Group dynamics | EPFL Graph Search

Group dynamics is a system of behaviors and psychological processes occurring within a social group (intragroup dynamics), or between social groups (intergroup dynamics). The study of group dynamics can be useful in understanding decision-making behaviour, tracking the spread of diseases in society, creating effective therapy techniques, and following the emergence and popularity of new ideas and technologies. These applications of the field are studied in psychology, sociology, anthropology, political science, epidemiology, education, social work, leadership studies, business and managerial studies, as well as communication studies. History The history of group dynamics (or group processes) has a consistent, underlying premise: 'the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.' A social group is an entity that has qualities which cannot be understood just by studying the individuals that make up the group. In 1924, Gestalt psychologist Max Wertheimer proposed ‘There are entit

Too big to grow

Vladislav Mantic Lugo

Open flows, such as wakes, jets, separation bubbles, mixing layers, boundary layers, etc., develop in domains where fluid particles are continuously advected downstream. They are encountered in a wide variety of situations, ranging from nature to technology. Such configurations are characterised by the development of strong instabilities resulting in observable unsteady dynamics. They can be categorised as oscillators which present intrinsic dynamics through self-sustained oscillations, or as amplifiers, which exhibit a strong sensitivity to external disturbances through extrinsic dynamics. Over the years, different linear and nonlinear approaches have been adopted to describe the dynamics of oscillators and amplifiers. However, a simplified physical description that accurately accounts for the nonlinear saturation of instabilities in oscillators as well as that of the response to disturbances in stable amplifier flows is still missing. In this thesis, this question is addressed by introducing a self-consistent semi-linear model. The model is formally constructed by a set of equations where the mean flow is coupled to a linear perturbation equation through the Reynolds stress. The full nonlinear fluctuating motion is thus approximated by a linear equation. The nonlinear dynamics of oscillators is studied in the cylinder wake, where the most unstable eigenmode of finite amplitude is coupled to the instantaneous mean flow for different oscillation amplitudes. This family of solutions provides an instantaneous mean flow evolution as a function of an equivalent slow time. A transient physical picture is formalised, wherein a harmonic perturbation grows and changes the amplitude, frequency, growth-rate and structure due to the modification of the instantaneous mean flow by the Reynolds stress forcing. Eventually this perturbation saturates when the flow is marginally stable. In contrast to standard linear stability analysis around the mean flow, the iterative solution of the model provides a priori an accurate prediction of the instantaneous amplitude, frequency and growth rate, as well as the flow fields, without resorting to any input from numerical or experimental data. Regarding noise amplifiers, the nonlinear saturation of the large linear amplification to external disturbances is studied in the framework of the receptivity analysis of the backward facing step flow. The self-consistent model is first introduced for harmonic forcing and later generalised to stochastic forcing by reformulating it conveniently in frequency domain. The results show an accurate prediction of the response energy as well as the flow fields. Hence, a similar picture is revealed, wherein the Reynolds stress dominates the saturation process. Despite the difference in the dynamics of the described flows, they share the same nonlinear saturation mechanism: the mean flow distortion.

EPFL2015

Orchestration of oscillatory activity to improve visual motion discrimination

Roberto Felipe Salamanca Giron

This thesis describes advances in the use of novel configurations of non-invasive brain stimulation over the visual system allowing to modulate of modifying electro-physiological activity, interregional interactions and by it, visual behavior such as motion discrimination capacity in healthy subjects. We have implemented three experimental protocols that include the application of a motion discrimination and integration task in combination with bifocal transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (i.e. tACS) over the primary visual cortex (i.e. V1) and medio-temporal areas (i.e. V5), while varying some of the âorchestraâ parameters in each study. The common objective pursued in the three studies presented in the upcoming chapters was to evaluate physiological changes induced by tACS combined with the visual task, leading to enhanced visual performance expressed by the accurate distinction of the generalized movement orientation of a kinetogram. After introducing the scientific rationale of this thesis in Chapter 1, Chapter 2 describes whether applying two phase-shifted (Alpha) É-tACS conditions (Anti-Phase and In-Phase tACS) within the V1-V5 network were able to positively modulate behavior compared to Sham tACS. Our results suggest that the active Anti-Phase condition significantly increased visual motion discrimination compared to In-phase tACS which rather tended to decrease performances. These two case scenarios were associated with opposite changes in Alpha-Gamma oscillatory modulation (i.e. V1 phase â V5 amplitude coupling) determined by multichannel EEG. Based on these findings, in Chapter 3, we describe testing the effects of modulating Alpha-Gamma interregional interaction. Hence, two conditions V1ÉV5Æ tACS and vice versa, V1ÆV5É tACS, were behaviorally and electrophysiologically evaluated. The results suggested that there was a common electrophysiological feature between the two Verum tACS, which contrasted with Sham tACS, expressed through WPLIÆ (i.e. Weighted Phase Locking Value) connectivity. Furthermore, WPLIÉ and ZPAC V1amplitude â V5phase (i.e. Z-scored Phase Amplitude Coupling) were the inter-areal mechanisms in which both Verum conditions differed to explain the variance of their corresponding group behavior. However, the electrophysiological changes did not lead to significant difference in behavioral measures.In Chapter 4, we combined the knowledge gained in the first two studies and thus, we time-locked, short bursts of phase-shifted É-tACS to the visual stimulus onset. This permitted to find out that, despite the phase difference between the tACS conditions (i.e. In-Phase vs. Anti-Phase), there was a generalized augmentation of the performance after verum stimulation compared to the results with Sham. This amelioration was generally associated with changes in causal PSI (i.e. Phase Slope Index) flows in Æ, whereas specifically the Î-Æ modulation permitted to explain the differences in behavior between Verum and Sham. Moreover, dynamic PSI-causal Î² bottom-up and top-down flows revealed the mechanisms behind each type of Verum stimulation. These studies provided first interesting evidence that physiology-inspired bifocal tACS applied to the visual network might be used to modulate visual behavior and respective underlying mechanisms. The induced electrophysiological and behavioural effects achieved are complex and need to be studied in more details in upcoming studies.

EPFL2021

Mechanosensory interactions drive collective behaviour in Drosophila

Dario Floreano, Lukas Frisch, Pawel Lichocki, Pavan P Ramdya, Winnie Wing Yee Tse

Collective behaviour enhances environmental sensing and decision-making in groups of animals. Experimental and theoretical investigations of schooling fish, flocking birds and human crowds have demonstrated that simple interactions between individuals can explain emergent group dynamics. These findings indicate the existence of neural circuits that support distributed behaviours, but the molecular and cellular identities of relevant sensory pathways are unknown. Here we show that Drosophila melanogaster exhibits collective responses to an aversive odour: individual flies weakly avoid the stimulus, but groups show enhanced escape reactions. Using high-resolution behavioural tracking, computational simulations, genetic perturbations, neural silencing and optogenetic activation we demonstrate that this collective odour avoidance arises from cascades of appendage touch interactions between pairs of flies. Inter-fly touch sensing and collective behaviour require the activity of distal leg mechanosensory sensilla neurons and the mechanosensory channel NOMPC. Remarkably, through these inter-fly encounters, wild-type flies can elicit avoidance behaviour in mutant animals that cannot sense the odour-a basic form of communication. Our data highlight the unexpected importance of social context in the sensory responses of a solitary species and open the door to a neural-circuit-level understanding of collective behaviour in animal groups.

2015