PHILOSOPHICAL CONCEPTS AND HISTORY

Philosophical Concepts
➢Psychology began in the late 1800s as an attempt to apply scientific methods to
certain questions of the philosophy of mind.

➢There have been a number of issues and debates within the discipline of
psychology, even before its inception as an independent, academic discipline.

➢Different viewpoints arising from various schools and perspectives in

psychology have led to conflicts, resulting in unending debates.

➢These debates, however, have only led to the growth of the discipline by raising
persistent and pertinent questions.
The three philosophical issues

• Three of the most profound philosophical questions related to

psychology are
1) the nature–nurture issue,
2) the free will versus determinism, and
3) the mind–brain problem.

• The issues and debates affect the basic view of the nature of human
behaviour.
❑ The nature versus nurture
This debate addresses the age-old question of whether we are born a
certain way or do we become a certain way.

❑Free will versus determinism involves the debate of whether human

behaviour is caused by internal and external forces or if behaviour is
freely chosen, and that every individual is responsible for their own actions.

❑The mind-body problem addresses the issue of mental and physical

events, whether or not they are related, and how they may be related to each
other.

❑Finally, the issue of the individual and the society is about how the
individual functions within the society, can the individual be viewed
independent of the society, to what extent does the society influence the
individual, and whether or not the individual and society influence each other.
Nature and Nurture
The debate of nature vs nurture is about the extent to which individuals and their behaviours are shaped by
biological inheritance, that is, nature, or by environmental factors, that is, nurture.

individuals and their

behaviours

nature nurture

(biological inheritance) (environmental factors)

Nature

➢ Behaviour being shaped by nature means that there is an evolutionary and genetic
foundation.

➢ Proponents of nature suggest that growth takes place in an orderly manner.

➢ The evolutionary and genetic basis causes commonalities in growth and development.

➢ Nature, with respect to genetics, refers to inheritance.

➢ This indicates a difference in genetic material, that is, chromosomes and genes, which are
transmitted from one generation to another.

➢ In modern human genetics, there is a focus on genetic differences among individuals.

➢ Nature, in this context, means that emphasis is given on genetically produced differences
among individuals, within the human species.
Nature
➢ Francis Galton, the pioneer of studying individual
differences in humans, with respect to hereditary,
used the term nature.

➢ It was Galton who had coined the phrase nature-

nurture, in 1883, leading to its usage in science
over the years, till today’s time.

➢ Having an evolutionary and genetic basis does not

Francis Galton
mean that the environment does not play any role (1822-1911)
at all.
➢ Researchers supporting the idea of nature suggest that

extreme environments stunted

(psychologically barren or hostile) development.

➢ However, according to them, basic growth tendencies are genetically

programmed into humans.
Nurture
In contrast to nature, proponents of nurture suggest that individuals are
shaped by the environment.

nutrition, medical care, drugs, and physical

Biological accidents, all that take place
environment
during the prenatal stage (before birth)
Individuals
shaped by
environment
Personal experience, circumstances,
Social learning, the social and political
environment background, family, peers, schools,
community, media, and culture.
Nurture- Biological environment

➢The influence of environment on a person begins right after the particular

set of chromosomes and genes combine at the moment of fertilization.
➢ This includes all the wide-ranging influences on the embryo, like hormones,
drugs taken by the mother, the diet of the mother, and any accidents that
may take place.
➢All of this constitutes to what is called the biological environment.
➢This biological environment, which is prenatal, plays a very significant role
in the development of the child.
➢If proper care is not taken, it may lead to biological or psychological deficits
within the child, after birth.
Nurture- Social environment

➢ The social environment includes the environmental context such as the

immediate family, which in itself is shaped by the broader social-cultural
setting.
➢ In such instances, the environment is postnatal.

➢ It is viewed as external to the individual, and it refers to all the influences

of the environment on a passive individual.

