420005 SE Seminar for Doctoral Candidates of Psycho- and Patholinguistics (2011S)
Cognitive Mechanisms of Cultural Knowledge Transmission: A Comparative Perspective
Continuous assessment of course work
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Anmeldung erfolgt per E-Mail an: Fr. Margareta Löffler, margareta.loeffler@univie.ac.at;
Anmeldezeitraum: ab sofort bis 25.02.2011; Abmelden bis 03.03.2011;
Erster Termin: 28.02.2011, letzter Termin: 04.03.2011
MO, 28.02.2011, 10:00-12:00, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
DI, 01.03.2011, 10:00-12:00, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
MI, 02.03.2011, 10:00-12:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
MI, 02.03.2011, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Hörsaal 1, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
DO, 03.03.2011, 10:00-12:00,
Ort: Hörsaal 1, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
DO, 03.03.2011, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
FR, 04.03.2011, 10:00-12:00, 13:30-15:30,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
Anmeldezeitraum: ab sofort bis 25.02.2011; Abmelden bis 03.03.2011;
Erster Termin: 28.02.2011, letzter Termin: 04.03.2011
MO, 28.02.2011, 10:00-12:00, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
DI, 01.03.2011, 10:00-12:00, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
MI, 02.03.2011, 10:00-12:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
MI, 02.03.2011, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Hörsaal 1, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
DO, 03.03.2011, 10:00-12:00,
Ort: Hörsaal 1, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
DO, 03.03.2011, 15:00-17:00,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
FR, 04.03.2011, 10:00-12:00, 13:30-15:30,
Ort: Seminarraum 3, 1. OG, Sensengasse 3a, 1090 Wien
Details
max. 20 participants
Language: English
Lecturers
Classes
Currently no class schedule is known.
Information
Aims, contents and method of the course
Recent advances in cognitive science have radically transformed our thinking about the role of cognition in explaining culture. Historically the study of the origins, transmission, and variety of human cultural forms considered the fields of human anthropology and the psychology of human learning and cognition to be only loosely related at best. However, the new perspective provided by advances in developmental psychology, cognitive anthropology, and evolutionary psychology have changed this picture in significant and empirically fruitful ways. The course will explore the results and theoretical implications of current cognitive developmental, cross-cultural and comparative research on how universal core knowledge systems and their interaction with different cultural and linguistic environmental inputs can account for the stability as well as the variability of cultural forms and knowledge structures for different domains. We will also explore recent theoretical models for explaining the nature of a variety of cultural belief systems and social practices, such as religious and supernatural beliefs, as examples of cognitively partially opaque knowledge structures that form and proliferate by simultaneously exploiting the content specifications of several systems of primary cognitive adaptations.
Assessment and permitted materials
Minimum requirements and assessment criteria
Examination topics
Reading list
Topics and literature
1. Primate vs. human cultures
Tomasello, M., Kruger, A.C., & Ratner, H.H. (1993). Cultural learning. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16, 495-552.
Whiten, A., Horner, V., & Marshall-Pescini, S. (2003). Cultural panthropology. Evolotionary Anthropology, 12, 92-105.
Huffman, M.A., Nahallage, C.A.D., & Leca, J-B. (2008). Cultured monkeys: social learning cast in stones. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17, 410-414.
2. Human evolution and culture
Tooby, J. & Cosmides, L. (1992). The psychological foundations of culture. In: J. Barkow, L. Cosmides, J. Tooby (Eds.), The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary Psychology and the Generation of Culture (pp. 19-136). Oxford University Press
Donald, M. (1993). Precis of "Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition". Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16, 737-791.
Sperber, D. & Hirschfeld, L. (1999). Culture, cognition, and evolution. In: R. Wilson & F. Keil (Eds.), MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences (pp. cxi-cxxxii). MIT Press.
3. Mechanisms of cultural learning I: Imitation and emulation
Wohlschlager, A., Gattis, M., & Bekkering, H. (2003). Action generation and action perception in imitation: an instance of the ideomotor principle. Philosophical Transaction of the Royal Society London B, 358, 501-515.
