In everyday life, people often need to coordinate their actions with each other. Common examples are walking with someone at a set pace, playing collective sports, dancing, playing music in a duet or group as well as a wide range of social bonding behaviors such as eye-gaze coordination between mother and infant or between partners. Despite the undisputed developmental significance of these interpersonally coordinated behaviors, little, if any, is known about their real-time dynamics and about the brain mechanisms that support them. The Interactive Brains, Social Minds project investigates lifespan changes in behavioral and neuronal mechanisms that permit individuals to coordinate their behavior with each other in time and space. The empirical focus is on temporal aspects of interpersonal action coordination as assessed by simultaneous behavior and EEG recordings. The project is structured into two parts:

• the Interactive Brains BabyLab, focusing on infant development
• the Interactive Brains LifespanLab, studying other parts of the lifespan

Key references

• Lindenberger, U., Li, S.-C., Gruber, W., & Mueller, V. (in press). Brains swinging in concert: Cortical phase synchronization while playing guitar. BMC Neuroscience.
• Mueller, V., Gruber, W., Klimesch, W., & Lindenberger, U. (in press). Lifespan differences in cortical dynamics of auditory perception. Developmental Science.

Scientific Investigators:
Ulman Lindenberger
Franziska Kopp
Shu-Chen Li
Viktor Mueller

Postdoctoral Fellow:
Anna Kleinspehn-Ammerlahn

Predoctoral Fellows:
Cathleen Bache
Karen Bartling