“Over-imitation as a social glue“
Speaker: Dr. Stefanie Hoehl
(Professor of Developmental Psychology at the University of Vienna)
Date: 19.02.2026, Thursday
Time: 12:30 PM – 1:30 PM
Room: A 130 (FEASS Building)
Abstract:
Over-imitation is the peculiar tendency to imitate actions that are perceivably causally unnecessary to reach the goal of an observed action sequence. This behavior is consistently shown from preschool-age onwards and has been attributed to children’s propensity to comply with social norms and conventions. In my talk I will present new evidence from experiments with preschoolers showing that over-imitation may play a particular role in forming new relationships. In a series of experiments, we found that (a) preschoolers tend to more consistently over-imitate a friendly stranger compared to their own parent, (b) over-imitation boosts social affiliation and (c) over-imitation is not affected by previously experienced motor synchrony. Results will be discussed in relation to theories of social learning.
Biography:
Stefanie Hoehl is Professor of Developmental Psychology at the University of Vienna where she directs the Wiener Kinderstudien lab. She received her PhD from the University of Leipzig. From 2016 to 2019 she led the Max Planck Research Group on Early Social Cognition at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig. Her research lies at the intersection of developmental psychology and cognitive neuroscience and focuses on social and cognitive development in early childhood.