Horner, V. & Whiten, A. (2005). Causal knowledge and imitation/emulation switching in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and children (Homo sapiens). Animal Cognition, 8, 164-181.
Horner, V., Whiten, A., Flynn, E., & de Waal, F.B.M. (2006). Faithful replication of foraging techniques along cultural transmission chains by chimpanzees and children. PNAS, 103, 13878-13883.
Gergely, G., Bekkering, H., & Király, I. (2002). Rational imitation in preverbal infants. Nature, 415, 755.
Gergely, G. & Csibra, G. (2006). Sylvia's recipe: The role of imitation and pedagogy in the transmission of human culture. In: N.J. Enfield & S.C. Levinson (Eds.), Roots of Human Sociality: Culture, Cognition, and Human Interaction (pp. 229-255). Oxford: Berg Publishers.
4. Mechanisms of Cultural learning II. Natural Pedagogy
Csibra, G. & Gergely, G. (2006). Social learning and social cognition: The case for pedagogy. In: Y. Munakata & M.H. Johnson (Eds.), Processes of Change in Brain and Cognitive Development. Attention and Performance XXI (pp. 249-274). Oxford University Press.
Csibra, G. & Gergely, G. (2009). Natural Pedagogy. Trends in Cognitive Sciences.
13(4) 148-153.
Hoppitt, W.J.L. et al. (2008). Lessons from animal teaching. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 23, 486-493.
Thornton, A. & Raihani, N.J. (2008). The evolution of teaching. Animal Behaviour, 75, 1823-1836.
Fiske, A.P. (unpublished). Learning a culture the way informants do: observing, imitating, and participating.
Tehrani, J.J. & Riede, F. (2008). Towards an archaeology of pedagogy: learning, teaching and the generation of material culture traditions. World Archeology, 40, 316-331.
5. Cooperation and communication: Understanding Instrumental vs. Communicative Agency
Gergely, G. (2010). Kinds of Agents: The Origins of Understanding Instrumental and Communicative Agency, (pp. 76-105), In: U. Goshwami, (Ed.). Blackwell Handbook of Childhood Cognitive Development. 2nd Edition. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Dunbar, R. (1993). Co-evolution of neocortex size, groups size and language in humans. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16, 681-735.
Tomasello, M., Carpenter, M., Call, J., Behne, T., & Moll. H. (2005). Understanding and sharing intentions: The origins of cultural cognition. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 28, 675-735.
Boyd, R. & Richerson, P.J. (2006). Culture and the evolution of the human social instincts. In: N.J. Enfield & S.C. Levinson (Eds.), Roots of Human Sociality: Culture, Cognition, and Human Interaction. Oxford: Berg Publishers.
6. Understanding Artefact Kinds
Bloom, P. (1996). Intention, history, and artifact concepts. Cognition, 60, 1-29.
Kelemen, D. (1999). Function, goals, and intention: children's teleological reasoning about objects. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 3, 461-468.
Kelemen, D. & Carey, S. (2008). The essence of artefacts: Developing a design stance. In: E. Margolis & S. Lawrence (Eds.), Creations of the Mind: Theories of Artifacts and Their Representation. Oxford University Press.
German, T. & Barrett, H.C. (2005). Functional fixedness in a technologically sparse culture. Psychological Science, 16, 1-5.
Mithen, S. (2002). Mind, brain, and material culture: an archeological perspective. In: P. Carruthers & A. Chamberlain (2002). Evolution and the human mind (pp. 207-217.). Cambridge University Press.
7. Memetics and epidemiology of representations
Sperber, D. (1985). Anthropology and psychology: Towards an epidemiology of representations. Man, 20, 73-89.
Blackmore, S. (2000). The power of memes. Scietific American, October 2000, 65-73.
