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Deep Social Mind
Deep social mind is a concept in evolutionary psychology; it refers to the distinctively human capacity to 'read' (that is, to infer) the mental states of others while reciprocally enabling those others to read one's own mental states at the same time. The term 'deep social mind' was first coined in 1999 by Andrew Whiten, professor of Evolutionary and Developmental Psychology at St. Andrews University, Scotland. Together with closely related terms such as ' reflexivity' and 'intersubjectivity', it is now well-established among scholars investigating the evolutionary emergence of human sociality, cognition and communication. Mind-reading in apes and humans It is widely agreed that the brain is social in both human and nonhuman primates. But, according to Andrew Whiten, human sociality goes much further than ape sociality. Ape social intelligence is overwhelmingly ' Machiavellian' in the sense of manipulating others in social settings. One consequence is that while an ape may be mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Evolutionary Psychology
Evolutionary psychology is a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective. It seeks to identify human psychological adaptations with regards to the ancestral problems they evolved to solve. In this framework, psychological traits and mechanisms are either functional products of natural and sexual selection, non-adaptive by-products of other adaptive traits, or noise. Adaptationist thinking about physiological mechanisms, such as the heart, lungs, and the liver, is common in evolutionary biology. Evolutionary psychologists apply the same thinking in psychology, arguing that just as the heart evolved to pump blood, and the liver evolved to detoxify poisons, there is modularity of mind in that different psychological mechanisms evolved to solve different adaptive problems. These evolutionary psychologists argue that much of human behavior is the output of psychological adaptations that evolved to solve recurrent p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Conspecific
Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organisms or constituents of living organisms of being special or doing something special. Each animal or plant species is special. It differs in some way from all other species...biological specificity is the major problem about understanding life." Biological specificity within ''Homo sapiens'' ''Homo sapiens'' has many characteristics that show the biological specificity in the form of behavior and morphological traits. Morphologically, humans have an enlarged cranial capacity and more gracile features in comparison to other hominins. The reduction of dentition is a feature that allows for the advantage of adaptability in diet and survival. As a species, humans are culture dependent and much of human survival relies on the culture and so ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Origins Of Society
The origins of society — the evolutionary emergence of distinctively human social organization — is an important topic within evolutionary biology, anthropology, prehistory and palaeolithic archaeology. While little is known for certain, debates since Hobbes and Rousseau have returned again and again to the philosophical, moral and evolutionary questions posed. Social origins in nature Origin of social groups Thomas Hobbes Arguably the most influential theory of human social origins is that of Thomas Hobbes, who in his ''Leviathan'' argued that without strong government, society would collapse into ''Bellum omnium contra omnes'' — "the war of all against all": Hobbes' innovation was to attribute the establishment of society to a founding 'social contract', in which the Crown's subjects surrender some part of their freedom in return for security. If Hobbes' idea is accepted, it follows that society could not have emerged prior to the state. This school of thought has r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Origin Of Speech
The origin of speech refers to the general problem of the origin of language in the context of the physiological development of the human speech organs such as the tongue, lips, and vocal organs used to produce phonological units in all spoken languages. The origin of speech has been studied through many fields and topics such as: evolution, anatomy, and history of linguistics. The origin of speech is related to the more general problem of the origin of language, the evolution of distinctively human speech capacities has become a distinct and in many ways separate area of scientific research. The topic is a separate one because language is not necessarily spoken: it can equally be written or signed. Speech is in this sense optional, although it is the default modality for language. Background There are many different theories and ideas that give us a theoretical framework of how speech in humans originated. Multiple of these theories play on the idea of how humans evolved ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Origin Of Language
The origin of language (spoken and signed, as well as language-related technological systems such as writing), its relationship with human evolution, and its consequences have been subjects of study for centuries. Scholars wishing to study the origins of language must draw inferences from evidence such as the fossil record, archaeological evidence, contemporary language diversity, studies of language acquisition, and comparisons between human language and systems of communication existing among animals (particularly other primates). Many argue that the origins of language probably relate closely to the origins of modern human behavior, but there is little agreement about the facts and implications of this connection. The shortage of direct, empirical evidence has caused many scholars to regard the entire topic as unsuitable for serious study; in 1866, the Linguistic Society of Paris banned any existing or future debates on the subject, a prohibition which remained influen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mirror Neuron
A mirror neuron is a neuron that fires both when an animal acts and when the animal observes the same action performed by another. Thus, the neuron "mirrors" the behavior of the other, as though the observer were itself acting. Such neurons have been directly observed in human and primate species, and in birds. In humans, brain activity consistent with that of mirror neurons has been found in the premotor cortex, the supplementary motor area, the primary somatosensory cortex, and the inferior parietal cortex. The function of the mirror system in humans is a subject of much speculation. Birds have been shown to have imitative resonance behaviors and neurological evidence suggests the presence of some form of mirroring system. To date, no widely accepted neural or computational models have been put forward to describe how mirror neuron activity supports cognitive functions. The subject of mirror neurons continues to generate intense debate. In 2014, Philosophical Transactions o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Intersubjectivity
