Contextualizing neuro-collaborations: reflections on a transdisciplinary fMRI lie detection experiment

TY - JOUR

T1 - Contextualizing neuro-collaborations

T2 - reflections on a transdisciplinary fMRI lie detection experiment

AU - Littlefield, Melissa M.

AU - Fitzgerald, Des

AU - Knudsen, Kasper

AU - Tonks, James

AU - Dietz, Martin J.

PY - 2014/3/31

Y1 - 2014/3/31

N2 - Recent neuroscience initiatives (including the E.U.'s Human Brain Project and the U.S.'s BRAIN Initiative) have reinvigorated discussions about the possibilities for transdisciplinary collaboration between the neurosciences, the social sciences, and the humanities. As STS scholars have argued for decades, however, such inter- and transdisciplinary collaborations are potentially fraught with tensions between researchers. This essay build on such claims by arguing that the tensions of transdisciplinary research also exist within researchers' own experiences of working between disciplines - a phenomenon that we call "disciplinary double consciousness" (DDC). Building on previous work that has characterized similar spaces (and especially on the Critical Neuroscience literature), we argue that "neuro-collaborations" inevitably engage researchers in DDC - a phenomenon that allows us to explore the useful dissonance that researchers can experience when working between a "home" discipline and a secondary discipline. Our case study is a five-year research project in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) lie detection involving a transdisciplinary research team made up of social scientists, a neuroscientist, and a humanist. In addition to theorizing neuro-collaborations from the inside-out, this essay presents practical suggestions for developing transdisciplinary infrastructures that could support future neuro-collaborations.

AB - Recent neuroscience initiatives (including the E.U.'s Human Brain Project and the U.S.'s BRAIN Initiative) have reinvigorated discussions about the possibilities for transdisciplinary collaboration between the neurosciences, the social sciences, and the humanities. As STS scholars have argued for decades, however, such inter- and transdisciplinary collaborations are potentially fraught with tensions between researchers. This essay build on such claims by arguing that the tensions of transdisciplinary research also exist within researchers' own experiences of working between disciplines - a phenomenon that we call "disciplinary double consciousness" (DDC). Building on previous work that has characterized similar spaces (and especially on the Critical Neuroscience literature), we argue that "neuro-collaborations" inevitably engage researchers in DDC - a phenomenon that allows us to explore the useful dissonance that researchers can experience when working between a "home" discipline and a secondary discipline. Our case study is a five-year research project in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) lie detection involving a transdisciplinary research team made up of social scientists, a neuroscientist, and a humanist. In addition to theorizing neuro-collaborations from the inside-out, this essay presents practical suggestions for developing transdisciplinary infrastructures that could support future neuro-collaborations.

KW - neuro-collaboration

KW - disciplinary double consciousness

KW - transdisciplinarity

KW - fMRI lie detection

KW - critical neuroscience

KW - BOUNDARY-WORK

KW - SCIENCE

KW - DECEPTION

KW - NANOTECHNOLOGY

KW - KNOWLEDGE

KW - SOCIETY

KW - TRUTH

U2 - 10.3389/fnhum.2014.00149

DO - 10.3389/fnhum.2014.00149

M3 - Article

SN - 1662-5161

VL - 8

SP - N/A

JO - Frontiers In Human Neuroscience

JF - Frontiers In Human Neuroscience

IS - N/A

M1 - 149

ER -