The Art Engager Slow looking, leadership and the neuroscience of perspective-taking
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Oct 30, 2025 
Dr. Elizabeth (Zab) Johnson, Executive Director of the Wharton Neuroscience Initiative, explores how visual perception impacts leadership and decision-making. She discusses her innovative museum-based sessions for executives that combine slow looking with perspective-taking, enhancing empathy and communication. Zab reveals the neuroscience behind these practices and how group dialogues transform art into shared learning experiences. Plus, learn why rules like 'no pointing' matter and how spending an hour with a single artwork fosters deeper connections.
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Seeing Guides Decision Making
- Zab Johnson's work centres on how visual perception directs decisions, actions and behaviour.
- Understanding vision reveals that cognition predicts and subsamples the world, shaping interpretation and choice.
From Lab Finding To Museum Practice
- Zab discovered in doctoral work that color and form are processed together in early cortex, which shifted her view of artists as experimentalists.
- That finding pulled her into museums and led to teaching art-and-vision programs like Neuro Humanities in Paris.
Time Uncovers Hidden Visual Information
- Slow looking reveals information hidden at a glance because attention actively selects and suppresses visual input.
- Giving time uncovers different details and meaning that quick glances miss.
