Dr Guido Orgs
Staff details
I studied both performing dance (BA at the Folkwang University of the Arts, Essen, Germany) and Psychology (BSc/MSc at the University of Dusseldorf, Germany). After completion of my PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience on the neural correlates of sound meaning, I joined German Dance Company NEUER TANZ/VA WÖLFL as a full-time performer. Since 2009, I have lived and worked in London, as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, UCL, Action & Body Group, Prof Patrick Haggard and as Lecturer in Psychology at Brunel University, London. I joined the Psychology Department at Goldsmiths in 2015.
I am Co-Director of the MSc in Psychology of the Arts, Neuroaesthetics and Creativity (with Dr Rebecca Chamberlain) and the Science of the Performing Arts (SPA) Lab (with Dr Jamie A. Ward) at Goldsmiths. I am also scientist in residence at advertising agency VMLY&R.
Academic qualifications
- PhD in Psychology 2007
- BA in Performing Dance 2007
- MSc/BSc in Psychology 2004
Teaching and Supervision
Research interests
The main themes of my research relate to the cognitive neuroscience of dance and the performing arts
• Cognitive neuroscience of dance and the performing arts
• Neuroaesthetics of dance and the performing arts
• Liveness
• Synchrony, joint action and social signaling
• Action perception
• Body perception
• Visual and motor expertise
• Time Perception
• Dance Movement Therapy
Publications and research outputs
Book Section
Lee, Haeeun and Orgs, Guido. 2022. Experiencing art in social settings. In: Martin Skov and Marcos Nadal, eds. The Routledge International Handbook of Neuroaesthetics. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 448-460. ISBN 9781003008675
Millman, L.S. Merritt; Richardson, Daniel C. and Orgs, Guido. 2022. Continuous and collective measures of real-time audience engagement. In: Matthew Reason; Lynne Conner; Katya Johanson and Ben Walmsley, eds. Routledge Companion to Audiences and the Performing Arts. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 293-307. ISBN 9780367470753
Orgs, Guido and Howlin, Claire. 2020. The Audio-Visual Aesthetics of Music and Dance. In: Marcos Nadal and Oshin Vartanian, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Empirical Aesthetics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198824350
Orgs, Guido; Calvo-Merino, Beatriz and Cross, Emily S.. 2018. Knowing dance or knowing how to dance? Sources of expertise in aesthetic appreciation of human movement. In: Bettina Bläsing; Martin Puttke and Thomas Schack, eds. The Neurocognition of Dance: Mind, Movement and Motor Skills. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 238-257. ISBN 9781138847866
Orgs, Guido; Caspersen, Dana and Haggard, Patrick. 2016. You Move, I Watch, It Matters: Aesthetic Communication in Dance. In: Sukhvinder S Obhi and Emily S. Cross, eds. Shared Representations: Sensorimotor foundations of social life. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 627-653. ISBN 9781107279353
Article
Millman, L.S. Merritt; Hunter, Elaine C.M.; Terhune, Devin Blair and Orgs, Guido. 2023. Online structured dance/movement therapy reduces bodily detachment in depersonalization-derealization disorder. Complementary Therapies in Clinical Practice, 51, 101749. ISSN 1744-3881
Sun, Yanke; Greaves, Dwaynica A; Orgs, Guido; de C. Hamilton, Antonia F; Day, Sally and Ward, Jamie A. 2023. Using Wearable Sensors to Measure Interpersonal Synchrony in Actors and Audience Members During a Live Theatre Performance. Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies, 7(1), 27. ISSN 2474-9567
Cracco, Emiel; Linthout, Tilia and Orgs, Guido. 2023. The Role of Objecthood and Animacy in Apparent Movement Processing. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 18(1), nsad014. ISSN 1749-5016
Orgs, Guido and Cross, Emily S.. 2023. Dancing robots: Social interactions are performed, not depicted. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 46, e40. ISSN 0140-525X
Millman, L.S. Merritt; Hunter, Elaine C.M.; David, Anthony S.; Orgs, Guido and Terhune, Devin Blair. 2022. Assessing responsiveness to direct verbal suggestions in depersonalization-derealization disorder. Psychiatry Research, 315, 114730. ISSN 0165-1781
Monroy-Agamez, Ernesto; Imada, Toshie; Sagiv, Noam and Orgs, Guido. 2022. Dance across cultures: Joint action aesthetics in Japan and the UK. Empirical Studies of the Arts, 40(2), pp. 209-227. ISSN 0276-2374