Sperber, D. (2000). An objection to the memetic approach to culture. In: R. Aunger (Ed.), Darwinizing Culture: The Status of Memetics as a Science (pp. 163-173). Oxford University Press.
Pléh, C. (2003). Thoughts on the distribution of thoughts: memes or epidemies. Journal of Cultural and Evolutionary Psychology, 1, 21-51.
Sperber, D. & Hirschfeld, L. (2004). The cognitive foundations of cultural stability and diversity. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 8, 40-46.
8. Religion and rituals
Boyer, P. & Liénard, P. (2006). Why ritualized behavior? Precaution systems and action parsing in developmental, pathological and cultural rituals. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 29, 1-56.
Liénard, P. & Boyer, P. (2006). Whence collective rituals? A cultural selection model of ritualized behavior. American Anthropologist, 108, 814-827.
9. Culture, language and conceptual development
Astuti, R., Solomon, G., & Carey, S. (2004). Constraints on conceptual development: A case study of the acquisition of folkbiological and folksociological knowledge in Madagascar. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, No. 277, Vol. 69.
Carey, S. (2004). Bootstrapping and the origin of concepts. Dcedalus, Winter 2004, 59-68.
Gelman, R. & Butterworth, B. (2005). Number and language: how they are related?. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9, 6-10.
Li, P. & Gleitman, L. (2002). Turning the tables: language and spatial reasoning. Cognition, 83, 265-294.
1. Primate vs. human cultures
Tomasello, M., Kruger, A.C., & Ratner, H.H. (1993). Cultural learning. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16, 495-552.
Whiten, A., Horner, V., & Marshall-Pescini, S. (2003). Cultural panthropology. Evolotionary Anthropology, 12, 92-105.
Huffman, M.A., Nahallage, C.A.D., & Leca, J-B. (2008). Cultured monkeys: social learning cast in stones. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17, 410-414.
2. Human evolution and culture
Tooby, J. & Cosmides, L. (1992). The psychological foundations of culture. In: J. Barkow, L. Cosmides, J. Tooby (Eds.), The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary Psychology and the Generation of Culture (pp. 19-136). Oxford University Press
Donald, M. (1993). Precis of "Origins of the Modern Mind: Three Stages in the Evolution of Culture and Cognition". Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16, 737-791.
Sperber, D. & Hirschfeld, L. (1999). Culture, cognition, and evolution. In: R. Wilson & F. Keil (Eds.), MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences (pp. cxi-cxxxii). MIT Press.
3. Mechanisms of cultural learning I: Imitation and emulation
Wohlschlager, A., Gattis, M., & Bekkering, H. (2003). Action generation and action perception in imitation: an instance of the ideomotor principle. Philosophical Transaction of the Royal Society London B, 358, 501-515.
Horner, V. & Whiten, A. (2005). Causal knowledge and imitation/emulation switching in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and children (Homo sapiens). Animal Cognition, 8, 164-181.
Horner, V., Whiten, A., Flynn, E., & de Waal, F.B.M. (2006). Faithful replication of foraging techniques along cultural transmission chains by chimpanzees and children. PNAS, 103, 13878-13883.
Gergely, G., Bekkering, H., & Király, I. (2002). Rational imitation in preverbal infants. Nature, 415, 755.
Gergely, G. & Csibra, G. (2006). Sylvia's recipe: The role of imitation and pedagogy in the transmission of human culture. In: N.J. Enfield & S.C. Levinson (Eds.), Roots of Human Sociality: Culture, Cognition, and Human Interaction (pp. 229-255). Oxford: Berg Publishers.
4. Mechanisms of Cultural learning II. Natural Pedagogy
Csibra, G. & Gergely, G. (2006). Social learning and social cognition: The case for pedagogy. In: Y. Munakata & M.H. Johnson (Eds.), Processes of Change in Brain and Cognitive Development. Attention and Performance XXI (pp. 249-274). Oxford University Press.
Csibra, G. & Gergely, G. (2009). Natural Pedagogy. Trends in Cognitive Sciences.
