Our third episode in Season 4 is with Dr. Sophie Scott, the Wellcome Senior Research Fellow in Basic Biomedical Science and Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London.  She is part of UCL's Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and in the Division of  Psychology & Lang Sciences.  So of course we're having her on the podcast, right?  Well it is an of course because of her particular lines of inquiry do have quite a lot to say about a subject that all improvisers, comedians and communicators who use humor care about -- laughter.

More generally, Dr. Scott's work looks at the neural basis of vocal communication - how our brains process the information in speech and voices and correspondingly produce what comes out of us that's audible. Within that, is a very special and interesting focus that she has placed on laughter.  And her conclusions can -- if we let them -- be quite transformational, I think, in how we evaluate our work.  I don't want to give too much away, so I will leave it there -- but what for more follow up material on the topics addressed.

You are also welcome and encouraged to check out more of Dr. Scott's background and work product.  Here are a few places to get you started:

Official Site: http://ucl.ac.uk/pals/people/profiles/academic-staff/sophie-scott

Select Lectures and Resources from Dr. Scott:

Sophie Scott: Why we laugh | TED Talk

The Science of Laughter with Sophie Scott - YouTube

‎The Neuromantics on Apple Podcasts