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Dominik Deffner

@dominikdeffner.bsky.social

1.4K followers 1K following 68 posts

Assistant Prof for Computational Modelling of Behaviour @unimarburg.bsky.social | (Social) decision-making and (cultural) evolution | https://www.uni-marburg.de/en/fb04/team-deffner/deffner | Prev. @arc-mpib.bsky.social @mpi-eva-leipzig.bsky.social

www.uni-marburg.de

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Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

Which processes underlie collective intelligence in naturalistic human groups?

In new work led by Valerii Chirkov, we show that payoff selectivity is key in transforming a group of individuals into an intelligent collective 🤝🧠

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xY7n...

Preprint: osf.io/preprints/ps...

First-Person Perspective of the Voluntary Payoff-Sharing (VP) Condition

YouTube video by Valerii Chirkov

www.youtube.com

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Charley Wu | hiring PhDs/Postdocs @thecharleywu.bsky.social · 56m

Great to see this work finally released! Fun fact, Valerii was the winner of the #COSMOS2023 poster prize with an earlier iteration of this project

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Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 8h

@watarutoyokawa.bsky.social @thecharleywu.bsky.social @bjornlindstrom.bsky.social @ketikagarg.bsky.social @rdhawkins.bsky.social @shoalgroup.bsky.social @psmaldino.bsky.social

Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

Thanks so much to @ralfkurvers.bsky.social and @promanczuk.bsky.social, but especially to Valerii: www.scienceofintelligence.de/people/valer... 🙏

@arc-mpib.bsky.social @mpib-berlin.bsky.social @scioi.bsky.social @unimarburg.bsky.social @humboldtuni.bsky.social

Valerii Chirkov - scienceofintelligence.de

Valerii Chirkov initially studied Clinical Psychology and then pursued a master's degree in Cognitive Neuroscience. Prior to joining SCIoI, Valerii worked as

www.scienceofintelligence.de

Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

Finally, to prove our model insights could explain the observed dynamics, we developed an ABM reproducing key aspects of the behavioral data.

Simulations also provided generalizable insights beyond our experiment, revealing why collective intelligence can only emerge in certain environments.

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Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

We then used a comp model predicting movement decisions to test how private and social features guided participants' behavior.

Results confirmed that payoff information let participants selectively tune behavior to the position and direction of successful peers, unlocking collective intelligence!

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Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

Using high-resolution time-series data of participants' visual information and movement trajectories, we found that payoff information boosted performance by allowing collectives to flexibly reorganize visibility networks over time and adaptively guide information flow between group members.

Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

Results show that sociality was a double-edged sword:

Groups could outperform solitary individuals through both superior tracking and search performance, but only when full payoff information was available.

In the absence of payoff information, they sometimes even performed worse!

Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

We challenged individuals with a spatially-explicit search-and-tracking task in an immersive 3D environment.

By manipulating task complexity and the availability of social cues, we study how individuals adapt their visual attention and social learning strategies to different dynamic contexts.

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Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

Previous research (including my own) has predominantly studied these processes in simplified paradigms with unrealistic environments and predefined features!

Thus, it is largely unknown how collective intelligence can emerge in mobile human groups coping with dynamically changing environments.

Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · 9h

First-Person Perspective of the Voluntary Payoff-Sharing (VP) Condition

YouTube video by Valerii Chirkov

www.youtube.com

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Sonja Wild @sonjawild.bsky.social · 5d

Out today in @plosbiology.org (1/5)

Siblings and non-parental adults provide alternative pathways to cultural inheritance in juvenile great tits 🐦🧩

Link to study:
10.0.5.91/journal.pbio...

Co-authors:
@lucymaplin.bsky.social
@galarconnieto.bsky.social

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

EHBEA @ehbea.bsky.social · 8d

EHBEA is looking for new PRESIDENT and SECRETARY for 2026-2029! 👀

If you know of anybody who could represent EHBEA, nominate them as president!

If you know with good organisational skills, nominate them as secretary!

DEADLINE: 16/12/2026

HERE IS THE FORM 👇

docs.google.com/document/d/1...

EHBEACommitteeNominationForm_Pres_Sec.doc

EHBEA Committee 2026-2029: Nomination Form The EHBEA Steering Committee is calling for nominations for the following open committee positions for 2026-2029. You are invited to nominate one or more c...

docs.google.com

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Nico Schuck @nicoschuck.bsky.social · 8d

I am gonna take the option where I get more time to read, understand and write. maybe that AI can go to committee meetings for me?

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Elham Nourani @enourani.bsky.social · 9d

🦅PhD position 🦅 in my new group at @fbm-unil.bsky.social in Switzerland, studying how the social and resource landscapes shape the learning process for soaring flight. Deadline: Oct 30. Pls repost! career5.successfactors.eu/career?caree...

