Embodied Dyadic Interaction Increases Complexity of Neural Dynamics: A Minimal Agent-Based Simulation Model

Frontiers in Psychology

article

Madhavun Candadai¹  Matt Setzler¹  Eduardo J. Izquierdo¹  Tom Froese³ 

[1] Program in Cognitive Science, Indiana University, United States;School of Informatics, and Engineering, Indiana University, United States;Institute for Applied Mathematics and Systems Research (IIMAS), National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM);Center for the Sciences of Complexity (C3)

关键词: social interaction;    agent-based models;    artificial neural networks;    evolutionary robotics;    embodied cognition;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00540

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

The concept of social interaction is at the core of embodied and enactive approaches to social cognitive processes, yet scientifically it remains poorly understood. Traditionally, cognitive science had relegated all behavior to being the end result of internal neural activity. However, the role of feedback from the interactions between agent and their environment has become increasingly important to understanding behavior. We focus on the role that social interaction plays in the behavioral and neural activity of the individuals taking part in it. Is social interaction merely a source of complex inputs to the individual, or can social interaction increase the individuals' own complexity? Here we provide a proof of concept of the latter possibility by artificially evolving pairs of simulated mobile robots to increase their neural complexity, which consistently gave rise to strategies that take advantage of their capacity for interaction. We found that during social interaction, the neural controllers exhibited dynamics of higher-dimensionality than were possible in social isolation. Moreover, by testing evolved strategies against unresponsive ghost partners, we demonstrated that under some conditions this effect was dependent on mutually responsive co-regulation, rather than on the mere presence of another agent's behavior as such. Our findings provide an illustration of how social interaction can augment the internal degrees of freedom of individuals who are actively engaged in participation.

【 授权许可】

CC BY