Supersense

Why do we believe in the unbelievable? Neuroscientist Bruce Hood explores with author Peter Matthiessen how our brains may be pre-wired with a “SuperSense” that shapes our intuitions, superstitions, and social interactions. Hood is the director of the Bristol Cognitive Development Centre in the Experimental Psychology Department at the University of Bristol. Matthiessen recently won the National Book Award for a second time for his Shadow Country. His first award was for The Snow Leopard (1980).
Hood’s new book SuperSense: Why We Believe in the Unbelievable will be available for purchase at the Shop @ RMA. The author will be available after the program to sign copies.

“An intriguing look at a feature of the human mind that is subtle in itsoperation but profound in its consequences.”– Steven Pinker, Harvard College Professor of Psychology, Harvard University,and author ofHow the Mind Works andThe Stuff of Thought.

Bruce Hood is the Director of the Bristol Cognitive Development Centre in the Experimental Psychology Department at the University of Bristol. He has been a research fellow at Cambridge University and University College London, a visiting scientist at MIT and a faculty professor at Harvard. He has been awarded an Alfred Sloan Fellowship in neuroscience, the Young Investigator Award from the International Society of Infancy Researchers, the Robert Fantz memorial award and was recently voted to Fellowship status by the society of American Psychological Science.
He holds grants from the Leverhulme Trust, the Medical Research Council, the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation and the Economic and Social Research Council to fund research into the origins of supernatural beliefs, the development of face and gaze processing, the development of inhibition and general cognitive development.