Document Detail


The infant's theory of self-propelled objects.
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  2383967     Owner:  NLM     Status:  MEDLINE    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
"Theory of mind" is treated as a modular component of human social behavior and an attempt is made to find the origins of this component in the perception of the infant. According to the theory I describe here, the infant assigns a high priority to changes in motion and divides the world into two kinds of objects on the basis of this criterion: those that are and those that are not self-propelled. How the infant perceives these two kinds of objects is described by four basic assumptions. First, when the state of motion of a nonself-propelled object is changed by another object, the infant's principal hard-wired perception is causality; when a self-propelled object changes its motion without assistance from another object the infant's principal hard-wired perception is intention. Second, if two self-propelled objects are related in a special way--a relation called the BDR sequence--the infant perceives not only intentional movement but also one object as having the goal of affecting the other object. Third, the BDR sequence has a more powerful consequence: the infant perceives that the affected object intends to reciprocate. Fourth, the infant expects that reciprocation will preserve valence (not form), where valence is formulated either as the preservation/denial of liberty, or as an aesthetic response.
Authors:
D Premack
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Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't    
Journal Detail:
Title:  Cognition     Volume:  36     ISSN:  0010-0277     ISO Abbreviation:  Cognition     Publication Date:  1990 Jul 
Date Detail:
Created Date:  1990-09-20     Completed Date:  1990-09-20     Revised Date:  2006-11-15    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  0367541     Medline TA:  Cognition     Country:  SWITZERLAND    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  1-16     Citation Subset:  C    
Affiliation:
Psychology Department, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia 19174.
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MeSH Terms
Descriptor/Qualifier:
Child Psychology*
Concept Formation*
Form Perception*
Humans
Infant
Motion Perception*
Set (Psychology)*

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine


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