➢ According the proponents of nurture, this social environment continuously

shapes the individual throughout life.
Nativism vs. Empiricism
Nativism

➢The idea of nature can be traced back to nativism, the philosophical

theory that emphasizes heredity to determine abilities and capacities

Abilities and
Heredity
capacities
Empiricism
➢In contrast to nativism is empiricism, the philosophy that emphasizes
learning and experience.
➢The idea of nurture can be traced back to the philosophy of empiricism.

Abilities and Learning and

capacities experience

➢Empiricism is associated to the 17th century British philosophers, especially

John Locke.

➢Locke suggested that at birth the human mind is like a blank slate (tabula
rasa), and as the child grows older, the blank slate is filled in by learning and
experience.
Nativism and empiricism
➢ They are viewed as two polar opposites, suggesting that human abilities are
either completely innate or completely learnt.

➢ The present-day psychologists, however, very rarely take such extreme

positions, and find it to be highly simplistic. They propose more of an
interaction between heredity and environment..

➢ Nevertheless, nativism and empiricism, separately, leading to the ideas of

nature and nurture, respectively, have had a significant impact on the
discipline of psychology, and there have been different perspectives that
have been proponents of either of the two.
Nativists

➢ The Gestalt psychologists, who believed that perceptual organization is innate,

are nativists.

➢ Arnold Gessel, one of the pioneers of child psychology, introduced the concept of
maturation, which is said to be genetically programmed sequential patterns of
change.

➢ According to this, babies and children pass through the same series of changes, in
the same order, and almost the same rate.

➢ Noam Chomsky’s idea of language acquisition device (LAD).

➢ The LAD proposes an innate knowledge of a general or universal system of rules of

grammar.

➢ The theory suggests that the individual selects the rule of grammar from the
Empiricists
➢ Like nativism, empiricism has also played an influential role in the discipline
of psychology, in many different forms.

➢ One of such an early influence has been the school of behaviourism.

➢ The founder of behaviourism, John Watson in his now infamous statement

suggested that given the right kind of environment, he could make an infant
to grow up into a doctor, lawyer, artists, and even a beggar or thief,
despite whatever talent or abilities they may have.

➢ He also believed that there is no such thing as inheritance of capacity,

talent, or temperament.
CONCLUSION
➢ In more recent times, there has been a consensus that both nature and nurture
shape behaviour.

➢ The argument, therefore, from ‘which one?’ has now shifted to ‘how much?’

➢ This argument has, however, been criticized, because it tries to quantify the
role of genetics and environment.

➢ A better argument has been suggested to be ‘how do they interact?’ This is

more about how heredity and environment influence each other, in a qualitative
manner
Free will vs. Determinism

internal and external

forces

or
Human behaviour

Freely chosen

➢Human behaviour is caused by internal and external forces or if

behaviour is freely chosen, and that every individual is responsible for
their own actions.
Free Will vs. determinism

➢ The scientific approach to anything, including psychology, assumes that we live in

a universe of cause and effect.

➢ The debate of free will versus determinism centers around the notion of
causation.

➢Free will is the idea that behaviour is not constrained by either current
circumstances or past experience.

➢That is, the way individuals act is not

I. simply a response to an immediate stimulus
II. nor determined solely by previous events.

➢Instead, human beings choose and decide how to behave based on their
subjective assessment of a situation.
➢Free will is also termed as non-determinism. It is a complete rejection of scientific
psychology.

➢This approach is all about personal responsibility.

➢The psychologists believing in the perspective of non-determinism suggest that

behaviour does not necessarily have a cause, because it is self-generated.

➢This is the complete opposite of determinism, suggesting that behaviour does not
have a specific cause, it is rather freely chosen. This perspective is held by the
humanistic and existential psychologists.
 Determinism
➢Determinism, on the other hand, is the assumption that all behaviour has
specific causes.

➢The debate of free will versus determinism is about the assumption of whether
or not behaviour is under one’s own control.

➢The proponents of free will suggest that every individual is in control of their own
behaviour; they can act independently of all external forces.

➢The other side of the argument, that is, the proponents of determinism, suggest
that behaviour is caused by forces beyond one’s control.
Free will vs.Determinism
Free will (non-determinism) Determinism
1. Choose and decide how to behave based on All behaviour has specific causes.
situation.
2. Behaviour does not necessarily have a
cause, because it is self-generated.