Cracco, Emiel; Lee, Haeeun; van Belle, Goedele; Quenon, Lisa; Haggard, Patrick; Rossion, Bruno and Orgs, Guido. 2022. EEG frequency tagging reveals the integration of form and motion cues into the perception of group movement. Cerebral Cortex, 32(13), pp. 2843-2857. ISSN 1047-3211
Millman, L.S.M.; Hunter, Elaine C.M.; Orgs, Guido; David, Anthony S. and Terhune, Devin Blair. 2022. Symptom variability in depersonalization–derealization disorder: A latent profile analysis. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 78(4), pp. 637-655. ISSN 0021-9762
Chamberlain, Rebecca; Orgs, Guido; Mayer, Veronika; Chana, Kirren; Berio, Daniel and Leymarie, Frederic Fol. 2022. A dot that went for a walk: People prefer lines drawn with human-like kinematics. British Journal of Psychology, 113(1), pp. 105-130. ISSN 0007-1269
Rose, Dawn; Müllensiefen, Daniel; Lovatt, Peter and Orgs, Guido. 2022. The Goldsmiths Dance Sophistication Index (Gold-DSI): A Psychometric Tool to Assess Individual Differences in Dance Experience. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts, 16(4), pp. 733-745. ISSN 1931-3896
Millman, L.S.M.; Terhune, Devin Blair; Hunter, Elaine and Orgs, Guido. 2021. Towards a neurocognitive approach to Dance Movement Therapy for mental health: A systematic review. Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy, 28(1), pp. 24-38. ISSN 1063-3995
Orlandi, Andrea; Cross, Emily S. and Orgs, Guido. 2020. Timing is everything: Dance aesthetics depend on the complexity of movement kinematics. Cognition, 205, 104446. ISSN 0010-0277
Orgs, Guido; Vicary, Staci and Howlin, Claire. 2020. Audiovisual aesthetics of sound and movement in contemporary dance. Empirical Studies of the Arts, 38(2), pp. 191-211. ISSN 0276-2374
Bigliassi, Marcelo; Karageorghis, Costas I.; Nowicky, Alexander V.; Wright, Michael J. and Orgs, Guido. 2018. Effects of auditory distraction on voluntary movements: exploring the underlying mechanisms associated with parallel processing. Psychological Research, 82(4), pp. 720-733. ISSN 0340-0727
von Zimmermann, Jorina; Vicary, Staci; Sperling, Matthias; Orgs, Guido and Richardson, Daniel C.. 2018. The choreography of group affiliation. Topics in Cognitive Science, 10(1), pp. 80-94. ISSN 1756-8757
Howlin, Claire; Orgs, Guido and Vicary, Staci. 2017. The Impact of Soundtrack Congruency on the Aesthetic Experience of Contemporary Dance: Exploring Aesthetic Interaction in Terms of Arousal and Enjoyment Ratings in Three Audio Settings. Proceedings of the 25th Anniversary Conference of the European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music, pp. 91-95.
Bigliassi, Marcelo; Karageorghis, Costas I.; Wright, Michael J.; Orgs, Guido and Nowicky, Alexander V.. 2017. Effects of auditory stimuli on electrical activity in the brain during cycle ergometry. Physiology & Behavior, 177, pp. 135-147. ISSN 0031-9384
Vicary, Staci; Sperling, Matthias; von Zimmermann, Jorina; Richardson, Daniel C. and Orgs, Guido. 2017. Joint action aesthetics. PLoS ONE, 12(7), e0180101. ISSN 1932-6203
Bigliassi, Marcelo; Karagheorgis, Costas; Nowicky, Alexander; Orgs, Guido and Wright, Michael. 2016. Cerebral Mechanisms Underlying the Effects of Music during a Fatiguing Isometric Ankle-Dorsiflexion Task. Psychophysiology, 54(10), pp. 1472-1483. ISSN 0048-5772
Orgs, Guido; Dovern, Anna; Hagura, Nobuhiro; Haggard, Patrick; Fink, Gereon R and Weiss, Peter H. 2016. Constructing Visual Perception of Body Movement with the Motor Cortex. Cerebral Cortex, 26(1), pp. 440-449. ISSN 1460-2199
Orgs, Guido; Hagura, Nobuhiro and Haggard, Patrick. 2013. Learning to like it: aesthetic perception of bodies, movements and choreographic structure. Consciousness and Cognition, 22(2), pp. 603-12. ISSN 1053-8100
Orgs, Guido; Kirsch, Louise and Haggard, Patrick. 2013. Time perception during apparent biological motion reflects subjective speed of movement, not objective rate of visual stimulation. Experimental Brain Research, 227(2), pp. 223-9. ISSN 0014-4819
Hagura, Nobuhiro; Kanai, Ryota; Orgs, Guido and Haggard, Patrick. 2012. Ready steady slow: action preparation slows the subjective passage of time. Proceedings. Biological sciences / The Royal Society, 279(1746), pp. 4399-4406. ISSN 1471-2954
Orgs, Guido; Bestmann, Sven; Schuur, Friederike and Haggard, Patrick. 2011. From body form to biological motion: the apparent velocity of human movement biases subjective time. Psychological Science, 22(6), pp. 712-717. ISSN 0956-7976
