My collaborator Ying Wu (from the Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience) and I are thrilled to have received a grant from the California Arts Council to study empathy and attention in the experience of art. I can’t wait to start work on the project this summer!

With support of the California Arts Council, the Clarke Center for Human Imagination at UCSD will combine state-of-the-art wearable biosensors and machine perception to study individual and culturally-mediated variation in aesthetic engagement during real-world exploration of visual art at the San Diego Museum of Art. This work will examine neurocognitive and physiological correlates of empathy, attention, and emotion in order to explore how art museums can cultivate empathic understanding.

Full announcement: https://www.cac.ca.gov/programs/program_files/1819/CurrentGrantees/FY18-19_Project_Descriptions_RIA.pdf