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Psychology Political sciences
S
AIT Consciousness Qualidem:

TR as learning the present of the past

C POR In her doctorate thesis, Virginie Van Ingelgom, now a FNRS Research

ER FNRS Research Director in cognitive Associate and Professor at UCLouvain, worked through discussion groups
to unlock the causes for people’s indifference to European integration. Her
psychology at ULB, Axel Cleeremans was Qualidem project, for which she was awarded an ERC Starting Grant in 2017,
awarded an ERC Advanced Grant in 2014. goes much further, thanks to an unusual method.
He is aware that his life as a researcher
Axel Cleeremans,
was changed as a result. He recently FNRS Research Director, Awareness, Cognition and
became President of the Association of Computation Research Unit, ULB emocracy is no longer a recipe for departed from the subject of the study. But of increasing the interest of our colleagues
ERC Grantees. success. All over the world, there is they can be studied subsequently using for our method of reanalysis, but especially
Da growing lack of satisfaction about special methods of analysis…” the need for methodological though about
it among people, who are becoming these new practices and their feasibility...”
wareness, that subjective “The hypothesis is that the signature of As part of the continuity of his work, increasingly critical or disengaged. “How One, two, three
phenomenon, has long been consciousness is not to be found in the Axel Cleeremans now wants to focus do you explain this development?”, asks Marie-Françoise Dispa
Asomething reserved to the intrinsic activity of neurones: if I have on the links between consciousness Virginie Van Ingelgom. “Instead of focusing The Qualidem project – which stands
philosophy of the mind. It wasn’t until a representation in my visual cortex of and emotion. “In life, what prompts me on the characteristics of people, as in for “qualitative” and “democracy” – is
the 1990s that we emerged from a the person in front of me, this neuronal to do A rather than B is the search for the previous studies, Qualidem focuses on the beginning to bear fruit. “The first result
strictly speculative approach to adopt an activity will only become conscious mental state I would be in if I decide to experience of public policies and, more is one of methodology: we used a new Project name: Qualidem
experimental approach made possible by when there are other representations, do A.” In other words, the mechanisms specifically, on social policies. How have the method to answer questions that had been C IN BRIEF - Eroding Democracies. A
the emergence of cerebral imaging. With i.e. a metarepresentation, for example of consciousness would contribute in changes that they have undergone since insoluble until then. The second result is qualitative (re-)appraisal
MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), it has in my frontal cortex.” The fact that priority, not to guarantee our survival, the 1990s – strengthening of budgetary about content: the attitudes and beliefs of of how policies shape
become possible to show the contrast a representation makes other but to give value to the choices we make. constraints, tightening of the eligibility citizens are explained by the way in which democratic linkages in
between what goes on in our brain when representations aware is a learning That’s why we are capable of taking risks, criteria, multiplication of checks, etc. they perceive the action of the State and ER Western democracies
we react to a subliminal stimulus (which we process: via the mechanisms of cerebral like doing a parachute jump or testing a affected democratic links?” the politicians. And the third result is a
have the impression of not having seen) plasticity, the brain would not stop daring scientific hypothesis. contribution to the understanding of the Type of grant:
and what happens when we respond to a describing its own activity to itself, over Julie Luong Reanalysis current situation. So, through ‘reanalysis’, it ERC Starting Grant
conscious stimulus. and over again. For this theory, called is possible to understand the breakthrough Dates : 2017 -2022
radical plasticity, consciousness would be To answer this question, “we were faced made by populism and its underlying
Radical plasticity totally “something that the brain learns”. with a problem of methodology, because mechanisms.”
the studies at the time did not include much
However, no decisive experiment has Flexibility and (or anything) in the way of questions about Quality databases
been able to show that awareness the impact of public policies.” So Virginie
is located in a specific area of the freedom Van Ingelgom resorted to a practice that The process used by Virginie Van
brain. Some researchers, such as Axel From 2016 to 2019, thanks to the ERC The Association of is currently developing in social sciences, Ingelgom and her team of six researchers
Cleeremans, FNRS Research Director in Advanced Grant RADICAL project, Axel “but had never been applied on such a large – in coordination with Claire Dupuy,
cognitive psychology at ULB, believes Cleeremans explored some twenty ERC Grantees scale over such a long period of time: the Professor at UCLouvain and a specialist in
that awareness is the result of a process experimental paradigms around this Axel Cleeremans is President of The ‘reanalysis’ of qualitative data. It involved public policy – is also part of a movement
of plasticity involving numerous neural theory. Having applied three times before Association of ERC Grantees, a new looking again at the conversations of other in social sciences aimed at making the
- FNRS.NEWS 121 - FEBRUARY 2021 C IN BRIEF Project name: RADICAL – The very competitive funding, but the budget importance of fundamental research And then the rest… or all of which disappeared at the end of - FNRS.NEWS 121 - FEBRUARY 2021
researchers since the 1990s, but analysing
networks.
structure that aims to bring together
data produced available to researchers.
obtaining this funding, he believes that
what wasn’t analysed by them.”
the recipients of ERC grants to link
“Previously, social sciences researchers
his life as a researcher has changed as a
them up and communicate about the
did not archive their conversations, part
result. “Not only is there the prestige of this
with the general public and political
their project or when their career ended.
also allows us to run a whole laboratory.
players, as well as to attract applications
The Qualidata movement, launched in
Indeed, in any conversation there are
Not counting the time saved by not having
from researchers in European countries
Great Britain fifteen years ago, is aimed
direct responses to the questions that
whose infrastructures make the
to spend hours any longer applying for
structure the research, and then the rest.
at bringing them together in qualitative
conception and development of these
much smaller loans.” Axel Cleeremans also
Radical Pasticity Thesis: How
“So, in my studies into Europe, people often
databases. And now, the donors of national
types of projects more difficult. “There
appreciates the reporting requirements
we learn to be conscious
are currently 10,000 recipients who are
and European funds – such as the ERC – are
deviated from the European idea to talk
– “serious but not onerous” – of the ERC
ERC Advanced Grant
them together as much as possible, across
local authorities didn’t work properly. These
public funding to be made available at
and freedom.
Virginie Van Ingelgom,
all countries, so that these missions can be
the end of a certain period of time, to the
elements, brought up spontaneously by
Dates : 2014-2019
conducted together.”
12 ER Type of grant: grants, giving the team both flexibility all excellent researchers. We hope to bring about how their own national and even also asking for the data gathered using FNRS Research Associate, 13
scientific community. This has had the effect
citizens were left to one side because they
ISPLE, UCLouvain