Tania Singer facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Tania Singer
Born	1969 (age 55–56) Munich, Germany
Nationality	German, French
Alma mater	Freie Universität Berlin
Awards	Otto Hahn Medal of the Max Planck Society for the best dissertation of the year 2000
Scientific career
Fields	Social neuroscience, Neuroeconomics, Contemplative Science
Institutions	Social Neuroscience Lab, Max Planck Society (professor, Scientific Head)

Tania Singer (born 1969) is a German psychologist and brain scientist. She is known for her work in social neuroscience. This field studies how our brains help us understand and interact with others. She is currently the scientific director of the Social Neuroscience Lab at the Max Planck Society in Berlin, Germany.

From 2007 to 2010, she was a professor at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. Her research looks at how our brains, bodies, and hormones affect how we act socially. She studies emotions like compassion (caring for others) and empathy (understanding what others feel).

Tania Singer started and leads the ReSource project. This is a big study that looks at how mental training changes our brains and improves our health. She also works with economist Dennis Snower on "caring economics." This idea explores how caring and kindness can improve economic systems. In 2015, she published a book called Caring Economics. Tania Singer is the daughter of famous brain scientist Wolf Singer.

Becoming a Scientist

Tania Singer studied psychology at the University of Marburg from 1989 to 1992. She then continued her studies at Technische Universität Berlin, finishing in 1996.

She worked at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin. In 2000, she earned her Ph.D. (a high university degree) from the Free University of Berlin. For her excellent work, she received the Otto Hahn Medal. She continued her research at the Max Planck Institute until 2002.

After working in London, UK, she became a professor at the University of Zurich in 2006. In 2008, she became the first professor of social neuroscience and neuroeconomics there. In 2010, she became a director at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany. She has also been an honorary professor at other universities. Since 2019, she has been the scientific director of the Social Neuroscience Lab in Berlin.

What Tania Singer Researches

Tania Singer's work focuses on how we think about others (social cognition). She studies social emotions like empathy, compassion, and fairness. She also looks at how we make decisions and communicate. She is interested in why people cooperate and help each other. She also studies why cooperation sometimes breaks down and why people act selfishly.

Her research uses different methods. These include functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which shows brain activity. She also uses virtual reality and studies biological signs like cortisol (a stress hormone).

Singer has worked with Matthieu Ricard, a French Buddhist monk. They have studied brain activity during meditation. They also helped organize big conferences with the Dalai Lama. These meetings led to two books: Caring Economics and Power and Care. Tania Singer has written over 150 scientific articles.

The ReSource Project

Singer started and leads the ReSource Project. This is a big study that lasts for one year. It looks at how different types of mental training affect people. The training includes practices like mindfulness and compassion. The study checks how these practices affect well-being, brain changes, helping others, stress, and health.

More than 300 people took part in the study. Scientists used 90 different ways to measure changes. So far, over 30 scientific papers have been published from this project. The results show that mental training can reduce social stress. It can also lead to changes in the brain's structure.

Caring Economics

Another part of her research looks at how our social thoughts and feelings affect economic decisions. She works with Professor Dennis J. Snower on a project called "caring economics." This project explores how what we know about human feelings and social thinking can help solve global economic problems.

Empathy and Compassion in the Brain

In 2004, Singer published a paper in the journal Science. She showed that parts of the brain that feel pain also become active when people see their partners feeling pain. In later studies, she found that our brain's empathy responses change based on how fair we think others are. They also change depending on whether someone is part of our group or not.

Based on her work with Matthieu Ricard, she also found something important. The brain areas involved in feeling with someone (empathy for their suffering) are different from the areas involved in compassion. Compassion means feeling concern for someone and wanting to help them. Empathy can sometimes lead to feeling overwhelmed or "burned out" if it becomes too much distress. But compassion comes with positive feelings of care and warmth. It can help us stay strong when we see suffering.

Singer also enjoys connecting art and science. For example, she created a free e-book called Compassion: Bridging Practice and Science with artist Olafur Eliasson.

Awards and Memberships

• 2000: Otto Hahn Medal of the Max Planck Society
• 2011: Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Zurich, Switzerland
• Since 2014: Vice President of the Board, Mind & Life Europe, Zurich, Switzerland
• Since 2013: Member, Young Academy of Europe (YAE)
• Since 2012: Board Member, Mind & Life Institute (MLI), Hadley, MA, USA
• Since 2011: Member, European Initiative for Integrative Psychological Science, Association for Psychological Science (APS)

Selected Publications

Here are some of Tania Singer's important publications:

• Singer, T. & Ricard, M. & Karius, K. (2019). Power and Care: Conversations toward balance for our common future - Science, society, and spirituality. New York: MIT Press. ISBN: 978-0262039529
• Singer, T. & Ricard, M. (2015). Caring economics: Conversations on altruism and compassion, between scientists, economists, and the Dalai Lama. New York: Picador. ISBN: 978-1250064127
• Singer, T. & Bolz, M. (2013). Compassion. Bridging Practice and Science. Max Planck Society. ISBN: 978-3-9815612-1-0. (E-Book)
• Singer, T., & Engert, V. (2019). It matters what you practice: Differential training effects on subjective experience, behavior, brain and body in the ReSource Project. Current Opinion in Psychology, 28, 151–158.
• Engert, V., Kok, B. E., Papassotiriou, I., Chrousos, G. P., & Singer, T. (2017). Specific reduction in cortisol stress reactivity after social but not attention-based mental training. Science Advances, 3(10): e1700495.
• Kok, B. E., & Singer, T. (2017). Effects of contemplative dyads on engagement and perceived social connectedness over 9 months of mental training: A randomized clinical trial. JAMA Psychiatry, 74(2), 126-134.
• Valk, S. L., Bernhardt, B. C., Trautwein, M., Böckler, A., Kanske, P., Guizard, N., Collins, D. L., & Singer, T. (2017). Structural plasticity of the social brain: Differential change after socio-affective and cognitive mental training. Science Advances, 3(10): e1700489.
• Singer, T., Seymour, B., O'Doherty, J., Kaube, H., Dolan, R. J., & Frith, C. D. (2004). Empathy for pain involves the affective but not sensory components of pain. Science, 303 (5661), 1157–1162.

Images for kids

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  Tania Singer

See also

In Spanish: Tania Singer para niños