Professor Tali Sharot awarded £3.5m to better understand the ‘joy of thinking’

Professor Tali Sharot has been awarded £3,518,821 in the Wellcome Discovery Grants scheme to better understand why cognitive activities, such as reading and solving puzzles are pleasurable. Wellcome Discovery Awards provide funding for established researchers to pursue bold and creative research ideas related to human life, health and wellbeing.

Understanding the rewards of cognitive engagement

Cognitive activities are often pleasurable. This hedonic response is crucial for motivating education, innovation, and enhancing well-being. Professor Sharot’s project ‘Cognitive Rewards: Mechanisms, Development & Well-Being’ seeks to understand what makes cognition intrinsically rewarding and how the association develops.

To investigate this, Professor Sharot and her international collaborators – Professors Catherine Hartley (New York University), Ilya Monosov (Washington University) and Eric Schulz (Helmholtz Munich) – will study human adults, children, monkeys and artificial agents to try and isolate the components that make cognitive activities pleasurable using both controlled tasks and more ‘real life’ 3D embodied environments.

Professor Sharot hopes that the understanding gained from this project will generate a significant shift in our understanding of cognition.

“Our research will provide a new theoretical and empirical basis for understanding why, when, and how cognition becomes rewarding. The findings can inform the design of curious artificial agents, the creation of educational programs that consider cognitive features children find rewarding, and mental health treatments that target reduced pleasure from cognitive activities.”

Related:

• Professor Tali Sharot’s academic profile
• UCL Division of Psychology and Language Sciences
• Department of Experimental Psychology
• Wellcome Discovery Award