Principle investigators:
Prof. Guðbjörg R Jóhannesdóttir
Institution: Iceland University of the Arts
Guðbjörg’s role is to co-ordinate the co-operation between the IUA and UOI in the project with Sigríður Þorgeirsdóttir. She will also lead along with Kristín Valsdóttir the implementation of the methodologies into teaching and learning practices of the IUA department of art education and other master programs at the IUA, and conduct action research on the experiences of teachers and students of the effects of using the methods. She will teach in the TAE/focusing part of the training.
Prof. Donata Schoeller
Institution: University of Iceland-School of Humanities/University of Koblenz
Schoeller is head of research and training, coordinating and interlinking the agenda of the two work packages, overseeing training and research. She will coordinate the process of publications and manage the deliverables (book, special issue and Mooc). Expertise: embodied theory of meaning based on 4E cognition and an international TAE and Focusing trainer. She co-initiated the novel research and training approaches of ECT, TECT and MakeSense, building an international research community.
Prof. Sigríður Þorgeirsdóttir
Institution: University of Iceland-School of Humanities
Þorgeirsdóttir will co-ordinate the project, manage the organisation, delivery, finances, risk and co-design and deliver the dissemination and impact strategy, training etc in conjunction with the project manager and the PIs. Her research expertise is introducing embodied thinking into feminist/queer philosophy as situated knowledge. Sigríður Þorgeirsdóttir has been leading in making Iceland a hub for this pioneering field of research. She just completed her TAE training certificate.
Prof. Björn Þorsteinsson
Institution: University of Iceland-School of Humanities
Þorsteinsson will work closely with the PL Thorgeirsdottir and the project manager in the organizational running of the project, managing the budget, the reporting, the deliveries and hiring of staff. Together with PI Schoeller he will lead the philosophical-foundational workgroup of WP1 where he will examine the precarious research situation of 1. person inquiry based on his work on philosophy and quantum mechanics.
Prof. Kristín Valsdóttir
Institution: Iceland University of the Arts
Valsdóttir will on behalf of the IUA be responsible for the agreement between the UoI and IUA. She and Guðbjörg R. Jóhannesdóttir will coordinate the research of artistic methods in WP1 and WP2 and their development for the training module. Kristín is an expert in music education and will oversee the implementation of methods in the department of art education and other master programs at the IUA and conduct action research on the experiences of teachers and students.
Co-proposers:
Prof. Dorothe Bach
Institution: Center for Teaching Excellence of the University of Virgina
Bach will participate in all trainings and will play an important role for the development of the MakeSense program. As Associate Director for Center for Teaching Excellence, she brings 20 years of experience in educational development, working departments and institutions to improve teaching and learning in higher education. She regularly consults and presents workshops nationally and internationally on matters of course design, inclusive teaching, contemplative pedagogy and affective learning.
Prof. Thomas Fuchs
Institution: University of Heidelberg
Fuchs will contribute and consult both work packages WP1 and WP2, as his areas of research include phenomenological philosophy and psychopathology, embodied and enactive cognitive science and interactive concepts of social cognition. His clinical work focuses on the psychopathology and psychotherapy. He is internationally renowned as a pioneer in the philosophical and cognitive scientific foundations of the turn to embodiment
Prof. Pascal Frank
Institution: University Wageningen
As a former representative of the UBA TES Academy, Pascal Frank is responsible for the development, conduct, and evaluation of training activities addressing sustainability professionals. He has published several studies on mindfulness and introspective practices as well as the qualitative assessment of these practices in the context of Environmental and Sustainability Education. Frank will introduce the MakeSens methods to the International Academy of Transformation for Environment and Sustainability.
Prof. Sigríður Guðmarsdóttir
Institution: University of Iceland-School of Humanities
Sigríður Guðmarsdóttir is involved in feminist and environmental approaches within philosophies of embodied thinking. She is one of the co-organizers of the Irigaray Circle conference hosted by MakeSense and the Institute of Philosophy in June 2024.
Prof. Katrin Heimann
Institution: Aarhus University
Heimann’s role will be that of a trainer, furthermore of an action researcher responsible for exploration, evaluation and further promotion of the program designed. She is trained in micro-phenomenological interview and analysis and has acquired extended teaching capacities in this field. Furthermore, she has been applying the method in the field of art-science collaborations (within the Horizon 2020 grant ARTIS as well as the Sapere Aude Grant Experimenting Experiencing Reflecting.
Prof. Akira Ikemi
Institution: Kansai University Graduate School of Psychology
Ikemi will figure as a trainer and also a researcher (WP1). Akira Ikemi’s research themes cover the practice of Focusing and has contributed in the developments of various Focusing methods, including recent developments that incorporate mindfulness. At the same time, he is an expert of the theoretical model which can articulate the experiential change that happen in Focusing methods. He has been He has been awarded the prestigious Japanese Association of Humanistic Psychology Award in 2020.
Prof. Ólafur Páll Jónsson
Institution: University of Iceland-School of Education
Ólafur Páll Jónsson supervises the PhD dissertation of Gunndís Ýr Finnbogadóttir, one of the doctoral students of MakeSense. He is an expert in philosophy of education and philosophy of environment and philosophy of moral development.