Every individual is in control of their own Behaviour is caused by forces beyond one’s
behaviour; they can act independently of all control.
external forces

humanistic and existential psychologists. All other psychologists (refer next slides)
➢The psychologists who have a scientific orientation go along
with a deterministic perspective in the study of human
behaviour.

➢They feel that the more causes of behaviour will be

known, the more human behaviour can be controlled and
be predictable.

➢Prediction and control of behaviour is a criterion to

demonstrate that behaviour has a cause.
Levels and types of determinism
Biological
determinism

Physical Environmental
determinism determinism

Determinism
Socio-cultural
determinism

Psychical
determinism
Biological determinism
➢ is about the role of physiological processes or genetics in determining behaviour. For
example, evolutionary psychologists claim that much human behavior, reflects matters
acquired through our long evolutionary past.

Environmental determinism
➢ is about the role of environmental stimuli in behaviour – the source of the behaviour is in
the environment, and not within the individual.

Sociocultural determinism
➢ emphasizes the role of culture, norms, and customs in determining behaviour.
➢ is a form of environmental determinism, but rather than emphasizing the physical
stimuli that cause behavior, it emphasizes the cultural or societal rules, regulations,
customs, and beliefs that constrain human action.

In all these cases the causes of behaviour, for instance, genes, environmental stimuli,
customs, can be accessed and are quantifiable. (directly measured and quantifiable)

➢ Thus, psychologists involved in biopsychology, behavioural theory, and cultural

psychology go along with the idea of physical determinism.
 Psychical determinism
➢In contrast to physical determinism, when the causes of behaviour are
explained in terms of cognitive and emotional experiences, then it is called
psychical determinism.
➢In such a case, the causes of behaviour are said to be subjective, and
cannot be directly measured or quantified.
➢These mainly include personal beliefs, emotions, perceptions, ideas, and
values, among others.

➢The psychologists that emphasize on conscious, non-conscious, and

unconscious mental events such as cognitive psychologists and
psychoanalysts go along with the idea of psychical determinism.
Free Will, Determinism, and Personal Responsibility

➢ When talking about free will and determinism, the aspect of personal
responsibility comes into play.

➢ Free will, that is, behaviour being self-generated, indicates that every
individual is responsible for their own behaviour. This approach is all
about personal responsibility.

➢ On the other hand, with respect to determinism, if every behaviour has a

cause (physical or psychical), the individual has no personal responsibility
for his or her actions.
For instance, according to determinism, a person who commits a crime, the
criminal action could have been caused by some circumstances in that person’s
life or the neural circuitry of that person might have triggered to behave in that
manner.

Whereas, according to free will, the criminal activity was well within control of
the individual, and if he or she wanted, it could have been avoided.

It is due to this lack of personal responsibility with respect to determinism, that

has led to it facing criticism.

However, according to William James, the major precursor to the school of

functionalism, one type of determinism actually involves personal
responsibility.
Levels of determinism-
Hard and soft determinism

➢William James differentiates between hard determinism and soft determinism.

Hard determinism
➢When the cause of behaviour is said to be automatic or mechanistic, then it
is referred to as hard determinism.
➢In such cases, there will be NO personal responsibility
➢ Forces outside of our control shape our behaviour.
➢Hard determinism is seen as incompatible with free will.
Hard Determinism:

➢ Freud (1909) assumes that all behaviour is caused by innate drives and
unconscious processing.

➢ He suggests that all individuals progress through the psychosexual stages and
that behaviour in childhood is predictable.

➢ There is no consideration of freewill, as it suggests that our behaviour is

governed by the unconscious mind, a part of the mind which we have no
awareness or control of.

➢ Freud believes that the only way to access the unconscious is through therapy,
as it cannot be easily accessed alone.
Hard Determinism
➢ Sperry (1968) argued that different functions are located within certain areas of
the brain and that these cause behaviour.

