Perspectives on Child Development: Social Learning and Interaction

Perspectives on Child Development: Social Learning and Interaction

Toruń, June 19–21-2025 (scientific sessions on June 20–21)
Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń

Perspectives on Child Development: Social Learning and Interaction is an international, interdisciplinary conference organized by the Department of Cognitive Science and the Institute of Psychology at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Poland. The event will bring together researchers investigating how children understand the social world through interaction with others across individual, dyadic, and cultural levels.

Central to the conference are questions about how children evaluate the reliability of information from others, develop a theory of mind (ToM), coordinate emotionally and behaviorally with caregivers, and use language to navigate social environments. The program also includes contributions addressing neural and behavioral synchrony between children and caregivers and neurobiological foundations of social learning and cognition in early development.

The conference fosters interdisciplinary dialogue across developmental psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience, and related fields by exploring the developmental roots of trust, communication, mentalizing, emotional understanding, and cultural learning. Through keynote lectures, thematic sessions, and open discussions, the meeting will highlight both foundational and cutting-edge research on how social interaction shapes the developing mind.

We welcome empirical, theoretical, and methodological work from developmental science. 

Confirmed keynote speakers include Prof. Paul L. Harris (Harvard University), Francisco Pons (University of Oslo), Fabrice Clément (University of Neuchâtel), Arvid Kappas (Constructor University), Tone Kristine Hermansen (University of Oslo), Alessandro Carollo (University of Trento), Arkadiusz Gut (Nicolaus Copernicus University), Marta Białecka (Nicolaus Copernicus University), Małgorzata Stępień-Nycz (Jagiellonian University), Ewa Haman (University of Warsaw), Agnieszka Pluta (University of Warsaw), Katarzyna Lubiewska (University of Warsaw) and Przemysław Tomalski (Polish Academy of Sciences), among others.