Golden eagle on the nest in Finland (by O. Karlin)

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

ESLR @eslr.bsky.social · 13d

📢🚀 Are you an early-career researcher working on anything related to culture, behaviour or learning? 🧠🌍 Join ESLR, an interdisciplinary research community! We have a NEW website and our membership is now FREE. 👉 Sign up here to get updates and become a member: www.eslrsociety.com/membership

ESLR | Membership

www.eslrsociety.com

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Haneul Jang @haneuljang.bsky.social · 14d

Finally in my hands! A new book from @mgurven.bsky.social on why we age, and how we can age better, through the lens of evolutionary anthropology💙 Very excited to dive in!

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Ruben C. Arslan @ruben.the100.ci · 16d

Our fragmentation paper is now finally out! I put some of the dumb quips that didn't make the cut in the alt texts.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

A fragmented field. If we conceive of the constructs and concepts studied in behavioral science as a map, we would find that it is highly fragmented and directions are hard to come by. Scientists can hardly stand on each others' shoulders if they cannot manage to meet on common ground.

Fragmentation has worsened, not decreased, as the field has grown. Partly, this happens because we have too many reverse Columbuses, who, in search of prestige, set out to find a new continent, but just end up renaming India. But partly, we face a real, solvable search problem when trying to connect our fuzzy constructs and flexible measures.

Most measures are used only once. To be clear, we do not want to prevent or reduce refinements of existing constructs and measures. Revisions, translations, and other refinements can contribute to a more coherent, organized literature and improve measurement. We are most concerned with the measures conceived with limited planning and released into the literature without much commitment or much of a life expectancy. In ontologies, these are sometimes referred to as “orphan nodes.”

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Wataru Toyokawa @watarutoyokawa.bsky.social · 16d

COSMOS2025 kick started!! And we’ve got the generous support from #ESLR community for the ESLR travel award!! Join ESLR if you are interested in social learning, cultural evolution, collective behaviour, and beyond!!

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Bret Beheim @babeheim.bsky.social · 29d

How to quantify the impact of AI on long-run cultural evolution? Published today, I give it a go!

400+ years of strategic dynamics in the game of Go (Baduk/Weiqi), from feudalism to AlphaGo!

Miyagawa Shuntei's 1898 painting, "Playing Go (Japanese Chess)"

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Haneul Jang @haneuljang.bsky.social · Sep 14

💙New paper!💙

How is knowledge transmitted across generations in a foraging society?

With @danielredhead.bsky.social
we found: In BaYaka foragers, long-term skills pass in smaller, sparser networks, while short-term food info circulates broadly & reciprocally

academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...

Transmission networks of long-term and short-term knowledge in a foraging society

Abstract. Cultural transmission across generations is key to cumulative cultural evolution. While several mechanisms—such as vertical, horizontal, and obli

academic.oup.com

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Dominik Deffner @dominikdeffner.bsky.social · Sep 12

Unfortunate I'm not based in Berlin anymore, but still looking forward to seeing what you're up to :) Have a great start!

Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Marina Papadopoulou @marinapapa.bsky.social · Sep 12

After a very fun summer (👇), some personal updates: I am moving to @mpib-berlin.bsky.social @arc-mpib.bsky.social in Berlin next month with a Humboldt Fellowship @humboldt-foundation.de to join @ralfkurvers.bsky.social for some exciting collective decision-making work😁🐟🚶‍♀️

Any Berlin/DE tips welcome!

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Felix W. Moll @mollfw.bsky.social · Sep 11

New paper on precise tool use learning in carrion crows @currentbiology.bsky.social. We show that—like New Caledonian crows—expert carrion crows pay close attention to the working end of their tool, suggesting tool integration into their peripersonal space. 🧵 & vids! 👇

www.cell.com/current-biol...

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Sheina Lew-Levy @sheinalew.bsky.social · Sep 11

@durhampsych.bsky.social current has 5 (FIVE!!) PhD studentships being advertised!

3 to work with me on children as agents of cultural evolution

2 to work with @drboothroyd.bsky.social on examining school-based body image interventions.

Please share and apply!

www.durham.ac.uk/departments/...

Fees and Funding - Durham University

www.durham.ac.uk

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Reposted by Dominik Deffner

Oleg Sobchuk 🇺🇦 @sobchuk.bsky.social · Sep 4

Great news from the @erc.europa.eu today: I received an ERC Starting Grant to study the cultural evolution of literature 🔥

www.eva.mpg.de/press/news/a...

Charting the evolution of European literature

Oleg Sobchuk has received an ERC Starting Grant to study 200 years of European literary evolution

www.eva.mpg.de

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