Prof. Urban Kordes
Institution: Center for Cognitive Science, Ljubljana University
Kordeš will oversee empirical pilot studies of the trainings, and develop with the WP2 qualitative and empirical research criteria to measure the effects of the methods tested for the final evaluation plan. He will also contribute to training meditative methods of researching the mind. He will lead the adaptation of the training module to the standards of HE. His expertise is on empirical phenomenology and epistemological characteristics of researching subjective experience.
Prof. Kevin Krycka
Institution: Seattle University
Krycka contributes to develop and research the MakeSense program and adapting it to standards of HE. He will take part in WP 1 as expert on focusing based theories of embodied meaning. In WP 2 he will develop immediacy models for qualitative research. As Dean of School of Social Sciences at the University of Seattle, he will be instrumental in disseminating the training program.
Prof. Julia Lockheart
Institution: University of Wales Trinity Saint David
Lockheart contributes to develop and research the MakeSense program and adapting it to standards of HE. She is head of contextual practices at the Swansea college of art at the University of Wales. She will facilitate languaguing and metadesigning workshops within the Training module on artistic methods. These offer team-based tools and approaches to co-designing neologisms and approaches to language use for use in cross-disciplinary design projects.
Prof. Aston McCullough
Institution: University of Massachusetts Amherst
As a dancer and empirical researcher, McCullough’s know-how will contribute greatly to the emp/qual research in WP2, as his expertise lies in examining the impact of movement both quantitatively and qualitatively. His specific research areas include- movement & health, motion analysis, dance behaviour. McCullough is a also contemporary/improvisational dancer and Focusing teacher and thus will also figure as a trainer in the Focusing module.
Prof. Naohiko Mimura
Institution: Kansai University
Mimura will contribute to WP1. His core research expertise is the mind-body duality problem outlined in Husserl’s phenomenology and in particular in the “Theory of Experiencing” and the “Process Model” proposed by Eugene Gendlin. He currently leads the Studies of the Architectural Body Research Program.
Prof. em. Claire Petitmengin
Institution: Micro-phenomenology Laboratory
Petitmengin will oversee the micro-phenomenological training and will participate in both WP1 and WP2. She is the head of the Micro-phenomenology-Lab, and has established micro- phenomenology as a new discipline to research the dynamics of lived experience and describe its fine- grained structures. She is internationally known for her publications on epistemological conditions of this method, as well as its educational, therapeutic, artistic and contemplative applications.
Prof. Jenny Roche
Institution: University of Limerick
Roche contributes to develop and research the MakeSense program and adapting it to standards of HE. She teaches artistic research methods at BA, MA and PhD level and does research through dance and related arts projects. She has undertaken training in micro-phenomenology and incorporates this approach into her teaching, scholarly and artistic practice. She will contribute to the Training module on artistic methods.
Prof. Mike Sandbothe
Institution: University of Applied Sciences in Jena
Mike Sandbothe will be responsible for the first training module on mindfulness training in universities. Through the Network of Mindful Universities in Germany that he directs, he will be instrumental in disseminating the final training program within the Network that has over 70 universities. Based on his experiences with Network, he will oversee the assessment plan for the training program.
Prof. Satoko Tokumaro
Institution: Kaichi International University
Satoko Tokumaru will be part of WP 1 and a teacher for the TAE training module. She teaches TAE at Kaichi University, at Tokyo University and Sophia University Graduate School. In recent years, she has been developing TAE as
a qualitative research method. She wrote some books including “Writing With TAE? Thinking At the Edge? ” and “Qualitative research with TAE steps? Thinking at the edge: theory and applications.”
Prof. Siebrecht Vanhooren
Institution: University Leuven
Siebrecht Vanhooren will be conducting research regarding focusing in relation to well-being, meaning of life and reflection in different samples. He will draw on his experience how to use mixed-method procedures in different populations due to his current involvement in an international group of researchers developing new measures to study the felt sense and focusing. He will contribute to WP2.
Prof. Marieke van Vugt
Institution: University of Groningen
Van Vugt will oversee pilot-studies of the training programs as well elaborating feasible empirical procedures to empirically measure the impact and effects of the methods tested. As an expert on the cognitive neuroscience of mind-wandering as well as mindfulness meditation, she will greatly contribute to WP2. Dr. van Vugt is also involved in innovative research projects that include collaborations with dancers and Tibetan monks, in the intersection of art and mindfulness.
Prof. Greg Walkerden
Institution: Macquarie University
Walkerden will contribute to developing MakeSense program, with a special emphasis on environment, and participate in WP2. He is an expert in environmental management, and has a research background in philosophy and psychology, with a research emphasis on Eugene Gendlin’s Philosophy of the Implicit. Developing innovative practices is central to his research programs. He is co-editor of The embodied turn in critical thinking
Prof. Jeanne Watson
Institution: University of Toronto
Jeanne Watson will draw on her extensive background of process research methodology to study focusing among people who have varying levels of experience attending to, symbolizing and reflecting on their felt sense. She will contribute to WP2 using her experience of studying change processes to further develop procedures and measures to study focusing, and lead pilot-studies on focusing with different groups including students and more experienced practitioners.