➢ Like many biological researchers, he suggests that the performance of tasks is

due to the activation in the different brain structures.
Soft determinism

➢ behaviour can be determined by the environment or biological

make-up, but only to a certain extent, you have some free will.

➢ Soft determinism involves cognitive processes like intention,

motivation, and beliefs.

➢These processes intervene between experience and behaviour.

➢In such cases, behaviour is governed by thoughtful deliberation,

which indicates personal responsibility for the action of the
individual.
Soft determinism

➢ There are cognitive and rational processes involved in behaviour,

according to soft determinism, which actually give individuals a choice
to act in a specific manner.

➢ These processes, however, are the causes of behaviour.

➢ Thus, even though being deterministic, behaviour is self-governed.

➢ Soft determinism, therefore, lies somewhere between hard determinism

and free will, which suggests that personal responsibility can be involved
in determinism also, and not just free will.
Soft determinism

Hazan & Shaver (1987) – The Love Quiz:

➢ found a strong relationship between childhood attachment type and adult
attachment type.

➢ Those with secure attachments as babies tended to be in happy and trusting

relationships and believed in long lasting love.

➢ Whereas people with insecure attachments tended to feel jealous, possessive

and afraid of abandonment.

➢ However, not all participants followed this pattern which implies individual
differences, and therefore choice.
Soft determinism

Bandura et al (1961) believes that our learning from the environment

determines our behaviour and that we can predict future behaviour based on
influences such as aggressive models (Bobo doll experiment)
Free will vs. Determinism- Conclusion

➢ Throughout the history of psychology, it can be found that different systems

of psychology have OPPOSED each other with respect to free will and
determinism.
➢ Psychology became an independent discipline by incorporating the scientific
method.

➢ One aspect of the scientific approach is the assumption of determinism.

➢ The initial perspectives that emerged, thus, were deterministic in nature.

➢ The perspectives that followed, also believed in the idea of determinism.

Free will vs. Determinism- Conclusion

➢ However, there were perspectives that disagreed with the earlier systems in
strictly using the scientific approach. They felt that the scientific approach is not
very suitable for studying human behaviour.

➢ These were the systems that were more in favor of the idea of free will.

❑ Systems in favour of determinism

➢ Old perspectives of psychology: Associationism, Structuralism, functionalism,

Psychoanalysis, Gestalt psychology, and Behaviourism.
Recent perspectives of psychology: Cognitive psychology, Social psychology,
Cultural psychology, Neuropsychology, and evolutionary psychology, are all largely
deterministic in approach.
Free will vs. Determinism- Conclusion

❑Systems in favour of free-will

➢ There are other perspectives in psychology that oppose and criticize the
idea of determinism.

➢ These perspectives suggest that human beings have free will.

➢ Humanistic psychology, suggesting that every individual has the potential to

overcome obstacles to achieve self-actualization, believes in free will.

➢ Existential psychology, suggesting that human beings have purpose in life

and are seeking meaning in life, believes in free will.
Mind- Body Relationship
The Mind-body problem
Is the mind—”the inner agent
of consciousness and thought”

a spiritual entity
Or is it a part of the
separate from the
body’s activities?
body

➢The mind-body problem has been an age-old issue in psychology, which clearly
has its roots in philosophy.
➢ There has always been the question about -
• the existence of a mind, and
• the ways in which it could be related to the body.
The Mind-body problem

In other words, the issue of mind and body is about mental events
(perception, pains, hopes, desires and beliefs) and physical events in the
brain (brain activity).

Whether they are related?

How are they related.

 Mind and body

Dualism
Monism

Interactionism Emergentism
aterialsim Idealism
Psychophysical
Epiphenomenalism Parallelism

Pre-established
Double Aspectism
Harmony
Monism
• They attempt to explain everything in terms of one type of
reality
• Monism holds that mind and body are one and that the mind
is not a separate spiritual entity.
• To monists, mental events are simply a product of physical
events in the brain, a position advocated by English philosopher
Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679).
• Two types- Materialism and Idealism
Materialism

➢ Some suggest that all events (including mental events) can be

explained in physical terms.

