Storytelling as adaptive collective sensemaking

Bietti, L.M., Tilston, O., & Bangerter, A. (2018). Storytelling as adaptive collective sensemaking. TopiCS in Cognitive Science.  https://doi.org/10.1111/tops.12358

Abstract

Storytelling represents a key element in the creation and propagation of culture. Three main accounts of the adaptive function of storytelling include (a) manipulating the behavior of the audience to enhance the fitness of the narrator, (b) transmitting survival-relevant information while avoiding the costs involved in the first-hand acquisition of that information, and (c) maintaining social bonds or group-level cooperation. We assess the substantial evidence collected in experimental and ethnographic studies for each account. These accounts do not always appeal to the specific features of storytelling above and beyond language use in general. We propose that the specific adaptive value of storytelling lies in making sense of non-routine, uncertain, or novel situations, thereby enabling the collaborative development of previously acquired skills and knowledge, but also promoting social cohesion by strengthening intragroup identity and clarifying intergroup relations.

Memory bias toward emotional information in burnout and depression

Bianchi, R., Laurent, E., Schonfeld, I.S., Bietti, L. M., & Mayor, E. (2018). Memory bias toward emotional information in burnout and depression. Journal of Health Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359105318765621

Abstract

A sample of 1015 educational staff members, exhibiting various levels of burnout and depressive symptoms, underwent a memory test involving incident encoding of positive and negative words and a free recall task. Burnout and depression were each found to be associated with increased recall of negative items and decreased recall of positive items. Results remained statistically significant when controlling for history of depressive disorders. Burnout and depression were not related to mistakes in the reported words, or to the overall number of recalled words. This study suggests that burnout and depression overlap in terms of memory biases toward emotional information.

Multimodal processes of joint remembering in complex collaborative activities

Bietti, L.M. & Baker, M.J. (2018). Multimodal processes of joint remembering in complex collaborative activities. In M. Meade, A. Barnier, P. van Bergen, C. B. Harris & J. Sutton (eds.), Collaborative remembering: Theories, Research and Applications (pp. 177-196). New York: Oxford University Press.

Abstract

The aim of this chapter is to expand research on joint remembering into real- world complex collaborative activities at the workplace. In order to do so, we aim to show how a substantial part of the joint remembering in complex collaborative activities takes place outside the verbal domain. We illustrate how the interweaving of verbal, corporal, social, and material resources supports joint remembering of relevant aspects of work projects during group interactions. Here we focus on those interactional sequences concerning past actions and events, in relation to work projects, that are triggered by questions acting as reminders. We call such sequences collaborative remembering sequences (CRSs). Our qualitative microanalysis of CRSs deals with cases of “real world” organizational remembering. The group interactions that we present as illustrative examples to support our theoretical standpoint were taken from a corpus collected on the basis of two naturalistic studies following a joint remembering collaborative design that we conducted with architects and animation designers at their workplaces.

The interactive shaping of social learning in transmission chains

Bietti, L.M., Bangerter, A., & Mayor, E. (2017). The interactive shaping of social learning in transmission chains. In  G. Gunzelmann, A. Howes, T. Tenbrink & E.Davelaar (Eds.), Proceedings of the 39th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 1641-1646)  Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.  

Abstract

This study investigated the social transmission of memories and skills collected from a collaborative cooking task (ravioli-making) and across transmission chains. The transmission over three generations of pairs of participants occurred under two conditions. In the interactive condition, transmissions over generations occurred in face-to-face conversations, whereas in the non-interactive condition, generations video-recorded their instructions to the next generations. We analyzed the effects of verbal and embodied features of informational transfer on task performance. Our results show that performances improved over generations regardless of interactivity. In the discussion we suggest that tools (like cooking utensils) may have operated as cultural affordances encapsulating and transmitting important cultural knowledge for the successful completion of the task.

Ethnomethodogical studies of nurse-patient and nurse relative interactions. A scoping review

Mayor, E. & Bietti, L.M. (2017). Ethnomethodogical studies of nurse-patient and nurse relative interactions. A scoping review. International Journal of Nursing Studies. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2017.01.015

Abstract

Researchers in nursing science interested in the study of nurse-patient and nurse-relative interactions have displayed an ever increasing interest in ethnomethodology and conversation analysis. This review assesses the scope of this literature. We categorize the papers in thematic categories determined both inductively and deductively and synthesize the main findings of this literature within category. Finally we discuss the interactional determinants of the lack patient participation, the limitations of the field, and focus on implications.

