Beyond the Lab: Exploring Kronberg Together
From medieval castles to lively conversations: TAM ECRs explored Kronberg together as part of the Beyond the Lab social events series. With Prof. Dr. Streit as our guide, we discovered some of the town’s most remarkable historical sites and enjoyed an afternoon of exchange beyond the lab.
Make it in Germany
Make it in Germany – Being Successful in German Academic Culture is a practical and interactive workshop for Early Career Researchers navigating the German and international academic environment. Participants will explore how communication, collaboration, feedback, and an understanding of academic structures and expectations can support their effectiveness and career development. The workshop will be led by intercultural psychologist and diversity trainer Dr. Iris Wangermann and will take place on 22–23 October 2026 at JLU Gießen.
Summer School Brings together Visual Neuroscientists at Schloss Rauischholzhausen
Organized by Wolfgang Einhäuser-Treyer (TU Chemnitz) and TAM PIs Roland Fleming and Alexander Schütz, the two-week program of the European Visual Neuroscience Summer School from August 30 to September 11, 2026 combined lectures, discussions, and workshops covering key topics in contemporary vision research. Renowned international experts introduced participants to approaches ranging from neurophysiology and psychophysics to computational and theoretical neuroscience, creating an intensive environment that facilitated scientific exchange, interdisciplinary learning, and long-lasting networks.
The 2026 Treasure Box: Supporting Scientific Independence of ECRs
Five Early Career Researchers have been selected as the 2026 winners of the TAM Treasure Box Competition. With around €20,000 in funding, their projects turn innovative research ideas into independent research across The Adaptive Mind. From spider phobia and sensory attenuation to intuitive physics, active vision and interpersonal touch, the funded projects reflect the breadth and interdisciplinary character of TAM. We look forward to following these projects as they develop over the coming year.
Teddy Talk: Small Participants, Big Questions – Laura Faßbender Takes the GGN Science Slam Stage
Laura Faßbender, doctoral researcher supervised by Prof. Dr. Gudrun Schwarzer, presented her research at the Science Slam during the GGN Summer Festival 2026. In her talk “Teddy Talk”, she offered insights into the challenges of conducting experimental research with young children and introduced her work on motor adaptation in early childhood. Her research shows that even 1.5-year-old children can adapt their movements to changing conditions, providing new insights into how internal models for motor control develop early in life.
Diana Kollenda receives the Herbert Stolzenberg Award
Diana Kollenda, doctoral researcher in the group of Prof. Dr. Benjamin de Haas, has received the Herbert Stolzenberg Award for her outstanding scientific work. Her research investigates how individual differences in gaze shape subjective visual perception. In her publication “Individual gaze predicts individual scene descriptions”, published in Nature Communications, she and her co-authors show that systematic differences in where people look predict how they describe the same visual scenes, providing new insights into the relationship between visual attention and individual perception.
17 candidates advance to the second round of the TAM Scholarships
It is our great pleasure to announce the 17 candidates who have advanced to the second round of the TAM Scholarships 2026: Soeren Pohlmann (Prof. Dominik Endres), M. Reza Laali (Prof. Katja Fiehler), Marai Söhngen and Ronja Linhardt (Prof. Andrea Hermann), Leon Elias Feldt (Prof. Christiane Melzig), Julia San Martin (Prof. Mareike Grother), Lukas Hensler and Leon Philipp (Prof. Jochen Triesch), Jonas Neumann and Mitra Hani (Prof. Angela Yu), Nico Weigmann and Silja Kessler (Prof. Charley Wu), Anna Neubert (Prof. Tom Wallis), Nebin Kabrimokhatarfa (Prof. Yee Lee Shing), Roua Nasir (Prof. Katharina Dobs), Rongming Xiang (Prof. Daniel Kaiser), and Hannah Willkomm (Prof. Constantin Rothkopf).
We congratulate all candidates who have advanced to the second round of the selection process and wish them every success in the next stage.
Connecting Minds Across TAM at the Annual Retreat 2026
The Annual TAM Retreat 2026 brought together researchers from all partner institutions for three days of scientific exchange, international keynote lectures by Zoe Kourtzi (University of Cambridge), Mick Bonner (Johns Hopkins University), Jasper Smits (University of Texas at Austin) and Asya Acimova (Philipps University Marburg), and interdisciplinary networking. The retreat provided a platform to present ongoing research, foster new collaborations across institutions and career stages, and discuss future directions of the Excellence Cluster.
ECR Day 2026: Building Careers, Community and Collaboration
Career development, peer learning and community building took centre stage at the 2026 TAM ECR Day. Early-career researchers from across the cluster explored career opportunities, connected with peers and launched the new TAM Peer Labs as a bottom-up initiative to shape future TrainingHub activities.
Bringing Psychology to the Streets – TAM at the Straße der Experimente
Researchers and students from The Adaptive Mind (TAM) brought psychology and cognitive science to the public at the 2026 Straße der Experimente. Through eye tracking, visual illusions, 3D drawing and other hands-on activities, visitors explored how perception, cognition and adaptive behavior shape everyday life.