Computational Cognitive Science Lab

Led by Bonan Zhao

As part of the Institute for Language, Cognition and Computation (ILCC) at the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, we are proudly located at Scotland's beautiful historical center.

Research

We build computational models, aiming to reverse-engineer the information-processing algorithms of the human mind. To evaluate these models, we run (online) behavioral experiments and collect empirical data.

The lab is particularly excited by topics like:

  • Why do people (sometimes) think about the same question differently?
  • How do people create concepts and communicate their thoughts?
  • How do people solve problems together?
  • What is the role of language in thinking?
  • What does it mean to create human-like intelligence?

Representative publications

A model of conceptual bootstrapping in human cognition
B. Zhao, C. G. Lucas, N. R. Bramley
Nature Human Behaviour

A rational model of innovation by recombination
B. Zhao, N. Velez, T. L. Griffiths
Proceedings of the 46th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

All publications