December 2nd, 2020
Directors concerned
The Japanese Society for Cognitive Psychology
Japanese Academic Societies Unite to Release a Joint Statement to Protect the Independence of the Science Council of Japan
Japanese scholars have met the Prime Minister Suga’s decision to reject the candidacy of six humanities and social sciences scholars for the Science Council of Japan with grave concern. 226 academic societies in the humanities and social sciences in Japan issued a Joint Statement on November 6th. Since then, the number of co-signers has reached 310. On December 2nd, they issued the same statement in English, gave a press interview and appealed to scholars and citizens worldwide for support and cooperation.
The Science Council of Japan, which is a national academy and not a federation of academic societies, does not directly represent the interests of the societies. Nevertheless, the societies are deeply concerned with the issue as the Prime Minister’s rejection of appointment not only violates the independence of the Science Council of Japan but also further threatens academic freedom, autonomy and democracy in Japan.
See the interview video on the Joint Statement: https://youtu.be/47unG8Y0-JQ
As one of the societies that have co-signed the Joint Statement, hereby The Japanese Society for Cognitive Psychology also releases it.
Please send your supportive message to:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdG8c42G4jnqvV3WygBNkttnEAzIeB-UiHMcOMhtE-INn0z3w/viewform?usp=sf_link
https://psych.or.jp/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Joint_Statement.pdf
About JSCP
Cognitive psychology is concerned with the human mind from the perspective of an information processing system (also known as the cognitive or information-processing approach) and attempts to explore cognitive activities, such as perception, memory, thinking, language, and learning. In recent years, the cognitive approach has been extended to other areas of psychology including emotion or sociality. The Japanese Society for Cognitive Psychology (JSCP) is a professional community for psychologists who share these perspectives and work to understand cognitive activities.
As of June 2010, JSCP has over 800 members, holds an annual conference, publishes ‘The Japanese Journal of Cognitive Psychology’ twice per year, and financially supports four research workshops. In addition, JSCP presents a Creativity Award for creative research conducted within Japan, regardless of whether the researchers are JSCP members. The organization also bestows a number of Distinguished Presentation Awards for excellent presentations given at the annual conference.