Orgs, Guido and Haggard, Patrick. 2011. Temporal binding during apparent movement of the human body. Visual Cognition, 19(7), pp. 833-845. ISSN 1350-6285
Calvo-Merino, B; Urgesi, C; Orgs, Guido; Aglioti, S M and Haggard, P. 2010. Extrastriate body area underlies aesthetic evaluation of body stimuli. Experimental Brain Research, 204(3), pp. 447-456. ISSN 0014-4819
Orgs, Guido; Dombrowski, Jan-Henryk; Heil, Martin and Jansen-Osmann, Petra. 2008. Expertise in dance modulates alpha/beta event-related desynchronization during action observation. European Journal of Neuroscience, 27(12), pp. 3380-3384. ISSN 0953-816X
Orgs, Guido; Lange, Kathrin; Dombrowski, Jan-Henryk and Heil, Martin. 2008. N400-effects to task-irrelevant environmental sounds: further evidence for obligatory conceptual processing. Neuroscience Letters, 436(2), pp. 133-7. ISSN 0304-3940
Orgs, Guido; Lange, Kathrin; Dombrowski, Jan-Henryk and Heil, Martin. 2007. Is conceptual priming for environmental sounds obligatory? International Journal of Psychophysiology, 65(2), pp. 162-6. ISSN 0167-8760
Orgs, Guido; Lange, Kathrin; Dombrowski, Jan-Henryk and Heil, Martin. 2006. Conceptual priming for environmental sounds and words: an ERP study. Brain and Cognition, 62(3), pp. 267-272. ISSN 0278-2626
Mayr, Susanne; Niedeggen, Michael; Buchner, Axel and Orgs, Guido. 2006. The Level of Reaction Time Determines the ERP Correlates of Auditory Negative Priming. Journal of Psychophysiology, 20(3), pp. 186-194. ISSN 0269-8803
Conference or Workshop Item
Ward, Jamie A; Richardson, Daniel C.; Orgs, Guido; Hunter, Kelly and Hamilton, Antonia. 2018. 'Sensing Interpersonal Synchrony between Actors and Autistic Children in Theatre Using Wrist-worn Accelerometers'. In: International Symposium on Wearable Computers (ISWC). Singapore, Singapore 8-12 October 2018.
Hänsel, Katrin; Katevas, Kleomenis; Orgs, Guido; Richardson, Daniel C.; Alomainy, Akram and Haddadi, Hamed. 2018. 'The potential of wearable technology for monitoring social interactions based on interpersonal synchrony'. In: Wearable Systems, 2018. Munich, Germany 10 June 2018.
Orgs, Guido; Richardson, Daniel C. and Sperling, Matthias. 2016. 'Dance/Neuroscience Public Engagement Events'. In: Dance Neuroscience public engagement events. Siobhan Davies Studio, United Kingdom.
Broadcast
Orgs, Guido and UNSPECIFIED. 2017. Why audiences like dancing best when it stops.
Dataset
Orgs, Guido. 2017. Joint Action Aesthetics Dataset.
Performance
Sperling, Matthias and Orgs, Guido. 2016. Now that we know - Performance and Lecture. In: "Now that we know", Wellcome Collection, United Kingdom.
Hill Project, Dog Kennel and Orgs, Guido. 2016. Our True Feelings. In: "Our true feelings", Ashmolean Museum Oxford, United Kingdom.
Professional Activity
Orgs, Guido. 2017. Flamingo x DDB: Turning Uncertainty into Advantage.
Orgs, Guido. 2016. APG Noisy Thinking - Why did we stop thinking beyond next week?.
Further profile content
Featured publications
2020:
Timing is everything: Dance aesthetics depend on the complexity of movement kinematics
Cognition
2016:
Constructing visual perception of body movement with the motor cortex
Cerebral Cortex
2011:
From body form to biological motion: The apparent velocity of human movement biases subjective time
Psychological Science
2020:
The Goldsmiths Dance Sophistication Index (Gold-DSI): A Psychometric Tool to Assess Individual Differences in Dance Experience
Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts
2017:
Joint action aesthetics
Plos One
Professional projects
At the intersection of the arts and the sciences, I regularly organise and participate in public engagement events that develop collaborations across dance, performance and neuroscience. Events took place for example at the Barbican, Siobhan Davies Studios, the Ashmolean Museum and Modern Art Oxford. Collaborators include Matthias Sperling, Siobhan Davies Dance, the Scottish Ensemble and NEUER TANZ/VA WÖLFL. I also provide consulting services for advertising, branding and market research agencies, including adamandeveDDB, Flamingo and most recently VMLY&R.
Grants and awards
2019: The Neurocognition of Liveness - NEUROLIVE - ERC Consolidator Grant (PI, €1.93 Mio, 5 years)
2010: Neuropsychology of choreographic patterns in aesthetic perception of dance - Leverhulme Trust Research Grant (Named Researcher, £115k, 3 years)
2009: Visual perception of apparent human movement - DAAD Postdoctoral Fellowship (£27k, 2 years)