➢ They believe that all mental events are aspects of physical

events.
➢ The ones who go along with this notion are called materialists.

➢ The materialists believe that matter is the only reality.

Accordingly, they suggest that everything in the universe, including

thoughts, feelings, and behaviour can be explained in terms of
MATTER.

➢ Because they explain everything with respect to one type of

reality, they are also called monists.
Materialism

➢ Thomas Hobbes, the founder of British Empiricism, was one of the major
proponents of materialism.

➢ Hobbes solely believed in the physical reality.

➢ According to him, human beings are like engines, suggesting that behaviour
and the causes operating on it can be explained in terms of the body.

➢ He also emphasized that the idea of a soul independent of the body does not
exist. Hobbes asserted that the body and the person are the same thing.

➢ He explained all human behaviour and thoughts in terms of the physical, that
is, the body.
Idealism
In contrast to materialism, the idealists believe that physical
reality is based on perception.

They are also monists, because like the materialists, they are also
explaining everything in terms of one type of reality, that is, the
mind or consciousness.

Emphasizes the role of the ideal or spiritual in experience.

According to idealism, reality is mainly about conscious
experiences, and that abstract entities are important in
understanding reality.
It also emphasizes that all that exists can be known in terms of
mental events, through ideas.
Idealism

➢ The two basic forms of idealism are metaphysical idealism and

epistemological idealism.

➢ Metaphysical idealism emphasizes on theorizing about the nature of

reality in terms of ideas. It can be viewed as the complete opposite of
materialism, which views reality only in terms of matter.

➢ Epistemological idealism asserts that in processing knowledge, the

mind can grasp only what is psychic in nature, and that the conditioning
of objects is in terms of their perceptibility.
Dualism
➢Dualism holds that the mind is separate from the brain but somehow controls
the brain and therefore the rest of the body.
➢They believe then that there are physical events and mental events. However,
once it is assumed that both a physical and a mental realm exist, the question
becomes how the two are related.
➢René Descartes, regarded as the founder of modern philosophy, did not agree
with the materialism of Hobbes. Descartes felt that the mind and body problem is
not as simple as Hobbes had thought of.
• Descartes believed that human beings are thinking beings, and cannot be
described in terms of materialism.
• According to him, human beings are incorporeal, and are only contingently
embodied. This belief of Descartes laid the foundation for the philosophical idea
of dualism.
Types of dualism
➢ Interactionism

➢ Emergentism

➢ Epiphenomenalism

➢ Psychophysical Parallelism

➢ Pre-established Harmony

➢ Double Aspectism
Interactionism

Rene Decartes’- Dualistic view

Humans are made of two

substances

the soul or
mind the body.
Physical substance that
Thinking substance
follows the mechanical laws.

The mind and the body are, thus, two very distinct entities. However, it no way
means that the mind does not interact with the body.
Interactionism
➢ According to interactionism, the mind and body influence
each other, indicating that there is an interaction between
the mind and the body.

➢ Interactionism suggests that the mind can initiate behaviour.

➢ René Descartes was the first person to propose this form of

mind-body relationship and hence this form of interactionism
is also called as Cartesian dualism.

➢ Sigmund Freud, and the other psychoanalysts have also

taken this position of dualism.

➢ Mental events (conflict and anxiety) → body ailments

which depicts interaction between mind and body.
Dualism types- according to Rene Decartes
➢ Dualism may be further classified into Substance Dualism and Property
Dualism.

Substance Dualism
➢ Substance Dualists argue that the mind is an independently existing
substance

Property Dualism
➢ Mind is not a distinct substance but a group of independent properties that
emerge from brain and cannot be reduced to the brain.

➢ The dualist viewpoint divides the human being into two basic or primary
substances: matter and mind. This view is, perhaps, the most natural one.
Substance dualism is well-established among non-philosophers and holds
the view that there are two fundamentally different types of substance--
physical and non-physical--and that human beings are made up of two
components: physical bodies and non-physical minds. This theory has many
attractions, but is now seen by many, rightly or wrongly, as old-fashioned
and naïve.

