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Author
Name Hölken, Alexander
Research field Cognitive Science
Career stage doctoral researcher
Home university/institution Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB)
Department/Research unit at home university/institution Philosophy and Educational Research
Chair/Working group at home institution Prof. Albert Newen

International activity
Country Japan
Location Okinawa
University Okinawa Institute for Science and Technology
Fund Research School PR.INT
Type of activity research stay
Period starts 23-10-2024
ends 09-01-2025
Keywords Embodied Cognitive Science, Ecological Psychology, Theory of Mind
Report From October 23rd, 2024, to January 10th, 2025, I learned and worked under the supervision of Prof. Tom Froese, as part of the Embodied Cognitive Science Unit (ECSU) at the Okinawa Institute for Science and Technology (OIST) in Onna-son, Japan. I was fortunate enough to be granted this opportunity thanks to financial and logistic support from Prof. Froese’s research unit itself, as well as funding received from the RUB Research School’s “Project International” for my travel expenses.

During my stay at the OIST, I collaborated with and learned from a variety of different fellow PhDs, postdoctoral fellows, and professors. First and foremost was of course Prof. Froese himself, who met with me and other researchers from his lab to at least once every week to discuss new research on the neural basis of voluntary decision-making, behavioral coordination, and complex systems models. In addition, I had the opportunity to gain practical experience in conducting and analyzing EEG experiments, as I was offered to take over the management of such an experiment that was developed by a student just before the end of their PhD studies. During this time, I received a lot of help and guidance by Finda Putri, a PostDoc with nearly 10 years of experience with designing and conducting EEG experiments. She taught me both about the practical aspects (preparing and cleaning EEG caps) and the theoretical aspects (limitations of the technology and how they affect analysis) of EEG, and is still supporting me currently, together with the original designer of the experiment, Dr. Loh Chen Lam, in sanitizing and analyzing the data we gathered. In total, the experiment involved 10 groups of two people who were tasked with coordinating mouse movements and click times within a rhythmic video game while being situated in two different rooms. During this task, we monitored both their behavioral dynamics (click times and movement patterns) and recorded scalp EEG within a frequency band of 0.1 – 120Hz. I supervised the sessions between the 23rd of December, 2024, and the 9th of January, 2025, while sessions since the 10th of January have been supervised by either Finda Putri or Brian Morrissey, the ECSU group’s technician. We expect data collection to be finished in early March, with analysis following immediately afterwards. We will then prepare a paper for joint publication during the months of April and May, for submission to either Behavior Research Methods or PLOS Complex Systems.

In early November, I was also given the opportunity to join members of the ECSU group on a field trip to the stadium of the FC Ryukyu in Okinawa city during a practice game and learn about practical methods for capturing group dynamics in the context of team sports. I also later learned about the basics of analyzing the collected data by PhD researcher Ivan Shpurov, who published a paper on these methods later that year (Shpurov, Froese & Ikegami, 2024). Finally, I used much of my time at OIST to work on my own papers and Doctoral Thesis, and received very helpful feedback by a variety of individuals, some of which were from other research groups. During my time at the graduate university, my paper on Tom Froese’s Irruption Theory got published (Hölken, 2025), and I completed another paper for submission to a special issue of Topoi, which is currently under review (Hölken, under review). I was also able to receive some feedback on Part 2 of my Doctoral Thesis, which describes how to understand mental states as states of coordinative structures within Dynamical Systems Theory, and which I am currently revising based on this feedback.

Outside of my work within the ECSU group, I also used the opportunity granted by this research visit to get into contact with other, more senior researchers at the OIST, whose research was relevant to my own interests and future career plans. Perhaps the most important contact I made was with Dr. Shunichi Kasahara (https://shunichikasahara.com/), whose work focuses on the design and development of currently-practical human-computer interfaces, which are designed to augment human bodily and cognitive dynamics. In early December 2024, I was invited to visit his research laboratory at OIST and had the opportunity to talk with Dr. Kasahara and one of his PhDs about their past and current work. I was also shown one of their experimental setups, which included a device built to facilitate the direct transfer of embodied skill between a teacher and a student learning the basics of a rhythm game. Dr. Kasahara also gave me valuable advice regarding my search for a PostDoc position within Japan, either at a university or as part of the research division of a private company. As I am planning to apply for these positions within the next months, this kind of advice from Dr. Kasahara and other senior researchers at the OIST, such as Dr. Jun Tani, was very helpful to me.

I am very glad I was able to visit the OIST with the help of the funding received from the RUB’s Project International and am happy to report that at least one joint paper (based on the inter-agent synchronization experiment run from December 2024 – March 2025) is currently being prepared for publication as a result of my visit. Furthermore, the possibility of a visit by Prof. Froese to the RUB’s Institute for Philosophy II later this year is currently being evaluated, and there is reason to be optimistic about the possibility of future research collaboration between the RUB and the OIST.
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