Part of Jagiellonian University in Kraków
Part of Jagiellonian University in Kraków
Ph.D., Habil., Associate Professor

Mateusz Hohol

Mateusz is the founder and leader of the MCLL and an Associate Professor of psychology at the Jagiellonian University (JU), holding a habilitation in psychology and a Ph.D. in philosophy. Currently, he serves as the director of the Copernicus Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, JU. At the JU, Mateusz is also an associate member of the Centre for Brain Research and a lecturer at the Cognitive Science Programme and at the Doctoral School in the Social Sciences.

His research interests focus mainly on mathematical cognition, i.e., psychological mechanisms of processing numbers and space, in various populations. In addition, Mateusz has been keenly involved in investigations on cognitive artifacts, methodological and conceptual issues in cognitive science, and social cognition. Currently, his main research foci include numerical cognition in professional mathematicians, the relationships between long-term memory and math skills, the cognitive profiles of individuals with developmental dyscalculia, and math anxiety.

Mateusz is a Principal Investigator of the following grants: "Cognitive artifacts on various time scales: An integrative approach" from National Science Centre, PL (2022–2026), "Mind, number, space: Spatial-numerical cognition in professional mathematicians" from Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Poland (2024-2027), and "The gist of math: Applying Fuzzy-Trace Theory as an integrative framework to investigate different dimensions of numerical memory and their associations with mathematical skills in the general population and among individuals with dyscalculia" from National Science Centre, PL (2025–2029). He also represents JU in the steering committee of a grant "ErasMAs+ Enriching HEI training to help future primary school teachers tackle math anxiety in themselves and their pupils" funded by European Comission under Erasmus+ Cooperation partnerships in higher education (2025–2028).

He authored three books, including “Foundations of geometric cognition” (Routledge, 2020), and several papers in journals such as Cognition, Emotion, Psychological Research, Consciousness and Cognition, Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, Animal Cognition, Acta Psychologica, PeerJ, Frontiers in Psychology, Foundations of Science, Theory & Psychology, Journal of Computational Neuroscience, Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, Topoi, Synthese, Frontiers in Psychiatry, American Journal of Bioethics, Method & Theory in the Study of Religion, Scientific Reports. He also co-edited five books, e.g., “The Concept of Explanation” (CCPress, 2017) and special issues of Theory & Psychology (2019) and Synthese (2021).

Foundations of Geometric Cognition

Mateusz is a member of the European Society for Cognitive Psychology (ESCOP), the Mathematical Cognition and Learning Society (MCLS), the Commission for Philosophy of Sciences of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences (PAU), and the Polish Society for Cognitive Science. Currently, he collaborates with researchers from numerous universities, e.g., Loughborough University (UK), University of Graz (Austria), University of Padova (Italy), and University of California, San Diego (USA), Thomas More University, Antwerp (Belgium), and KU Leuven (Belgium). He is also active in the Una Europa alliance, particularly as a member of the Future UniLab steering committee, a think tank serving as a living lab and providing a forum for discussions and research on the future role of universities in society.

Mateusz received a number of awards and scholarships, including the “Start” Scholarship of the Foundation for Polish Science, the Scientific Prize of “Polityka” (one of the most read Polish weeklies), and the Scholarship of the Minister of Science and Higher Education for outstanding young scientists.

In addition to research and executive duties, Mateusz has been involved in popular science projects and book translations. Outside working hours, he is a big fan of new technologies and tech gadgets, an FPV drone pilot, and an aerial photographer. He lives in Krakow with his beloved wife and cat.

Principal investigator in projects:

Selected publications:

Szymanek, P., Homan, M., van Elk, M., & Hohol, M. (2024). Effects of expectations and sensory unreliability on voice detection – A preregistered study. Consciousness and Cognition, 123, 103718. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2024.103718
Szymanek, P., Grodniewicz, J. P., Hohol, M. (2025). Cognitive artifacts in the evolution of cultural systems of beliefs and practices. Method and Theory in the Study of Religion, 1–32. https://doi.org/10.1163/15700682-bja10145
Obidziński, M., Bażela, N., & Hohol, M. (2025). More gist, better math: Fuzzy-trace theory-based investigation of the relationship between long-term memory and mathematical skills. Cognition, 263, 106212. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106212
Grodniewicz, J. P. & Hohol, M. (2024). Therapeutic chatbots as cognitive-affective artifacts. Topoi, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-024-10018-x
Szczygieł, M., & Hohol, M. (2024). The gender gap in math anxiety (and in the link between math anxiety and math performance) is not so salient when other anxieties are controlled for. PsyArxiv Preprint. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/5trew
Wołoszyn, K., Hohol, M., Kuniecki, M., & Winkielman, P. (2024). Facing emotional vocalizations and instrumental sounds: Sighted and blind individuals spontaneously and selectively activate facial muscles in response to emotional stimuli. Emotion. https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0001475
Hohol, M., Bażela, N. (2024). Mathematical cognition. In J. Bremer (Ed.), Cognitive science (pp. 223–241). Ignatianum University Press. https://doi.org/10.35765/slowniki.436en
Hohol, M., Bażela, N. (2024). Poznanie matematyczne. W J. Bremer (red.), Kognitywistyka (ss. 229–248). Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Ignatianum w Krakowie. https://doi.org/ 10.35765/slowniki.436
Baran, B., Krzyżowski, M., Rádai, Z., Francikowski, J., & Hohol, M. (2023). Geometry-based navigation in the dark: Layout symmetry facilitates spatial learning in the house cricket, Acheta domesticus, in the absence of visual cues. Animal Cognition, 23, 755–770. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-022-01712-7
Grodniewicz, J. P., Hohol, M. (2023). Therapeutic conversational artificial intelligence and the acquisition of self-understanding. The American Journal of Bioethics. 23(5), 59–61. https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2023.2191021
Grodniewicz, J. P., Hohol, M. (2023). Waiting for a digital therapist: Three challenges on the path to psychotherapy delivered by artificial intelligence. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 14, 1190084. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1190084
Hohol, M., Wołoszyn, K., & Cipora, K. (2022). No fingers, no SNARC? Neither the finger counting starting hand, nor its stability robustly affect the SNARC effect. Acta Psychologica, 230, 103765. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2022.103765
Wołoszyn, K., Hohol, M., Kuniecki, M., & Winkielman, P. (2022). Restricting movements of lower face leaves recognition of emotional vocalizations intact but introduces a valence positivity bias. Scientific Reports, 12, 16101. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-18888-0
Miłkowski, M., Hohol, M. (2021). Explanations in cognitive science: Unication versus pluralism. Synthese, 199(Suppl. 1), S1–S17. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-020-02777-y
Hohol, M., Wołoszyn-Hohol, K. (2022). Kryzys ucieleśnienia. Tygodnik Powszechny, 36(3817), 64-68.
Hohol, M. (2020). Foundations of geometric cognition. New York-London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429056291
Hohol, M., Willmes, K., Nęcka, E., Brożek, B., Nuerk, H.-C., & Cipora, K. (2020). Professional mathematicians do not differ from others in the symbolic numerical distance and size effects. Scientific Reports, 10(11531). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-68202-z
Miłkowski, M., Hohol, M., Nowakowski, P. (2019). Mechanisms in psychology: The road towards unity?. Theory & Psychology, 29(5), 567-568. https://doi.org/10.1177/0959354319875218
Hohol, M., Miłkowski, M. (2019). Cognitive artifacts for geometric reasoning. Foundations of Science, 24(4), 657–680. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-019-09603-w
Miłkowski, M., Hensel, W.M., Hohol, M. (2018). Replicability or reproducibility? On the replication crisis in computational neuroscience and sharing only relevant detail. Journal of Computational Neuroscience. 45(3), 163–172. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10827-018-0702-z
Hohol, M., Wołoszyn, K., Nuerk, H.-C., Cipora, K. (2018). A large-scale survey on finger counting routines, their temporal stability and flexibility in educated adults. PeerJ, 6(e5878). https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5878
Miłkowski, M., Clowes, R.W., Rucińska, Z., Przegalińska, A., Zawidzki, T., Gies, A., Krueger, J., McGann, M., Afeltowicz, Ł., Wachowski, W.M., Stjernberg, F., Loughlin, V., Hohol, M. (2018). From wide cognition to mechanisms: A silent revolution. Frontiers in Psychology, 9(2393). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02393
Brożek, B., Heller, M., Hohol, M. (Eds.). (2017). The concept of explanation. Kraków: Copernicus Center Press
Hohol, M., Baran, B., Krzyżowski, M., Francikowski, J. (2017). Does spatial navigation have a blind-spot? Visiocentrism is not enough to explain the navigational behavior comprehensively. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 11(154). https://doi.org/10.3389/fnbeh.2017.00154
Wołoszyn, K., Hohol, M. (2017). Commentary: The poverty of embodied cognition. Frontiers in Psychology, 8(845). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00845
Hohol, M., Cipora, K., Willmes, K., Nuerk, H.-C. (2017). Bringing back the balance: Domain-general processes are also important in numerical cognition. Frontiers in Psychology, 8(499). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00499
Cipora, K., Hohol, M., Nuerk, H.-C., Willmes, K., Brożek, B., Kucharzyk, B., Nęcka, E. (2016) Professional mathematicians differ from controls in their spatial-numerical associations. Psychological Research, 80, 710–726. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-015-0677-6
MCLL is funded by the Excellence Initiative – Jagiellonian University within the Priority Research Area Society of the Future
Funders
Contact
Main Market Square 34,
31-010 Krakow, Poland
mcll@uj.edu.pl
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