists developing a theory.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
This is very smart, especially when you realize how wildly underdetermined the data were – the sample patterns were short (i.e. 4-6 items) and could in principle reflect an enormous variety of possible algorithms. It’s an incredibly hard problem to solve!
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Accuracy was high at every age we tested, starting at 3 years old. Even children without any formal schooling – children who do not even know how to count – decoded our patterns well above chance on their first (and only) try.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Instead, they generalized. Even though the response patterns looked different physically from the sample patterns, they were similar logically – far more similar than you’d expect by chance. The kids saw through the superficial features and discovered the underlying rule.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
We showed US American and Indigenous Tsimane’ children simple patterns of colored blocks like 🔺🔷🔺🔷 and asked them to make their own ‘sibling’ pattern, with no help. We limited their patterns to different blocks and different lengths (and even different ‘alphabets’) to make copying impossible.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
New paper finally out in @NatureComms with E. Leib, D. O’Shaughnessy, C. Gallardo, @sferrigno.bsky.social, and @spiantado.bsky.social. 📝Children across cultures discover the latent algorithms that structure what they see, even without instruction, feedback, or formal schooling.🧵 tinyurl.com/4a238m2d
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Stephen Ferrigno @sferrigno.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
The Cognitive Origins Lab @uwpsych.bsky.social is hiring! We are looking for a full-time Research Specialist (postbac) to work on non-invasive primate + child cognition research. Full-time, 2 years, starts June 2026. Apply here: wisconsin.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/UW_Madison/j...
wisconsin.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com
Research Specialist
Current Employees: If you are currently employed at any of the Universities of Wisconsin, log in to Workday to apply through the internal application process. Job Category: Academic Staff Employment T...
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 23/03/2026
The Cognitive Construction Lab is hiring a full-time lab manager! Come work with me at UMass Amherst, starting this Fall. Apply here: tinyurl.com/3dpz5m3j
tinyurl.com
Technical Assistant I (Lab Manager - Cognitive Construction Lab) - Amherst, Massachusetts, United States
Title: Technical Assistant I (Lab Manager - Cognitive Construction Lab) Executive Area: Academic Affairs College/School/MBU: College of Natural Sciences Department: Psychology and Brain Sci Work Locat...
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Dorsa Amir @dorsaamir.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
What does it mean for culture to “shape” cognition? In our new TiCS paper, @benjaminpitt.bsky.social & I offer a typology of four possible effects: culture can Privilege one cognitive process over others, Prune out disfavored ones, Produce new ones, or have no effect. www.cell.com/trends/cogni...
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Kevin Mitchell @wiringthebrain.bsky.social · 21/02/2026
The strongest version of this illusion I’ve seen! Absolute head-wrecker!
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Olympia L K Campbell @olkcampbell.bsky.social · 19/02/2026
Humans exhibit an astonishing variety of marriage systems. Sometimes monogamous, other times polygamous, occasionally we even marry ghosts. The diversity can seem to defy any general explanation. In my new piece for Works in Progress, I write about the Darwinian logic behind it. 1/
worksinprogress.co
The market for marriage - Works in Progress Magazine
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good agricultural surplus, must be in want of a wife.
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Association for Psychological Science @psychscience.bsky.social · 23/01/2026
"We say things like, ‘You have some food on your left cheek,’” said @benjaminpitt.bsky.social. “We would never say that you have some food on your down-river cheek or on your east cheek, but other cultures do.”  www.psychologicalscience.org/news/2026-ja...
psychologicalscience.org
Across Cultures, People Combine Reference Frames to Orient Themselves
A 2025 study explores allocentric and egocentric references and whether the two can be integrated simultaneously in a single action.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 21/01/2026
Fun to see this paper featured in the APS Observer! @psychscience.bsky.social www.psychologicalscience.org/news/2026-ja...
psychologicalscience.org
Across Cultures, People Combine Reference Frames to Orient Themselves
A 2025 study explores allocentric and egocentric references and whether the two can be integrated simultaneously in a single action.
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Reposted by Benjamin Pitt
Cécile Sarabian @csarabian.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
Highly highly recommended! The place is great and @cmolho.bsky.social is fabulous to work with!
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 25/11/2025
Come work with me on cognitive diversity, development & dynamics in beautiful Amherst, Massachusetts! Graduate student applications are due a week from today. cognitiveconstructionlab.com
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Christoph Völter @christophvoelter.bsky.social · 13/11/2025
Fully funded #PhDposition in Comparative Cultural Psychology @mpi-eva-leipzig.bsky.social. We will use touchscreen experiments & eyetracking to study mental simulations in nonhuman apes & human children across different cultures. All info here: www.eva.mpg.de/career/posit... Please share / apply!🙏
eva.mpg.de
Positions available - Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Why do people use multiple maps when one would do? And why do people use one combination much more than the opposite combination? Tantalizing answers to these and other questions await in the open-access paper! @psychscience.bsky.social doi.org/10.1177/0956...
doi.org
One Action, Two Reference Frames: Compound Cognitive Maps of Object Location - Benjamin Pitt, 2025
To navigate complex physical environments, animals keep track of the spatial relations among objects using various reference frames, both body-based (e.g., left...