Collaborating to remember collaborative design: An exploratory study

Bietti, L.M. & Baker, M.J. (2016). Collaborating to remember collaborative design: An exploratory study. Memory Studies, 1-19. DOI: 10.1177/1750698016683438.

Abstract: We examine the ways in which members of a small group coordinate their memories, bodies and language in a functional and goal-oriented manner when they are co-designing their dream house and then collaborative remembering that previous interactive encounter. Our analyses show the following: (1) participants structured collaborative design and collaborative remembering sessions in different ways (e.g. linear and sequential vs iterative and hierarchically structured, respectively); (2) higher degrees of knowledge building were temporally synchronized with higher degrees of interactivity during both tasks; (3) collaborative remembering did not only follow the spatial structure of successive elements of the dream-house design session, but it was also proceeded by associations between semantic elements of the discourse; and (4) participants collaboratively remember better what initially generated most joint activity during collaborative design. This research thus contributes to understanding of collaborative remembering processes with respect to a knowledge-rich collaborative task.

Review of Beyond the Archive: Memory, Narrative, and the Autobiographical Process

Bietti, L.M. (2016). Review of the book Beyond the Archive: Memory, Narrative, andthe Autobiographical Process by J. Brockmeier. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 17 (3), Art.3

Abstract: Jens BROCKMEIER's new book proposes a very provocative aim for memory studies: "[T]o radically re-think our very idea of memory and challenge the notions of remembering and forgetting that we have taken for granted" (p.vii). The main target for the author's critique is the archival model of memory. In order to support his approach, the author provides empirical evidence from the neurosciences, social sciences, and humanities. "Beyond the Archive" represents an innovative contribution to the field of memory studies. It brings together disparate disciplinary fields in a novel and sophisticated fashion with a clear goal in mind: to propose a new model for the analysis of autobiographical remembering. BROCKMEIER's book is a true exercise of multidisciplinary research in action, which is much needed in the current climate of psychological and neuroscientific reductionism in the sciences of memory.

Joint remembering in collaborative design: a multimodal approach in the case of a video design studio

Bietti, L.M., Baker, M. J., & Detienne, F. (in press). Joint remembering in collaborative design: A multimodal approach in the case of a video design studio. CoDesign: International Journal of CoCreation in Design and the Arts. DOI:10.1080/15710882.2015.1103752

Abstract
The aim of this paper is to explore the role of joint remembering in collaborative design. Joint remembering sequences are identified on the basis of questions that act as triggers to specific interactive sequences. The sequences are situated in the ongoing collaborative design process, and empirical evidence is provided that illustrates how the interweaving of verbal, bodily, social and material resources supports joint remembering. Three examples of joint remembering sequences in co-design are analysed from a corpus of interactions (45+ hours of audio and video recording), collected during an observational study of a team of four 3D designers working on a TV commercial. This study suggests that questions acting as reminders foster the formation of multimodal remembering sequences (MRSs) that connect multiple timescales over the duration of co-design projects. In the corpus under study, MRSs enable designers to plan future actions and make decisions on the fly.

Special issue: Coordination, Collaboration and Cooperation: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Table of Contents

Coordination,Collaboration and Cooperation: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Federica Amici and Lucas M. Bietti

vii – xii

I do not understand but I care: The prosocial dog

Juliane Bräuer

341 – 360

Cooperation in primates: A critical, methodological review

Anna Albiach-Serrano

361 – 382

The evolution and development of human cooperation

Federica Amici

383 – 418

Interacting to remember at multiple timescales: Coordination, collaboration, cooperation and culture in joint remembering

Lucas M. Bietti and John Sutton

419 – 450

Collaboration in collaborative learning

Michael J. Baker

451 – 473

Coordination in language: Temporality and time-ranging

Stephen J. Cowley and Sune Vork Steffensen

474 – 494

Agreeing is not enough: The constructive role of miscommunication

Johanne Stege Bjørndahl, Riccardo Fusaroli, Svend Østergaard and Kristian Tylén

495 – 525

Nonverbal interaction patterns in the Delhi Metro: Interrogative looks and play-faces in the management of interpersonal distance

Martin Aranguren

526 – 552

Insights into coordination, collaboration, and cooperation from the behavioral and cognitive sciences: A commentary

Alan Cienki

553 – 560

You can get free access to the introduction of the special issue here