Property Dualism is in fact substance monist; it agrees with materialism

that there are only physical substances. However, it concedes to the dualist
that these substances have both physical and non-physical properties, and
that the non-physical properties cannot be fully explained in purely physical
terms. Although this position is intended to capture the best elements of both
positions, it arguably ends up with the liabilities of both as well.
Emergentism
➢ claims that mental states emerge the physical brain states.
➢ A common analogy is how the unique qualities of water (its wetness, its
boiling point, its density, etc.) emerge when hydrogen and oxygen combine—
elements without those specific qualities.

➢ The emergent properties of water then are analogous to mind, as something

that arises from the right sort of physical substrate (brain).

➢ One kind of emergentism claims that once mental events emerge from brain
activity (physical state), the mental events can influence subsequent brain
activity and thus behavior.

➢ Because of the postulated reciprocal influence between brain activity (body)

and mental events (mind), this kind of emergentism represents interactionism.
Nobel Prize winner Roger Sperry (1993), for example, advocated this kind of
emergentism.
Epiphenomenalism

➢ Epiphenomenalism is a type of emergentism, which is

different from interactionism.

➢ According to epiphenomenalism, the brain causes mental

events, but the mental events cannot influence the brain.

➢ This indicates that from the perspective of epiphenomenalism,

mental events are the by-products of physical events (brain),
but it has no influence on the brain.

➢ John Watson, the founder of Behaviourism, initially had taken

the position of epiphenomenalism, but later he became a
physical monist.
Psychophysical Parallelism:

➢ Psychophysics, the study of how psychologically

experienced sensations depend on the characteristics of
physical stimuli.

➢ Psychophysical parallelism suggests the mind and body

are completely independent of each other, and have no
interaction.

➢ According to psychophysical parallelism, environmental

experiences influence the mind and body
simultaneously, and one does not affect the other.

➢ Wilhelm Wundt and Edward Titchener, both, had taken this

position.
Pre-established Harmony

➢ There is a pre-established harmony between

bodily and mental events.

➢ The two types of events- mind and body are

two separate entities, and mental events are
different from physical events, but both are co-
ordinated by some external agent for example,
God.
Occasionalism
Indeed, in the seventeenth century, a priest named Nicolas de
Malebranche (1638–1715) accepted Descartes’s separation of the
mind and body but believed that when a person has a desire—say
to move an arm—God is aware of this desire and moves the
person’s arm.

Similarly, if the body is injured, God is aware of this injury and

causes the person to experience pain.

In reality, there is no contact between mind and body, but there

appears to be because of God’s intervention.

A wish to do something becomes the occasion for God to act, and

for that reason this viewpoint became known as occasionalism.
Reductionism vs. Emergentism
Reductionism

➢ The term “reduction” originates from the Latin term “reducere” which meant
to lead back, bring back, and restore.

➢ In the domain of psychology, reductionism is often linked with the mind-

body problem.

➢ Reductionism is an epistemological and methodological stance which

absolutizes the reduction of complex systems or problems to their
simple components or elements.
Reductionism

➢ Reduction is a legitimate and useful method of scientific

investigation of complex systems and problems through
analysis of their components.

➢ The reduction of the higher-level structures to lower-

level components is constructive only when the
researchers are aware of the specific characteristics of the
subject of their investigation, the conditions, and the
limitation of reduction.

➢ Reductionism as the opposite of holism accepts the view

that all objects or systems are reducible to lower levels in
the hierarchy of their constitution.
Types of reductionism
➢ Three types:
1. Ontological reductionism
2. Methodological reductionism, and
3. Theoretical reductionism.

➢ Ontological reductionism is the position that the higher-level structures

are reducible to lower-level structures.
➢ The world is not homogeneous, but stratified and composed of different
levels of organization with varying degrees of complexity.
➢ However, ontological reductionism leads to the elimination of the higher-
level to a single, lower-level substance.
Methodological reductionism
➢ is a research strategy based on the presentation of analysis as the only
scientific approach to the explanation of the higher level of organization in
terms of the lower level.