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
This shows people are not limited to using one reference frame at a time, even in the very same action. Instead, people across cultures may habitually use compound cognitive maps composed of multiple reference frames to represent the multidimensional spatial relations of their environment.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
A group of US undergrads were more egocentric overall (more blue), but often made the same kind of hybrid responses: Egocentric on the front-back axis and allocentric on the left-right axis at the same time. One action, two reference frames.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Here’s a canoncal response. She finds an object in her far right cup, turns around, and places it in her far LEFT cup. This preserves the object’s EGOcentric position in front-back space (i.e. far, far) but preserves its ALLOcentric position in left-right space (e.g. window-side, window-side).
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Here’s what they did. Some of their responses were fully egocentric (blue), and some were fully allocentric (pink), but most were mixed (purple), corresponding to an egocentric frame on one axis and an allocentric frame on the other axis in the very same action (i.e. placing an object in a cup).
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
The trick is that the cup you choose reveals which reference frame you were using to remember the object’s position. And because of the layout of the cups, choosing a cup actually means choosing a position on both the left-right axis and the front-back axis.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
In each trial, participants picked up an object from one of 16 cups laid out on the "study" table (in four groups of four), turned around 180 degrees to face an identical "test" table, and were asked to put the object in the corresponding cup.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
The question here is whether they would not only switch quickly between reference frames, but actually mix them together, using one frame on one axis and a different frame on the other axis *at the same time*. To find out, we designed a new, 2-dimensional test of spatial memory, the 4Quads task.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
We know from a past study that Tsimane’ switch reference frames depending on which spatial axis is relevant, lateral (left-right) or sagittal (front-back): tinyurl.com/347h9b2y.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
We addressed this question with the Tsimane’, an indigenous group of farmer-foragers living in the Bolivian Amazon.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
But neuroscience says otherwise. All sorts of animals – including humans – integrate egocentric and allocentric spatial information all the time, to be able to navigate a complex 3D spatial world. So which is it? One-at-a-time or habitually integrated?
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
We know people can flexibly switch between egocentric and allocentric reference frames. But on some psycholinguistic accounts, they are limited to using one at a time like in language – you can say “The spoon is on the right” or “The spoon is North” but not both at once.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
*Egocentric* coordinates are centered on the body (e.g. my left) and so turn with the observer. *Allocentric* coordinates are based on the environment (e.g. East-West, uphill-downhill), and so stay put even if you don’t.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Like other animals, humans depend on spatial memory to navigate, coordinate the movement of our bodies, and keep track of the hundreds of objects that compose our environment. But there are two fundamentally different ways to remember where things are: body-centered and environment-centered
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Do people remember where things are relative to their body (e.g. my left side) or relative to the environment (the North/uphill side)? The answer is both at once, according to my new paper now out in Psychological Science! 🧵 journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com
Sage Journals: Discover world-class research
Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
Another great PhD opportunity: An ERC-funded project on “Children as agents of cultural evolution,” lead by @sheinalew.bsky.social at Durham University. Come do fieldwork with Mayan groups in Belize with her, @dorsaamir.bsky.social, and I! One of three, 3-year PhD positions starting Fall 2026.
durham.ac.uk
Fees and Funding - Durham University
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
I’ll be considering graduate school applications for Fall 2026 – positions are fully funded, typically for 5 years. Deadline to apply to the Cognition program is December 1. Come do science with me in beautiful Amherst, Massachusetts! www.umass.edu/natural-scie...
umass.edu
PhD in Cognition and Cognitive Neuroscience : College of Natural Sciences : UMass Amherst
Engage in research centered on fundamental theoretical questions about cognitive function using multiple experimental methods and data analysis.
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
The Cognitive Construction Lab will study children and adults across cultures to understand how the diversity of human experience produces a diversity of human minds. Check out the brand new lab website! cognitiveconstructionlab.com
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Benjamin Pitt @benjaminpitt.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
I’m delighted to announce that I’ll be joining the faculty at @umassamherst.bsky.social next year as an assistant professor in Psychological & Brain Sciences! 🥳
media.tenor.com
a cartoon of homer simpson says whoo-hoo in front of a stone wall
ALT: a cartoon of homer simpson says whoo-hoo in front of a stone wall
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Reposted by Benjamin Pitt
Bill Thompson @wdt.bsky.social · 13/12/2024
We have extended the deadline for this position to January 31st. Also, the start date is pretty flexible; if you're graduating next spring/summer and interested in the role, apply!
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Léo Fitouchi @lfitouchi.bsky.social · 16/12/2024
Our new paper, on the evolution of institutions, is out in PNAS! How can institutions promote cooperation when they themselves rely on cooperation? Check out JB's awesome thread! Very proud of this paper with @jliep.bsky.social, N. Baumard, @jbaptistandre.bsky.social! www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...
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Christoph Völter @christophvoelter.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
No evidence for inequity aversion in non-human animals: a #meta-analysis of accept/reject paradigms royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/... New paper led by Oded Ritov and w/ @nicholaraihani.bsky.social and Jan Engelmann.
royalsocietypublishing.org
No evidence for inequity aversion in non-human animals: a meta-analysis of accept/reject paradigms | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Disadvantageous inequity aversion (IA), a negative response to receiving less than others, is a key building block of the human sense of fairness. While some theorize that IA is shared by species acro...
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