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Abstract for the INTERSUBJECTIVITY AND EMBODIMENT conference, Leuven, Belgium,
15-17/09/’03
HANNEKE DE JAEGHER, COGS, UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX, UK
One Body Is Not Enough
Research on intelligence or cognition has long focused
on object-cognition. The embodiment approach to perception and cognition
(Clark 1997; O'Regan and Noë 2001) situates itself very much within
this tradition. Recently, interest in social aspects of intelligence and
cognition, and in the influence of our being social creatures on the nature
and development of cognition, is reviving. The embodiment approach will inevitably
follow this shift in emphasis in cognitive science.
The slogan “no cognition without a body” is by now well accepted. It seems
however, that the translation of this motto in terms of investigations of
social cognition: “no intersubjectivity without a body” would be even more
obvious, natural, or self-evident. How can you interact with others if you
do not have a body?
Moreover, how can you interact with others if there are not two bodies?
For intersubjectivity, you need a body, furthermore you need a body essentially
in interaction. Interaction is an excellent concept, for in a conversation
(in the broadest sense of the word) you are not only in your own action, but
you are in the action that goes on precisely between persons.
People with autism give the impression of not being in the interaction.
Explanatory theories of autism have proposed that it is a deficit in (or
even lack of) theory of mind (Leslie 1987; Baron-Cohen 1995), that individuals
with autism have weak central coherence (Frith 1989; Happé 1999), or
that they have an executive dysfunction (Russell 1998).
The theory of mind theory has been criticized for not being a genuinely
developmental theory (Hendriks-Jansen 1997; Gallagher 2001; Hobson 2002)
and I think this criticism is applicable to the other two explanatory theories
of autism as well.
In order to understand autism, a properly interactional theory is necessary.
Such a theory will be richly developmental. Theory of mind theory and others
offer only a simple sequential model. Instead we need a dynamical model of
complex mutual interanimation between mechanisms, as they change and
mature (Thelen and Smith 1994; Hendriks-Jansen 1997). Drawing upon the work
of Peter Hobson (Hobson 2002), infancy research such as that pioneered by
Trevarthen (Trevarthen 1977), studies of the mechanism of dialogue (Jaffe
and Feldstein 1970) and work in behavioural robotics (Di Paolo 2000; Ikegami
and Iizuka 2003), I will sketch how such a richly developmental view will
enable us to understand autism better. I will focus on interpersonal engagement,
sensory input and integration into wholes. I will also stress the importance
of rhythm as a medium for bodily and interpersonal integration, offering this
as a critical parameter for the understanding of autism, and social interaction
in general.
References:
Baron-Cohen, S. (1995). Mindblindness: An Essay on Autism and Theory of Mind.
Cambridge, MA, MIT Press.
Bullowa, M., Ed. (1979). Before Speech. The Beginning of Interpersonal Communication.
Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
Clark, A. (1997). Being There: Putting Brain, Body and World Together Again.
Cambridge, MA, MIT Press.
Condon, W. S. (1979). Neonatal entrainment and enculturation. Before Speech.
M. Bullowa. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press: 131-148.
Di Paolo, E. A. (2000). "Behavioural coordination, structural congruence and
entrainment in a simulation of acoustically coupled agents." Adaptive Behaviour
8(1): 25-46.
Frith, U. (1989). Autism. Explaining the Enigma. Oxford, Blackwell.
Gallagher, S. (2001). "The practice of mind: theory, simulation or primary
interaction?" Journal of Consciousness Studies 8(5-7): 83=108.
Happé, F. (1999). "Autism: cognitive style or cognitive deficit?" Trends
in Cognitive Sciences 3(6): 216-222.
Hendriks-Jansen, H. (1997). "The epistemology of autism: making a case for
an embodied, dynamic and historical explanation." Cybernetics and Systems:
An International Journal 28: 359-415.
Hobson, R. P. (2002). The Cradle of Thought. London, Macmillan.
Ikegami, T. and H. Iizuka (2003). Joint attention and dynamics repertoire
in coupled dynamic recognizers. AISB '03 Convention: Cognition in Machines
and Animals, Aberystwyth, Wales.
Jaffe, J. and S. Feldstein (1970). Rhythms of Dialogue. London, Academic Press.
Leslie, A. M. (1987). "Pretense and representation: The origins of "Theory
of Mind"." Psychological Review 94(4): 412-426.
O'Regan, J. K. and A. Noë (2001). "A sensorimotor account of vision and
visual consciousness." Behavioural and Brain Sciences 24(5): 883-917.
Russell, J., Ed. (1998). Autism as an Executive Disorder. Oxford, Oxford University
Press.
Schaffer, H. R., Ed. (1977). Studies in Mother-Infant Interaction. London,
Academic Press.
Thelen, E. and L. B. Smith (1994). A Dynamic Systems Approach to the Development
of Cognition and Action. London, Bradford.
Trevarthen, C. (1977). Descriptive analyses of infant communicative behaviour.
Studies in Mother-Infant Interaction. H. R. Schaffer. London, Academic Press:
227-270.
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