LIP External Colloquium: Warsha Barde, DZNE Dresden – "Emergence of Individuality Beyond Nature and Nurture: The Role of Learning, Experience, and Agency"
- Datum: 14.10.2026
- Uhrzeit: 13:00 - 14:00
- Vortragende(r): Warsha Barde, DZNE Dresden
- Ort: Max-Planck-Institut für Bildungsforschung, Lentzeallee 94, 14195 Berlin
- Raum: Small Conference Room
- Gastgeber: LIP
- Kontakt: seklindenberger@mpib-berlin.mpg.de
LIP External Colloquium: Warsha Barde, Deutsches Zentrum für Neurodegenerative Erkrankungen e. V. (DZNE), Dresden – will present:
"Emergence of Individuality Beyond Nature and Nurture: The Role of Learning, Experience, and Agency"
How does individuality emerge when genetics and the shared environment are held constant? Using long-term IntelliCage monitoring of group-housed isogenic mice, I investigated how non-shared experiences shape behavioral and neural plasticity. I focused on three major components of experience: exploration, learning, and social interaction. Across several experiments, mice developed stable individual differences in exploratory behavior, task engagement, learning performance, flexibility, and social roles. These behavioral trajectories were associated with variation in adult hippocampal neurogenesis and functional connectivity. To examine the role of agency, I developed a self-paced learning paradigm in which mice progressed through increasingly complex tasks according to their own performance. Animals that engaged more actively advanced further and developed distinct learning profiles that were again linked to hippocampal neurogenesis. In a complementary experiment, restricting access to learning reduced both behavioral divergence and neurogenesis, despite animals sharing the same physical and social environment. Social interactions also contributed to these emerging differences. Stable leader-follower relationships developed, and animals with stronger social connectivity tended to perform better in learning tasks and showed higher neurogenesis. Together, these findings suggest that individuality emerges through the dynamic interaction of learning, exploration, social experience, and agency, with small differences in experience becoming progressively amplified into stable trajectories of behavioral and neural plasticity.
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Meeting link: https://mpib-berlin.webex.com/mpib-berlin/j.php?MTID=maf05eae7dc20c32e3cbb550688867b5a
Meeting number: 2740 004 4637
Password: 8bKvH8EbCe6
"Emergence of Individuality Beyond Nature and Nurture: The Role of Learning, Experience, and Agency"
How does individuality emerge when genetics and the shared environment are held constant? Using long-term IntelliCage monitoring of group-housed isogenic mice, I investigated how non-shared experiences shape behavioral and neural plasticity. I focused on three major components of experience: exploration, learning, and social interaction. Across several experiments, mice developed stable individual differences in exploratory behavior, task engagement, learning performance, flexibility, and social roles. These behavioral trajectories were associated with variation in adult hippocampal neurogenesis and functional connectivity. To examine the role of agency, I developed a self-paced learning paradigm in which mice progressed through increasingly complex tasks according to their own performance. Animals that engaged more actively advanced further and developed distinct learning profiles that were again linked to hippocampal neurogenesis. In a complementary experiment, restricting access to learning reduced both behavioral divergence and neurogenesis, despite animals sharing the same physical and social environment. Social interactions also contributed to these emerging differences. Stable leader-follower relationships developed, and animals with stronger social connectivity tended to perform better in learning tasks and showed higher neurogenesis. Together, these findings suggest that individuality emerges through the dynamic interaction of learning, exploration, social experience, and agency, with small differences in experience becoming progressively amplified into stable trajectories of behavioral and neural plasticity.
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Meeting link: https://mpib-berlin.webex.com/mpib-berlin/j.php?MTID=maf05eae7dc20c32e3cbb550688867b5a
Meeting number: 2740 004 4637
Password: 8bKvH8EbCe6