13(4) 148-153.
Hoppitt, W.J.L. et al. (2008). Lessons from animal teaching. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 23, 486-493.
Thornton, A. & Raihani, N.J. (2008). The evolution of teaching. Animal Behaviour, 75, 1823-1836.
Fiske, A.P. (unpublished). Learning a culture the way informants do: observing, imitating, and participating.
Tehrani, J.J. & Riede, F. (2008). Towards an archaeology of pedagogy: learning, teaching and the generation of material culture traditions. World Archeology, 40, 316-331.
5. Cooperation and communication: Understanding Instrumental vs. Communicative Agency
Gergely, G. (2010). Kinds of Agents: The Origins of Understanding Instrumental and Communicative Agency, (pp. 76-105), In: U. Goshwami, (Ed.). Blackwell Handbook of Childhood Cognitive Development. 2nd Edition. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Dunbar, R. (1993). Co-evolution of neocortex size, groups size and language in humans. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16, 681-735.
Tomasello, M., Carpenter, M., Call, J., Behne, T., & Moll. H. (2005). Understanding and sharing intentions: The origins of cultural cognition. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 28, 675-735.
Boyd, R. & Richerson, P.J. (2006). Culture and the evolution of the human social instincts. In: N.J. Enfield & S.C. Levinson (Eds.), Roots of Human Sociality: Culture, Cognition, and Human Interaction. Oxford: Berg Publishers.
6. Understanding Artefact Kinds
Bloom, P. (1996). Intention, history, and artifact concepts. Cognition, 60, 1-29.
Kelemen, D. (1999). Function, goals, and intention: children's teleological reasoning about objects. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 3, 461-468.
Kelemen, D. & Carey, S. (2008). The essence of artefacts: Developing a design stance. In: E. Margolis & S. Lawrence (Eds.), Creations of the Mind: Theories of Artifacts and Their Representation. Oxford University Press.
German, T. & Barrett, H.C. (2005). Functional fixedness in a technologically sparse culture. Psychological Science, 16, 1-5.
Mithen, S. (2002). Mind, brain, and material culture: an archeological perspective. In: P. Carruthers & A. Chamberlain (2002). Evolution and the human mind (pp. 207-217.). Cambridge University Press.
7. Memetics and epidemiology of representations
Sperber, D. (1985). Anthropology and psychology: Towards an epidemiology of representations. Man, 20, 73-89.
Blackmore, S. (2000). The power of memes. Scietific American, October 2000, 65-73.
Sperber, D. (2000). An objection to the memetic approach to culture. In: R. Aunger (Ed.), Darwinizing Culture: The Status of Memetics as a Science (pp. 163-173). Oxford University Press.
Pléh, C. (2003). Thoughts on the distribution of thoughts: memes or epidemies. Journal of Cultural and Evolutionary Psychology, 1, 21-51.
Sperber, D. & Hirschfeld, L. (2004). The cognitive foundations of cultural stability and diversity. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 8, 40-46.
8. Religion and rituals
Boyer, P. & Liénard, P. (2006). Why ritualized behavior? Precaution systems and action parsing in developmental, pathological and cultural rituals. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 29, 1-56.
Liénard, P. & Boyer, P. (2006). Whence collective rituals? A cultural selection model of ritualized behavior. American Anthropologist, 108, 814-827.
9. Culture, language and conceptual development
Astuti, R., Solomon, G., & Carey, S. (2004). Constraints on conceptual development: A case study of the acquisition of folkbiological and folksociological knowledge in Madagascar. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, No. 277, Vol. 69.
Carey, S. (2004). Bootstrapping and the origin of concepts. Dcedalus, Winter 2004, 59-68.
Gelman, R. & Butterworth, B. (2005). Number and language: how they are related?. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9, 6-10.
Li, P. & Gleitman, L. (2002). Turning the tables: language and spatial reasoning. Cognition, 83, 265-294.
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Last modified: Fr 31.08.2018 08:58