Complementary Cognition explains how our species became so extraordinarily adaptable, and capable of generating such complex knowledge.

The theory proposes that, as humans evolved, our brains became specialised in different but complementary aspects of discovering, developing and using knowledge. Greater capability in some aspects comes at a cost in others, making us dependent on minds with complementary strengths. These specialisations co-evolved with language and our capacity to collaborate around shared goals.

Together, these complementary specialisations and the mechanisms that combine them form an evolutionary system that operates across individuals. Like genetic evolution, this emergent system generates variation, tests what works and passes it on, building knowledge and ways of adapting that no single person could develop alone.

My research began over 20 years ago with a question about dyslexia: why is difficulty with reading, a technology our species invented only a few thousand years ago, so often interpreted as a deficit?

I found the difficulties were inseparable from the capabilities, and that these patterns were complementary across people. That led me to the theory of Complementary Cognition, which I have since developed in depth, investigating its mechanisms, and testing its predictions through research across complex systems theory, evolutionary biology, palaeoarcheology, cognitive neuroscience, and entrepreneurship.

I am an affiliated researcher at the McDonald Institute, University of Cambridge. My work on Complementary Cognition is published in the Cambridge Archaeology Journal and Frontiers in Psychology.

The research has been reported in more than 100 news outlets worldwide.

Business, Entrepreneurship & Innovation
It offers a new understanding of what shapes entrepreneurship and innovation. It explains how collaboration, team building, and breakthroughs depend on integrating complementary cognitive specialisations, and how the organisation of work can enable or obstruct that process.

Dyslexia Reframed
It reframes dyslexia, explaining it as a specialisation in global exploration, with reading and writing difficulties arising from the associated cognitive trade-offs. The same specialisation may also underlie some diagnoses of ADHD. This changes how we understand people's capabilities, and how we design systems so that everyone can contribute and benefit.

Support the Research

The aim is to found an Institute of Complementary Cognition, expanding the research through experimental studies and applying it to how we educate, design organisations and bring about positive social change.

The first step is publishing the findings on how collaborative intelligence works and how it evolved, together with case studies of how it operates in entrepreneurial teams. Funding would support completing that work and build towards the Institute.

If you would like to support this, please get in touch.

• The Hidden Architecture of High-Performing Teams

• The Dyslexic Edge – Reframing Dyslexia as an Exploratory Specialisation

• Complementary Cognition – A New Science of Collaborative Intelligence

• Adapting to a World of Our Own Making – Maladaptation and the Sustainability Crisis

Public Speaking

Dr Helen Taylor has given talks, keynotes and workshops for business, charities and government departments, and been invited to contribute to expert panels around the world.

She has been invited to speak by Barclays, the British Dyslexia Association at the V&A, Ernst & Young, GCHQ, Imperial College London, the World Economic Forum and for HRH Prince Carl Philip of Sweden and guests, among others.

Subjects include:

Interviews and insights for TV, radio and webinars including flagship science show The Sky at Night (BBCFour), and documentary Farther and Sun: A Dyslexic Road Trip (BBCFour), and a segment for RTL’s Atypiques, shown in Belgium, France and Canada. Interviewed and provided background research for Inside Our Dyslexic Minds, presented by Chris Packham (BBCTwo). Currently working with a filmmaker on a new documentary project.

Dr Taylor’s article in Frontiers in Psychology ranks in the top 5% of all Frontiers articles for views and downloads.

She is co-author of the award-nominated The Dyslexic Edge with Jamie Waller.

Articles and book contributions for audiences including entrepreneurs, education organisations, adults and young people with dyslexia, and academics.

Writing

Press

Complementary Cognition and associated research have been reported in respected publications around the world, including Europe, the US and Australasia, such as BBC Science Focus, The Telegraph, Psychology Today, New Scientist, La Repubblica, De Morgen and The World Economic Forum. Recent coverage includes being referenced by Rory Sutherland in several podcasts, including The Courageous Leaders, and being quoted in the Los Angeles Times.

For all media and writing enquiries.

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