Looking back at Measuring Behavior 2022

In the end, we had a good number of delegates, including presenters across a wide spectrum of time zones and many people taking advantage of the possibility to watch the parallel sessions offline after the conference itself was over.

The program and scientific outcomes of a truly multidisciplinary conference

The program was rich and diverse. We had sessions on specific domains (automotive human factors, sports science, food and eating, animal welfare), new technologies (drones, AI, virtual reality, new sensors, multi-modal measurements), a diversity of species (humans, rodents, farm animals, dogs and one study even included 16 different species of mammal), and methodological issues (reproducibility, measuring in the field, statistics).

Methods and techniques for measuring many different types of behavior were presented including emotions, movement, cognitive and mental states, health, eating, sleeping, posture, learning, sensing, driving, and social interaction. All authors wrote a short paper, which was peer-reviewed. These are freely available in the conference Proceedings, which are downloadable from the website, and have an ISBN as well as a DOI address. In addition, we had a special topic about developments in implicit measurements in Frontiers in Psychology, which can be downloaded as an e-book.

Sharing idea, presenting inventions, and inspiring each other

Most of the presentations were the traditional scientific format, but we also had tutorials, demonstrations of new software, commercial presentations and three keynote speeches. The keynotes were particularly interesting. Prof. Chris de Zeeuw (Erasmus Medical Centre & Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience) explained the latest techniques for measuring learning and memory (with particular attention to brain circuits).

Prof. Liesbeth Zandstra (Wageningen University and Unilever Foods Innovation Centre, Wageningen) showed the link between perception of food and the choice behavior of food, including the influence of packaging, placement etcetera and how that can help consumers make healthy choices. On the last day, Prof. Frederic Dehais (Holder of the AXA Neuroergonomics chair for flight safety at the Aeronautical and Space Center ISAE Supaéro) explained about neuroergonomics techniques for monitoring the brain in complex real-life situations, especially related to human factors in airplane cockpits.

Staying in touch

Ever since the first edition of the conference took place in 1996, Noldus has been the principal sponsor and has helped with its organization. The conference is an important way that the company can keep in touch with the latest developments in the field. Before each conference, a call for hosting is published and the winning bid hosts the next conference.

For 2022, the conference was hosted by Jarosław Barski from the Medical University of Silesia and the other conference chairs were Gernot Riedel (University of Aberdeen, who has severed as the neuroscience chair for several editions) and Anne-Marie Brouwer (TNO). That edition was also a joint meeting with the International Seminar of Behavioral Methods, which is also chaired by Jarosław Barski.

Neutrality with respect to the sponsors is ensured by the independent conference chairs (as well as the double-blind peer-review of the submissions) and in addition, there is a Scientific Program Committee of distinguished behavioral scientists, should issues arise which the conference chairs want to seek advice about.

The call for hosting for Measuring Behavior 2024 is now out and all bids are very welcome before 1st September 2022.