DEVELOPMENTAL
PSYCHOLOGY
Dr. Tom Froese
IIMAS-UNAM
How to scale from life to mind?
The life-mind continuity thesis has to
overcome a “cognitive gap” – how to
explain the transition from bacterial
chemotaxis to human cognition?
- Adopt a developmental perspective
- Drop the individualist perspective
Sociality all the way down
the life-mind continuity?
No culture without social interaction.
No mind without social interaction.
No life without social interaction.
Froese and Di Paolo (2009)
Autopoietic theory
Varela (1997)
Autopoiesis: regenerating identity
• “An autopoietic system—the minimal living organization—
is one that continuously produces the components that
specify it, while at the same time realizing it (the system)
as a concrete unity in space and time, which makes the
network of production of components possible.
• More precisely defined: An autopoietic system is
organized (defined as unity) as a network of processes of
production (synthesis and destruction) of components
such that these components:
• (i) continuously regenerate and realize the network that produces
them, and
• (ii) constitute the system as a distinguishable unity in the domain in
which they exist.”
Varela (1997, p. 75)
Enactive approach to development?
• Autopoiesis: identity of living system remains the same
• Adaptivity: identity of living system only changes with
respect to external perturbations
• Development: identity of living system is qualitatively
transformed in a spontaneous manner
• How to explain this self-organized instability of identity?
• E.g. Nuño de la Rosa (2010) “Becoming Organisms”
Origins of social cognition
• In the case of human infants, when is the point that we
can say that they understand other minds?
• When is the point that they begin to interact socially?
• The answer depends on what kind of definition of social
cognition we prefer.
• And on what kind of experimental methods we use.
• Let us consider the classic definition and methods.
Social cognition = Theory of Mind
• “In saying that an individual has a theory of mind, we
mean that the individual imputes mental states to himself
and to others (either to conspecifics or to other species as
well).
• A system of inferences of this kind is properly viewed as a
theory,
• first, because such states are not directly observable,
• and second, because the system can be used to make predictions,
specifically about the behavior of other organisms.”
• (Premack & Woodruff, 1978, p. 515, emphasis added)
Belief Question: "Where will Sally look for her marble?"
Sally-Ann false belief test
• The Sally-Ann task was originally devised as a false belief
task by Wimmer and Perner (1983).
• For a participant to "pass" this test, they must answer the
Belief Question correctly by indicating that Sally believes
that the marble is in her own basket.
• They showed that normally developing children aged 4
and above passed this test.
• Children with autism, with a mental age of 4 years and
above, had difficulty with this task.
Frith (2001)
Sally-Ann false belief test
• The correct answer is continuous with Sally's perspective,
but not with the participant's own.
• If the participant cannot take an alternative perspective,
they will indicate that Sally has cause to believe, as the
participant does, that the marble has moved.
• Passing the test is thus seen as the manifestation of a
participant understanding that Sally has her own beliefs
and that these may not correlate with reality.
• This is the core requirement of theory of mind.
Questions regarding early infancy
• Theory of Mind is the branch of cognitive science that
investigates how we ascribe mental states to other persons
and how we use the states to explain and predict the actions of
those other persons.
• More accurately, it is the branch that investigates mindreading or
mentalizing or mentalistic abilities.
• These skills are shared by almost all human beings beyond
early childhood.
• They are used to treat other agents as the bearers of
unobservable psychological states and processes, and to
anticipate and explain the agents’ behavior in terms of such
states and processes.
• Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (“Theory of Mind”)
Another kind of explanatory gap
• Cognitivism is forced to divide human development into
two qualitatively distinct phases:
• 0-4 years: infants merely show instinctive behavior to social stimuli
without any form of social understanding
• 4 years and more: children explicitly understand the existence of
other minds based on belief-desire concepts
• There is no doubt about the fact that something crucial
develops around 4 years of age in normal children.
• But are children really mind-blind “solipsists” before then?
• Or has cognitivism asked the wrong questions?
Prenatal life
Mother-fetus interaction
Affective maternal-foetal relation
• “the maternal body schema forms the basis of and for the foetal
body schema and subsequent foetal development.
• Together, the manner in which the maternal and foetal body
schemas merge and then diverge will form a communication
that is born through situated, gestational embodied
negotiations. This relationship is affectively structured through
the negotiated movements themselves.