➢ Reducing methods of psychology and other sciences to methods of physics

is a typical form of methodological reductionism (Jones, 2000).

➢ Reductionism as a research strategy has at least three main

characteristics:
1. Quantification,
2. a linear-serial way of proceeding, and
3. a deductive and analytical way of reasoning (Verschuren, 2001).
Theoretical reductionism
➢ is an attempt to explain the terms and laws of a theory of higher-level
phenomena on the basis of the terms and laws of another theory of lower-
level phenomena.

➢ In the 1930s, logical positivists with their program “Unity of Science” argued
that all scientific sentences should be in a physical language (Ney, 2008).

➢ Science is presented by logical positivists as a single unified system, in

which higher-level sciences such as sociology and psychology are reducible
to basic science (physics) (Bem & LoorendeJong, 2001).

➢ Physicalism is based on a reduction of all sciences – including social

sciences – to physics which pretends to provide the ultimate “explanations.”
Disciplinary imperialism produces claims that the particular discipline
(physics) is more fundamental than any other disciplines.
Reductionism in Psychology

➢ In the first decades of the twentieth century, psychology suffered from

“physics envy” expressed by its tendency to reproduce the methods of
physics as a “real science” (Leahey, 1991).

➢ The behaviorists from a physicalist standpoint attempted to give the status

of “real science” to psychology by reduction of mental states to external
behavior explained in terms of stimulus and responses.
Reductionism in Psychology

➢ Since the first steps of psychology as independent science, the

mainstream of psychological research has become reductionist, by
decomposing complex psychological phenomena into
independent, separated, atomistic elements.

➢ In consequence, atomism is an implicit assumption of reductionist

research strategy.

➢ Mainstream positivist psychological research promotes fragmentation

reducing the qualitative properties to abstract, homogeneous
quantitative units (variables) (Ratner, 1997).
Reductionists vs. Emergentism

Reductionists

Structuralism
Behaviorism

Emergentism

Gestalt Psychology
Genetic Epistemology
Embodied and Situated Cognition
Embodied cognition

➢ Embodied cognition focuses on development of spatial cognition in

infants and children.

➢ In the traditional approach to human cognition, the computer metaphor is

often used: the human mind functions just like a computer, with input,
output, and a set of computations in between.

➢ In contrast, in the embodied cognition approach, sensory and motor

systems are seen as fundamentally integrated with cognitive
processing.
Embodied cognition
➢ The philosopher Larry Shapiro gives a good example of the distinction between
the traditional approach, which uses the computer analogy to cognition, and
the embodied cognition approach.
➢ In this example, a psychologist is depicted who gives a particular sensory code
as input to an organisms’ nervous system in the laboratory, resulting in a given
set of cognitive processes.
➢ Had the psychologist given the same code to the same organism walking about
in the outside world, would the cognitive processes be the same?
➢ From the traditional cognitive psychology approach, the answer would be “yes”;
as the input to the neural system is the same, so will be the output.
➢ From the embodied cognition approach, the answer would clearly be “no,”
because cognition in this account is viewed as occurring in constant and
direct interaction with the environment (Shapiro, 2007).
Thelen (2000) provides a clear schematic overview of this theoretical account
and the way it contrasts to the view of a decoupled environment, body, and
brain, which is shown in fig below.

Thelen’s (2000) schematic overview

of the contrast between an “input-
output” model of human cognitive
processing (top panel) and an
integrated embodied dynamic
systems model (bottom panel).
➢ Embodied cognition theory tell us about the process through which
children acquire spatial knowledge and understanding.

➢ The answers given by the embodied cognition approach are rooted in

the ecological psychology approach to development.

➢ The ecological psychologist Eleanor Gibson proposed that infants

learn increasingly more about the world around them through active
exploration.

➢ Through exploration, infants learn about “affordances” which are the

possibilities for action that occur in the environment (Gibson, 1988;
Gibson, 1979).