In philosophy, psychology, sociology, and anthropology, intersubjectivity is the relation or intersection between people's cognitive perspectives. Definition is a term coined by social scientists to refer to a variety of types of human interaction. For example, social psychologists Alex Gillespie and Flora Cornish listed at least seven definitions of intersubjectivity (and other disciplines have additional definitions): * people's agreement on the shared definition of a concept; * people's mutual awareness of agreement or disagreement, or of understanding or misunderstanding each other; * people's attribution of intentionality, feelings, and beliefs to each other; * people's implicit or automatic behavioral orientations towards other people; * people's interactive performance within a situation; * people's shared and taken-for-granted background assumptions, whether consensual or contested; and * "the variety of possible relations between people's perspectives". has been use ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hominid Intelligence
The evolution of human intelligence is closely tied to the evolution of the human brain and to the origin of language. The timeline of human evolution spans approximately seven million years, from the separation of the genus '' Pan'' until the emergence of behavioral modernity by 50,000 years ago. The first three million years of this timeline concern ''Sahelanthropus'', the following two million concern ''Australopithecus'' and the final two million span the history of the genus ''Homo'' in the Paleolithic era. Many traits of human intelligence, such as empathy, theory of mind, mourning, ritual, and the use of symbols and tools, are somewhat apparent in great apes, although they are in much less sophisticated forms than what is found in humans like the great ape language. History Hominidae The great apes (hominidae) show some cognitive and empathic abilities. Chimpanzees can make tools and use them to acquire foods and for social displays; they have mildly complex huntin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Ape Language
Research into great ape language has involved teaching chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans to communicate with humans and with each other using sign language, physical tokens, lexigrams, and mimicking human speech. Some primatologists argue that these primates' use of the communication tools indicates their ability to use "language", although this is not consistent with some definitions of that term. Apes that demonstrate understanding Non-human animals have been recorded to have produced behaviors that are consistent with meanings accorded to human sentence productions. (A ''production'' is a stream of ''lexemes'' with semantic content. A language is grammar and a set of lexemes. A '' sentence'', or statement, is a stream of lexemes that obeys a grammar, with a beginning and an end.) Some animals in the following species can be said to "understand" (''receive''), and some can "apply" (''produce'') consistent, appropriate, grammatical streams of communication. David P ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cooperative Eye Hypothesis
The cooperative eye hypothesis is a proposed explanation for the appearance of the human eye. It suggests that the eye's distinctive visible characteristics evolved to make it easier for humans to follow another's gaze while communicating or while working together on tasks. Differences in primate eyes Unlike other primates, human beings have eyes with a distinct colour contrast between the white sclera, the coloured iris, and the black pupil. This is due to a lack of pigment in the sclera. Other primates have pigmented sclerae that are brown or dark in colour. There is also a higher contrast between human skin, sclera, and irises. Human eyes are also larger in proportion to body size, and are longer horizontally. Among primates, humans are the only ones where the outline of the eye and the position of the iris can be clearly seen. Studies The cooperative eye hypothesis was first proposed by H. Kobayashi and S. Kohshima in 2002 and was subsequently tested by Michael Tomasell ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Current Directions In Psychological Science
''Current Directions in Psychological Science '' is a bimonthly peer-reviewed scientific journal from the Association for Psychological Science (APS) that is published by SAGE Publications. Publication Scope ''Current Directions in Psychological Science'' publishes concise reviews by leading experts spanning all of scientific psychology and its applications. The reviews published in this journal cover diverse topics such as language, memory and cognition, development, the neural basis of behavior and emotions, various aspects of psychopathology, and theory of mind. These articles allow readers to stay apprised of important developments across subfields beyond their areas of expertise and bodies of research they might not otherwise be aware of. The articles in ''Current Directions'' are also written to be accessible to non-experts, making them suitable for use in the classroom as teaching supplements. The current editor of the journal is Robert Goldstone at Indiana University Bloo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Human Child
A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger than the age of majority. Children generally have fewer rights and responsibilities than adults. They are classed as unable to make serious decisions. ''Child'' may also describe a relationship with a parent (such as sons and daughters of any age) or, metaphorically, an authority figure, or signify group membership in a clan, tribe, or religion; it can also signify being strongly affected by a specific time, place, or circumstance, as in "a child of nature" or "a child of the Sixties." Biological, legal and social definitions In the biological sciences, a child is usually defined as a person between birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. Legally, the term ''child'' may refer to anyone below th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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