Abstract
It is our pleasure to welcome you to the 8th Annual Conference on Cognitive Science (ACCS8) held online and organized by the Amrita Mind Brain Center, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham (Amrita University), Kerala India from January 20-22, 2022. Cognitive Science is an interdisciplinary domain that challenges researchers and scientists to examine cognitive processes and understand how the mind works, functions, and behaves. Given the interdisciplinary nature of cognitive science, The Government of India and the Department of Science and Technology had formed the Association for Cognitive Science (ACS) in 2013. In the last seven years, the ACS has been organizing an Annual Conference of Cognitive Science (ACCS) at some of the top universities in India including IIT Kanpur, IIT Gandhinagar, IIT Guwahati, IISc Bangalore, BITS Pilani Goa and University of Hyderabad. In the 2022 event organized by Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, ACCS8 had 700 participants of which several of them were researchers or PhD students. The 30 oral and 61 poster presentations allowed 3 tracks of talks and 3 tracks of poster jam sessions. 2022’s ACCS has been graced by a wonderful array of 6 keynote speakers from various regions across the world. Prof. Nandini Chatterjee Singh from UNESCO MGIEP (India) talked on Game-based courses for learning – results of an online digital game-based course to build social and emotional skills in adolescents. Prof. Claudia Gandini Wheeler-Kingshott of University College London (UK) addressed on Principles of quantitative magnetic resonance imaging and relevance to clinical applications. Prof. Kenji Doya of Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (Japan) spoke on Neural Circuits for Mental Simulation. Prof. Egidio D’Angelo of University Pavia (Italy) addressed Bottom-up and top-down strategies for multiscale brain modelling. Prof. Ned Block of New York University (USA) spoke on an empirical argument that perception is non-conceptual. Prof. Bhavani Rao R of Amrita University (India) addressed on “Humane” Computer Interaction – The role of HCI in facilitating social and vocational empowerment.