• Thus, by the time of our birth we have already, within our
habituated repertoires, a way of moving and interrelating that
may well set the foundations for affective intersubjective
relations post-partum.”
• Lymer (2011, p. 139)
Neonatal imitation
How might 2-3 week old babies respond?
Meltzoff and Moore (1977)
Neonatal imitation
Meltzoff and Moore (1977)
Primary intersubjectivity
• In primary intersubjectivity, neonatal imitation gives way to
to more complex forms of reciprocation.
• Awareness of being the object of others’ attention.
• Reddy (2003)
• First examples of communication and cooperation based
on dyadic interactions.
• Trevathen (1979) – “Primary intersubjectivity”
• Key characteristic: reciprocity
Secondary intersubjectivity
• Formation of a second-person perspective with a triadic
structure (“me”, “you” and “it”).
• The second-person perspective is developmentally prior to the
third-person perspective (Fuchs 2013).
• Developmentally, this shift occurs around 9 months,
widely noted as a developmental milestone.
• “cooperative task performance becomes possible and attractive for
the infant, who now shows ‘person-person-object’ awareness”
(Trevarthen 1998, p. 18)
• Confidence, confiding and acts of meaning (Trevarthen & Hubley
1978)
• Key characteristic: joint attention
Tertiary intersubjectivity
• “Tertiary intersubjectivity concerns third person engagements,
involving he, she, it or they; at this level, the self and others
become public representations, able to be discussed and
judged by other parties.
• This psychological development usually begins around 20
months and is generally established by 4 years.
• It is this development which theory theorists propose indicates
that subjects have attained a ToM”
• Daly (2014, p. 237-238)
• Key characteristic: linguistic understanding of others’ beliefs
Still-face paradigm
• “The Still-Face Paradigm (SFP) was first introduced by Tronick, Als,
Adamson, Wise, and Brazelton (1978) to test the hypothesis that
infants are active contributors to social interaction.
• In the SFP, infants are generally observed in a three-step face-to-face
interaction with an adult:
• (1) a baseline normal interaction episode,
• (2) the ‘still-face’ episode in which the adult becomes unresponsive and
maintains a neutral facial expression, and
• (3) a reunion in which the adult resumes normal interaction.
• The still-face has been found to evoke marked changes in infant
behavior, now known as the still-face effect. Infants typically show
increased gaze aversion, less smiling and more negative affect during
the still-face compared to during normal face-to-face interaction”
• Mesman et al. (2009, p. 121)
Double TV monitor paradigm
Murray and Trevarthen (1985)
“Expectancies for social contingency in 2-month-olds”
Nadel et al. (1999)
Nadel et al. (1999)
Double TV monitor paradigm
Nadel et al. (1999)
Re-enactment of intended acts
Subjects tested were 18-month-olds
Meltzoff (1995)
Re-enactment of intended acts
• “The question can now be posed as to whether they interpreted the presentations
differently. The data showed that they did. The groups significantly differed in their
tendency to produce the target act. The children were six times more likely to
produce the target act after seeing the human attempt to pull it apart (60% did so)
than they were after seeing the demonstration by machine (10%).”
• Meltzoff (1995, p. 845)
Rational imitation in preverbal infants
How would a 14-month-old respond when presented with the switch?
Gergely et al. (2002)
Rational imitation in preverbal infants
Gergely et al. (2002)
Violation of expectation false belief test
“Do 15-month-old infants understand false beliefs?”
Onishi and Baillargeon (2005)
Violation of expectation false belief test
Onishi and Baillargeon (2005)
Violation of expectation false belief test
Onishi and Baillargeon (2005)
Violation of expectation false belief test
Onishi and Baillargeon (2005)
Active helping false belief test
• “Children watched as a toy was switched from one
box to another while an adult either witnessed the
switch (true belief condition) or not (false belief
condition).
• Then the adult attempted unsuccessfully to open the
box the toy originally had been in.
• In the true belief condition, infants could follow their
natural tendency to help immediately by opening the
empty box for the adult.
• Since in this condition the adult had watched the moving
of the toy from one box to the other, his attempt to get into
the first box could not be to extract the toy.