➢ For example, a cup offers the affordance of drinking, a bike offers the
affordance of cycling.
➢ Clearly, these affordances are not the same for all organisms: for a
bird, a bike does not offer the affordance of cycling, but instead may
offer the affordance of sitting on (the seat or handlebars) instead.

➢ Affordances thus exist in the interaction between agent and

environment.

Three phases of infant exploration

➢ Gibson (1988) describes three phases of infant exploration that occur in

the first year of life as follows:
Three phases of infant exploration

1. From birth through 4 months of age, infants explore whatever is

nearby enough for them to see, mouth, or touch.

2. Around the age of 5 months, on average, infants learn to reach to objects

in their vicinity and manipulate them. This brings about new opportunities
for exploration, such as turning, banging, and shaking objects.

3. Around the age of 9 months, on average, infants learn to crawl. With

this new skill comes the opportunity to explore a much larger world
around them. Not only can infants now seek out objects for exploration
which are beyond reaching distance, they also learn to navigate through
space independently, allowing them to learn about basic spatial relations
between themselves, others, and objects, as well as gain understanding
about distance and depth.
➢ Subsequently, in the first half of the second year of life, most infants learn
to walk, which again brings about many new opportunities for exploring
what is around them. For example, they may learn the affordance of
“transportability” when they start exploring carrying objects from place to
place (Gibson, 1988). Subsequently, new phases in exploration may occur
through which children can discover other, even more- complex
affordances (Gibson, 1988).

➢ Think, for example, of learning to angle a mirror in such a way that you
can see yourself in it or someone standing on the other side of the room,
and, a relatively new affordance to learn for children growing up in modern
day society, the act of swiping used with technological devices such as
smart phones and tablets. Following Eleanor Gibson’s theory, exploration
takes a central place in the development of cognition.
➢ The way children can explore their environment, in turn, changes with
development as a function of advances in visual perception and
increasing motor skill, among other factors.

➢ For example, with the acquisition of new gross motor skills, such as
sitting upright, infants gain access to a whole new array of opportunities
to elicit perceptual information from the world around them and discover
novel affordances.

➢ Thus, through exploration, infants learn about the properties of the

physical and social world around them. With respect to visuospatial
cognition, achievement of motor milestones for self-locomotion (i.e.,
crawling, walking) seems especially important.
Conclusion

➢ To summarize, embodied cognition theory suggest that developmental

changes in (spatial) cognition come about through the child’s interactions
with his or her environment that occur second-by second and day-by-day
through ongoing perception action cycles.

➢ As infants grow older and learn to sit, crawl, and walk, they are increasingly
able to explore the world around them, allowing them to discover new
affordances and gain insight in spatial relations.
Embodied and situated cognition
• It is an approach to study cognition which views our cognitive processes as
providing a means of interacting with the world around us.

• Cognition as an interaction between humans (and animals) and their

environment .

• Eg., studies from this area shows that memory of a text is better when
people act it out, compared with other learning strategies , like rereading
the text, or that people look at the space on an empty screen when
recalling information previously presented at that location on the screen
➢ Whereas embodied cognition refers to the embeddedness of the brain in
the body, situated cognition refers to the embeddedness of the brain-body
complex in an environment
➢ Just like our brains can “consult” visceral processes, they can also use
external structures or “epistemic structures” : road signs, post-it notes, color
codes are different means by which memory, categorization or inference can
be simplified.
➢ In a manifesto for the “extended mind” thesis, Clark and Chalmers argued
that retrieving information in a notebook or in long-term memory
involve essentially the same functional process, although in the first
case cognition extends in the environment.
➢ Notebook are epistemic structures that make retrieval simpler: why having
your whole shopping list in your head while you can conveniently carry it in
your pocket?
➢ These structures, however, are not just convenient appendage but
inherently tied to our mental life.

➢ Andy Clark referred these environmental and social regularities that

support and extend cognition as external scaffoldings.

➢ We grow, learn and act everyday through these, language being the ultimate
cognitive artifact.

➢ Human language, cultures and institutions allow our species to extend

cognitive processes beyond the brain, the body and the immediate
environment.

➢ Cognition is therefore embodied, and situated in an environment

The End!