Research
Departments
Music
Director: Prof. Dr. Melanie Wald-Fuhrmann
Using a variety of methods, the Department of Music researches the processing, experiencing and evaluation of music, as well as behaviour during its reception.
Cognitive Neuropsychology
Director: Prof. Dr. Fredrik Ullén
The Department of Cognitive Neuropsychology investigates the neuropsychological mechanisms of musical expertise, skill learning and creativity, as well as relations between cultural engagement, well-being and health.
Research Groups
Histories of Music, Mind, and Body
The "Histories of Music, Mind, and Body" Research Group seeks to historicize specific philosophical, embodied, and medical understandings of the experience of music.
Computational Auditory Perception
Focusing largely on the auditory modality, the "Computational Auditory Perception" Research Group explores the roles of experience and exposure in creating and affecting our perception of the world.
Neural and Environmental Rhythms
The Research Group "Neural and Environmental Rhythms" focuses on understanding how brain–environment synchrony contributes to our individual experience of the auditory world
Neurocognition of Music and Language
The Research Group “Neurocognition of Music and Language” explores perceptual, cognitive, and expressive similarities and differences between music and language, as well as their neural grounding and links with aesthetics.
Neural Circuits, Consciousness, and Cognition
The Research Group Neural Circuits, Consciousness, and Cognition seeks to understand why some experiences feel the way they do (consciousness) and how such experiences are imprinted on our brain (learning and memory).
Project Teams
Visual Neuroaesthetics (VisNA) Lab
The VisNA Lab investigates the psychological and neural basis of aesthetic experiences, such as when a person is aesthetically “moved” by visual art, poetry, architecture, music, or natural landscapes.
Neural Computation for Sound and Recognition (NCSR) Lab
The NCSR lab investigates the neural computations of auditory perception and recognition, as well as the plasticity of these processes. We focus on the role of brain rhythms for speech and music processing, how the processing interacts with the motor cortex, and how it is affected by training and individual experience.
Externally Funded Research
Biological Anthropology of Literature (Heisenberg Position)
This research project is funded by the DFG’s Heisenberg Program. It investigates the phylogenetic preconditions of poetic behavior
Apparent Motion (Department of Neuroscience)
This study focuses on why stimuli are perceived differently by the same participants, and how this ambiguity arises.
The Prosodic Syntax of German (Department of Language and Literature)
Prosody undisputedly affects the choice of syntactic constructions and the order of constituents within a sentence. However, for German, neither theories of grammar nor models of language production consider prosodic influences on sentence structure.
Focused Information (Music Department)
Information can be better perceived, processed, and maintained when it is prioritized. This focusing can unfold visually, through gaze, shifts of attention, or through memory. But how are these different forms of focus connected?
Reading Time Regularity (Department of Language and Literature)
This project is concerned with predicting text comprehension from statistical measurements of the reading process.
Creating an Academic Discipline (Music Department)
This project explores the simultaneous establishment of musicology and art history as academic disciplines at the University of Vienna, as part of an education reform undertaken by Leopold, Count von Thun und Hohenstein (1811–1888).
INHABIT // Artist-in-Residence
The INHABIT program fosters the exchange between artists and scientists and enables new and challenging perspectives towards the research at the institute. The new Artist-in-Residence program calls on artists interested in cooperating with scientists from the humanities and natural sciences who are active in aesthetics research.
Neuroscience
Director: Prof. David Poeppel, PhD
The Department of Neuroscience under the direction of David Poeppel existed from 2014–2021. It worked on the neurobiology of hearing, language processing, and music, including the dimensions of aesthetic experience.
Language and Literature
Director: Prof. Dr. Winfried Menninghaus
The Department of Language and Literature under the direction of Winfried Menninghaus existed from 2013–2022. It worked on the aesthetically relevant features and the aesthetic perception as well as the evaluation of linguistic utterances and texts, with a specific focus on literature.