Aims and Scope

Researchers on perceptual systems, whether they be human, animal or artificial, are continuously confronted with the need to select, prioritize and structure information coming from the vast and noisy sensory data flow. Attention mechanisms have been an object of interest in multiple disciplines in recent years. Deciding where to look when we search for something, what information to extract in order to swiftly and dexterously act upon objects, which landmarks are more useful for orienting in a maze, how can the external environment be encoded in an efficient way across multimodal perception or which cues of the partner´s behaviour have to be attended in a social interaction scenario, are just some examples of cognitive abilities requiring specific attentive mechanisms. The CITEC Summer School 2011 will focus on such mechanisms from the perspective of psychology, machine vision, neurobiology, linguistics and sports science, and will offer keynote lectures and discussions with world-renowned experts in these fields, along with hands-on tutorial streams for deepening and practicing theoretical notions and experimental skills.