| Return to Programs
Idea Showcase #1: How Context Changes Everything
Lisa Kimball - Moderator
Scott Kelso - Complementary Nature
Alice Ware Davidson - Multi-Sensory Environments
Eliot R. Smith - Situated Cognition, Social Context
Scott Kelso
The Complementary Nature
Why do we divide our world into contraries? Why do we perceive and interpret so many of life's contraries as mutually exclusive, either/or dichotomies such as individual~collective, self~other, body~mind, nature~nurture, cooperation~competition? Throughout history, many have recognized that truth may well lie in between such polar opposites. In The Complementary Nature, Scott Kelso and David Engstrøm contend that ubiquitous contraries are complementary and propose a comprehensive, empirically based scientific theory of how the polarized world and the world in between can be reconciled. They nominate the tilde, or squiggle (~), as the symbolic punctuation for reconciled complementary pairs.
Experiments show that the human brain is capable of displaying two apparently contradictory, mutually exclusive behaviors at the same time. Coordination dynamics -- a mathematically expressed theory that reconciles the scientific language of "states" with the novel dynamical language of "tendencies" -- attests to the complementary nature inherent in human brains and behavior. It may explain, Kelso and Engstrøm argue, why we (and nature) appear to partition things, events, and ideas into pairs. Kelso and Engstrøm's account is not just metaphorical; the reconciliations they describe are grounded in the principles and mathematical language of the theory of coordination dynamics. The Complementary Nature provides a clear-cut methodology for this evolving theory of brain and behavior that can also be applied to areas and developments outside the neurosciences, hence aiding reconciliations within and between disparate fields.
Alice Ware Davidson
Information in the environment challenges living things. The environments of elderly people should provide sufficient complexity of stimuli and information to challenge and thus exercise neurons in the aging brain as well as other tissues and organs. Complex, challenging and changing environments, that are within the elder's ability, but require effort, should stimulate the aging brain and body to maintain neurons, muscle fibers, and other tissues. Information theory indicates that when a recipient of a message has already received the message, and knows a message is being repeated, then no new information is being transmitted. When the system is at equilibrium, complexity disappears. Therapeutic environments and the caregivers working in them should utilize environmental patterns to stimulate all of the senses: auditory, visual, tactile, olfactory, and gustatory. Examples for fostering complexity of environmental patterns might include: the use of gardens and indoor plants; curving paths with interesting nooks; artwork in public and private places; furnishings of varied color, pattern and texture; varied foods; changing personalized and holiday decorations; books, magazines, newspapers, videos; and visits of family and friends. While such common sense recommendations extend beyond the results of this study, future scientific studies that investigate their relevance may increase the seriousness by which caregivers take these issues. The importance of these preliminary findings should be recognized. The consequences to the individual as well as to society of improving cognition and activity level of the elderly are significant. The implications for continued contribution, autonomy, and the reduction of costs anticipated for elder care justify further inquiry. While building effective care for the elderly is of universal importance, current and projected future demographic relevance has drawn increasing attention to these issues.
Environmental complexity may be a powerful resource in our search for a high quality of life in old age. A specific approximate measure of the visual environment provides a means to examine the human experience of complexity in order to understand the effects of stimulation and sensory deprivation and the maintenance of cognitive function. Designing environments that are sufficiently complex to maintain or even restore a high level of mental and physical functioning may become an important part of plans designed to keep elders healthy.
Eliot Smith
Situated/Embodied Cognition in Social Psychology
Recent thinking in many areas of the cognitive sciences has begun to question the traditional assumption that cognition is implemented by abstract, disembodied computation. Instead, these new approaches emphasize a more biologically based approach, treating cognition as adaptive behavior and emphasizing the moment-by-moment interaction between the agent and its environment. Although social psychologists have participated little in the development of these emerging viewpoints, four core assumptions are common to current social psychology and the situated/embodied cognition perspective. (a) Cognition is for the adaptive regulation of action, and mental representations are action-oriented. (b) Cognition is embodied, constrained and directed by the nature of our bodies. (c) Cognition and action are the emergent outcome of dynamic processes of interaction between an agent and an environment. (d) Cognition is distributed across brains and the environment (e.g., through the use of tools) and across social agents (e.g., when information is discussed and evaluated in groups). In recent research, I have been involved in exploring these important conceptual communalities and examining the implications of these new perspectives for many topics in social psychology.
Moderator: Lisa Kimball, Founder and Executive Producer, Group Jazz
Group Jazz is a leader in producing virtual meetings, and online conferences and events. Group Jazz supports the work of groups, whether they meet face-to-face, online, or both. We bring together the best tools, technologies, media, and PEOPLE to produce great group experiences with powerful results.
Return to Programs
|
