Returning to a New Home
Robert L. Goldstone
Indiana University
Keywords: Cognitive science; Editorial; Interdisciplinary; Basic research; Formalism
This issue of Cognitive Science marks the start of our partnership with Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates (LEA). The journal has never been published by LEA before, but in many ways, our
relocation feels like a homecoming. In 1976 Roger Schank approached Larry Erlbaum with the
idea of forming a cognitive science journal. Mr. Erlbaum was highly receptive, and together
with his partner Walter Johnson began publishing Cognitive Science in 1977 at the newly es-
tablished Ablex Publishing Company. The first editors were Eugene Charniak, Allan Collins,
and Roger Schank. The first Cognitive Science Society conference was chaired by Donald
Norman at University of California, San Diego in 1978. In the intervening years, LEA has pub-
lished the Annual Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Conference. Beyond this, LEA has
been a major force for the advancement of cognitive science through the impressive collection
of books and journals they have published in cognitive science. We are honored and delighted
to be working with LEA. Lawrence Erlbaum, both the man and the company, has been excep-
tionally generous with their time, expertise, and support. Indeed, his contributions to cognitive
science have been recognized twice by the Cognitive Science Society, as two independent gov-
erning boards have made him an honorary member of the society. He is the only two-lifetime
member of the society, but this is fitting in light of his redoubled efforts to promote cognitive
science. We have every expectation that the journal will flourish with LEA. Through resources
provided by LEA, the Cognitive Science Society will be able to significantly grow, offering its
members new services for reasonable dues. LEA is also committed to the timely production of
issues, Cognitive Science Society’s continued retention of copyrights, authors’right to dissem-
inate their articles on their own Web sites, and continued growth of the journal.
Even though our publisher has changed, our central mission has not. Our aim is to provide an
outlet for significant developments in the study of minds and other intelligent systems. This mis-
sion inherently involves interdisciplinary collaboration, and so we will continue our efforts to
serve as a home to research that spans anthropology, computer science, education, linguistics,
Cognitive Science 29 (2005) 1–4
Copyright © 2005 Cognitive Science Society, Inc. All rights reserved.
Requests for reprints should be sent to Dr. Robert Goldstone, Psychology Department, Indiana University,
Bloomington, IN 47405. E-mail: rgoldsto@indiana.edu