• In contrast, in the false belief condition, if infants
understood the adult’s false belief and wanted to
help, they should infer that he wanted the toy he
thought was in there.
• In this case they should not simply go help him open the
first box but rather go to the other box and extract the toy
for him.”
(Buttelmann et al. 2009, p. 338)
Active helping false belief test
Reddy (2003)
Changes in paradigm
• Developmental psychology was founded on the cognitive
principles of Theory of Mind.
• Experiments tested abstract knowledge of other minds in
passive spectator scenarios.
• But when we test practical knowledge of other minds in
interactive embodied situations, we find much earlier
evidence of social understanding.
• The theoretical foundations of cognitivist developmental
psychology must therefore be revised.
Homework
• Start reading:
• De Jaegher, H. (2014). Enacción y autonomía: Cómo el mundo
social cobra sentido mediante la participación. In A. Casado da
Rocha (Ed.), Autonomía con otros: Ensayos sobre Bioética (pp.
111-131). Madrid: Plaza y Valdés
• Copy of paper to be sent by e-mail!
• Note: The deadline of first assignment has been extended
to Wednesday, March 18.
References
• Buttelmann, D., Carpenter, M., & Tomasello, M. (2009). Eighteen-month-old infants show
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false belief understanding in an active helping paradigm. Cognition, 112, 337-342
Daly, A. (2014). Primary intersubjectivity: Empathy, affective reversibility, 'self-affection' and
the primordial 'we'. Topoi, 33, 227-241
Frith, U. (2001). Mind blindness and the brain in autism. Neuron, 32, 969-979
Fuchs, T. (2013). The phenomenology and development of social perspectives.
Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 12, 655-683
Gergely, G., Bekkering, H., & Király, I. (2002). Rational imitation in preverbal infants. Nature,
415, 755
Lymer, J. (2011). Merleau-Ponty and the affective maternal-foetal relation. Parrhesia, 13,
126-143
Meltzoff, A. N. (1995). Understanding the intentions of others: Re-enactment of intended acts
by 18-month-old children. Developmental Psychology, 31(5), 838-850
Meltzoff, A. N., & Moore, M. K. (1977). Imitation of facial and manual gestures by human
neonates. Science, 198, 75-78
Mesman, J., van Ijzendoorn, M. H., & Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J. (2009). The many faces
of the still-face paradigm: A review and meta-analysis. Developmental Review, 29, 120-162
Murray, L., & Trevarthen, C. (1985). Emotional regulations of interactions between twomonth-olds and their mothers. In T. M. Field & N. A. Fox (Eds.), Social Perception in Infants
(pp. 177-197). Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishin
References
• Nadel, J., Carchon, I., Kervella, C., Marcelli, D., & Réserbat-Plantey, D. (1999). Expectancies
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for social contingency in 2-month-olds. Developmental Science, 2(2), 164-173
Nuño de la Rosa, L. (2010). Becoming organisms: The organisation of development and the
development of organisation. History and Philosophy of Life Sciences, 32, 289-316
Onishi, K. H., & Baillargeon, R. (2005). Do 15-month-old infants understand false beliefs?
Science, 308, 255-258
Reddy, V. (2003). On being the object of attention: Implications for self-other consciousness.
Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 7(9), 397-402
Trevarthen, C. (1979). Communication and cooperation in early infancy: A description of
primary intersubjectivity. In M. Bullowa (Ed.), Before Speech (pp. 321-347). Cambridge, UK:
Cambridge University Press
Trevarthen, C. (1998). The concept and foundations of infant intersubjectivity. In S. Braten
(Ed.), Intersubjective Communication and Emotion in Early Ontogeny (pp. 15-46).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Trevarthen, C., & Hubley, P. (1978). Secondary intersubjectivity: Confidence, confiding and
acts of meaning in the first year. In A. Lock (Ed.), Action, Gesture and Symbol: The
Emergence of Language (pp. 183-229). London, UK: Academic Press
Varela, F. J. (1997). Patterns of life: Intertwining identity and cognition. Brain and Cognition,
34(1), 72-87
Wimmer, H., & Perner, J. (1983). Beliefs about beliefs: Representation and constraining
function of wrong beliefs in young children's understanding of deception. Cognition, 13, 103128