Inspiration Stage: Examining the Ordinary

Ordinary moments are powered by extraordinary processes. A bystander decides whether to step in. A shopper chooses whether to trust what's on their breakfast cereal box. A runner ties their laces without ever asking what their shoe is made of. A painting stops someone in their tracks for reasons they can't quite explain. These ordinary moments feel instinctive, almost automatic, but each one is shaped by an interplay of perception, emotion, experience, and design.

These talks examine the moments we usually rush past. Across psychology, nutrition science, materials research, and neuroaesthetics, this block of talks unpacks the processes behind how we judge, trust, and see. 

TALKS INCLUDE:

14:00 - 14:15 | Ranran Li,  Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security, and Law

Would you step in? The science of bystander courage

You see someone being harassed on a train. Do you step in, look away, or wait for someone else? Explore why caring does not always become action—and how social situations can make courage easier.

Someone is being harassed on a train. You notice. In the seconds that follow, empathy, anger, uncertainty, perceived risk, fear, self-efficacy, and the presence of other people can pull you in different directions. This talk uses bystander intervention to explore a broader question: what happens to our willingness to help when helping carries personal risk? Drawing on personality psychology, criminology, decision science, and immersive virtual-reality research, Ranran studies the decision process underlying bystander intervention, and why the presence of others sometimes diffuses responsibility and sometimes enables coordinated action. The audience will enter a vivid social dilemma, consider what they might do, and discover how personality, momentary feelings, cognitive appraisals, as well as expectations about other people’s behavior shape action. The aim is not to divide people into heroes and cowards. Instead, the talk asks how social environments can be designed so that concern is more likely to become effective collective action.

14:15 - 14:30 | Cassandra Ama Omane,  Leibniz Institute for Prevention Research and Epidemiology - BIPS

Do you and your grandparents trust the same food advice?

Curious if your favorite influencer or grandmother knows more about healthy eating? Find out what happens when you get the tools to question your trust judgments and make healthier food choices.

You are in the supermarket, deciding between two products, and something you read online last week comes back to you. Why did that exact source feel trustworthy, and the next one didn’t? Why do we trust some food advice and ignore others? Cassandra A. Omane studies that moment. As a former speech and language therapist now working in public health research, she asks how psychological biases and information design shape our trust in online nutrition information, and whether the answer is the same at 25 as it is at 70. Using a mixed-methods approach, she shows how unconscious processes influence our supermarket decisions – and how to spot trustworthy sources. The talk shows which factors quietly do the work: how a webpage looks, what we assume about whoever wrote it. Then it hands the question back to the room. This talk connects abstract research to your daily life and provides practical tools for navigating the overwhelming world of nutrition advice. For anyone who has ever looked up food advice online.

14:30 - 14:45  | Varqha Bagwan,  ITA Institut für Textiltechnik of RWTH Aachen University

What's really inside your shoes? The hidden science beneath our feet

We wear shoes every day, yet rarely think about what they're made of or what happens to them after use. Discover the hidden science inside one of our most personal everyday objects.

Shoes are among the most personal objects we own. They carry us through work, sport, travel, and everyday life, yet very few of us know what lies beneath the surface. A single shoe can contain dozens of materials including textiles, foams, rubbers, coatings, and adhesives, combined into a highly complex product that is surprisingly difficult to recycle or even evaluate from an environmental perspective. This talk reveals the hidden science inside modern footwear and explores why designing truly sustainable products is far more challenging than it appears. Using shoes as an example, it uncovers the invisible networks of materials, manufacturing, supply chains, and environmental decisions behind everyday products. Finally, the talk looks ahead to how science, digitalisation, and artificial intelligence could help us understand these hidden systems, enabling more transparent, circular, and sustainable product development in the future.

14:45 - 15:00 | Corinna Kühnapfel, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Touched by art: Wonder, understanding, and well-being

Can art change not only how we feel, but also how we understand the world? Discover how awe and wonder can open attention, shift perspective, and explain why art can affect us so deeply.

Why can a painting, installation, or public artwork stay with us long after the encounter has ended? This talk explores how awe and wonder can change not only how we feel, but also how we perceive and understand the world. Drawing on research in neuroaesthetics, empirical aesthetics, psychology, and philosophy, Corinna Kühnapfel examines awe and wonder as closely related but distinct emotions. Awe can expand our perspective and create a sense of connection to something larger than ourselves, while wonder invites us to stay with the unfamiliar, ask questions, and explore. Together, they may help explain how art can foster well-being, insight, emotional understanding, and new ways of seeing ourselves and the world. Combining scientific findings with relatable examples, the talk asks how art can put us in touch with ourselves, others, and the world around us, and why being touched by art can become a source of curiosity, connection, and understanding.

15:00 - 15:20 | Meet the Scientists

Meet the Scientists-session

Stay around for an informal networking session: ask your own questions, start a conversation, and connect directly with the speakers.