WORKSHOP: Workshop on Genes, Cognition and Social Behavior

该项目组织了一个为期一天的跨学科研讨会，将在NSF举行，来自美国各地的约10名教师参加。研讨会的目的是具体说明遗传学，认知和社会行为的研究将如何以及在何处产生变革性的科学实践，学术基础设施和具有高社会价值的广泛相关发现。该研讨会将特别关注其影响直接涉及政治学计划的兴趣领域的科学努力。由于许多学者、机构和基金会正在考虑或决定对社会行为的遗传和认知基础的研究进行投资，因此评估此类投资的研讨会特别有价值。将请讲习班参加者评价迄今为止在其领域进行的这类研究的贡献，以便澄清近期内“下一步”的种类（即，五到十年），可能会提供高价值的成果。通过关注近期和会议进行集体审议，与会者将阐明从目前的活动到遗传学，认知和社会行为交叉点的变革性研究的可行，具体成果的新途径。 对偏好形成的研究提供了一个例证，说明遗传、认知和社会行为领域专家之间的新互动可以加强研究。为什么人们想要他们想要的东西？在政治领域，这一问题除其他外涉及公民对政府在一系列政策领域的支出的偏好、对地方和国家政府权力之间适当平衡的看法以及总体意识形态。在某种程度上，个体的偏好具有特定的遗传相关性，我们是否可以利用这些信息来指导我们寻找特定认知操作能够或不能导致偏好改变的条件？更好地理解遗传和认知现象之间的条件关系可能会澄清，反过来，正在进行的背景变化，如技术进步引起的变化是否以及如何影响个人的偏好。

This project organizes a one-day interdisciplinary workshop, to be held at NSF and attended by approximately ten faculty members from around the United States. The purpose of the workshop is to specify concretely how and where research on genetics, cognition, and social behavior will generate transformative scientific practices, scholarly infrastructure, and widely relevant findings of high social value. The workshop will devote special attention to scientific endeavors whose implications speak directly to the Political Science program's areas of interest. Since many scholars, institutions, and foundations are considering or deciding on investments in research on the genetic and cognitive bases of social behavior, a workshop that evaluates such investments is particularly valuable. Workshop participants will be invited to evaluate the contributions to date of such research in their field so as to clarify the kinds of "next steps" in the near term (i.e., five to ten years) that are likely to provide high-value outcomes. By focusing on the near term and meeting to engage in collective deliberation, participants will clarify new paths from present activities to feasible, concrete outcomes for transformative research at the intersection of genetics, cognition, and social behavior. The study of preference formation offers one illustration of the ways that new interactions among specialists in the genetic, cognitive, and social behavioral domains could strengthen research. Why do individuals want what they want? As translated to the political world, this question concerns, among other things, citizens' preferences for government spending in a range of policy areas, views of the proper balance between local and national governmental authority, and overarching ideologies. To the extent that individuals' preferences have particular genetic correlates, can we use that information to guide the search for conditions under which particular cognitive operations can, and cannot, lead to changed preferences? A better understanding of the conditional relationships between genetic and cognitive phenomena may clarify, in turn, whether and how ongoing contextual changes such as those induced by technological advances might affect individuals' preferences.