Professor Sophie Scott CBE is the Director of the Institute for Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London, as well as the Head of their Speech Communications Group.
Her research interests include the neural basis of vocal communication - how our brains process the information in speech and voices, and how our brains control the production of our voice. She is also interested in the expression of emotion in the voice, especially laughter.
She is very active in the public communication of science and presented the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures in 2017, has appeared on loads of TV and radio shows in the UK, she regularly performs standup comedy.
Faculty page: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/icn/people/sophie-scott
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sophiescott
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophie_Scott
Royal Institution profile: https://www.rigb.org/explore-science/explore/person/sophie-scott
TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/sophie_scott_why_we_laugh?language=en
NOTES:
Parasocial relationships https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasocial_interaction
The Cluster F Theory Podcast is edited by Julian Mayers at Yada Yada.
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-cluster-f-theory-podcast/id1736982916
Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5V4bBn54hiImeoyDNmTcIr?si=729367e48b0940d9
10. Laughter - Sophie Scott