From Perceptual Categories to Concepts: What Develops?

People are remarkably smart: they use language, possess complex motor skills, make non-trivial inferences, develop and use scientific theories, make laws, and adapt to complex dynamic environments. Much of this knowledge requires concepts and this paper focuses on how people acquire concepts. It is argued that conceptual development progresses from simple perceptual grouping to highly abstract scientific concepts. This proposal of conceptual development has four parts. First, it is argued that categories in the world have different structure. Second, there might be different learning systems (sub-served by different brain mechanisms) that evolved to learn categories of differing structures. Third, these systems exhibit differential maturational course, which affects how categories of different structures are learned in the course of development. And finally, an interaction of these components may result in the developmental transition from perceptual groupings to more abstract concepts. This paper reviews a large body of empirical evidence supporting this proposal.     

The logical status of natural laws

In this note I have presented the essentials of a view of how laws are falsified, a view which has been held by some notable philosophers but which is radically opposed to that of Professor Popper. I have not scrupled to ‘improve? upon it, so the view of no one philosopher is presented. I try to show that an interesting and convincing account of scientific simplicity is implicit in the theory and I conclude by suggesting how we can bring the argument to bear on the problem of the logical status of laws of nature, showing that through their manner of falsifiability, laws share some characteristics with necessary statements as well as with empirical generalizations.     

Things Are What They Do: Katherine Nelson's Functional Approach to Language and Cognition

This article attempts to summarize Katherine Nelson's theoretical and empirical contributions to the ontogenetic study of language and cognition. Nelson's approach has consistently emphasized the function of language and linguistic concepts in children's larger conceptual and social lives and, conversely, how children's emerging understanding of the function of linguistic symbols in larger conceptual and social structures makes language acquisition possible in the first place. This approach has led to an especially fruitful body of theoretical and empirical work.     

The role of experience in children's developing folk epistemology: review and analysis from the theory–theory perspective

The role of experience in children's developing folk epistemology, specifically in their acquisition of an understanding of belief, is explored from the theory–theory perspective (i.e., the perspective claiming that children's conceptual development can be viewed as analogous to scientific theory development) through a selective review and analysis of extant empirical literature. Three types of investigations are identified: examinations of observed relationships between social experiences and belief understanding, attempts to facilitate the reasoning of children on the verge of belief understanding through experiences intended to compel children to face reasoning inconsistencies; and training studies demonstrating that children can be trained to understand belief over time through specific feedback experiences. A comparison of these studies reveals that experience is defined differently across them, resulting in varying and sometimes ambiguous implications for a theory–theory perspective on development. Implications for future research are discussed.     

The fruits of a functional approach for psychological science

The current paper introduces relational frame theory (RFT) as a functional contextual approach to complex human behaviour and examines how this theory has contributed to our understanding of several key phenomena in psychological science. I will first briefly outline the philosophical foundation of RFT and then examine its conceptual basis and core concepts. Thereafter, I provide an overview of the empirical findings and applications that RFT has stimulated in a number of key domains such as language development, linguistic generativity, rule‐following, analogical reasoning, intelligence, theory of mind, psychopathology and implicit cognition.     

Theory change as dimensional change: conceptual spaces applied to the dynamics of empirical theories

This paper offers a novel way of reconstructing conceptual change in empirical theories. Changes occur in terms of the structure of the dimensions—that is to say, the conceptual spaces—underlying the conceptual framework within which a given theory is formulated. Five types of changes are identified: (1) addition or deletion of special laws, (2) change in scale or metric, (3) change in the importance of dimensions, (4) change in the separability of dimensions, and (5) addition or deletion of dimensions. Given this classification, the conceptual development of empirical theories becomes more gradual and rationalizable. Only the most extreme type—replacement of dimensions—comes close to a revolution. The five types are exemplified and applied in a case study on the development within physics from the original Newtonian mechanics to special relativity theory.     

What is Structural Empiricism? Scientific Change in an Empiricist Setting

In this paper a constructive empiricist account of scientific change is put forward. Based on da Costa's and French's partial structures approach, two notions of empirical adequacy are initially advanced (with particular emphasis on the introduction of degrees of empirical adequacy). Using these notions, it is shown how both the informativeness and the empirical adequacy requirements of an empiricist theory of scientific change can then be met. Finally, some philosophical consequences with regard to the role of structures in this context are drawn.Now, we daily see what science is doing for us. This could not be unless it taught us something about reality; the aim of science is not things themselves, as the dogmatists in their simplicity imagine, but the relations between things; outside those relations there is no reality knowable.Henri Poincaré (1905), p. xxi     

Psychological mechanisms of medically unexplained symptoms: an integrative conceptual model

Theories of medically unexplained illness based on the concepts of dissociation, conversion, and somatization are summarized. Evidence cited in support of these theories is described and the conceptual strengths and shortcomings of each approach are considered. It is argued that each of these approaches adds to the understanding of unexplained illness but that none is able to provide a comprehensive explanation of the phenomenon. An integrative conceptual model of unexplained illness based on cognitive psychological principles is then presented. This model attempts to combine existing theoretical approaches within a single explanatory framework, extending previous theory by explaining how compelling symptoms can exist in the absence of organic pathology. The clinical and empirical implications of the model are then considered.     

The Cognitive Structure of Scientific Revolutions

For historical epistemology to succeed, it must adopt a defensible set of categories to characterise scientific activity over time. In historically orientated philosophy of science during the twentieth century, the original categories of theory and observation were supplemented or replaced by categories like paradigm, research program and research tradition. Underlying all three proposals was talk about conceptual systems and conceptual structures, attributed to individual scientists or to research communities, however there has been little general agreement on the nature of these structures. Recent experimental research in cognitive science has considerably refined the theory of concepts. Drawing upon the results of that research, philosophers can construct more concrete and empirically defensible representations of conceptual systems. I will suggest that this research supports a modest and useful sense of both normal and revolutionary science, not as epistemological continuities or discontinuities, but as particular patterns of conceptual change.     

后经验主义时代的理论心理学

随着经验实证主义的衰落,心理学迎来了后经验主义时代。在后经验主义时代,人们对理论和经验观察的关系有了新的理解。理论不再是经验观察的附属物,相反,经验事实是被理论决定的。理论不是经验事实的概括和归纳,而是一种文化历史的建构。后经验主义时代的理论心理学以库恩的范式论、现象学、释义学和社会建构论作为自己的哲学基础。理论的评价标准不再是与经验事实的一致性。因为经验事实由于受到理论的污染,不再是一种客观的标准。在后经验主义条件下,理论的评价标准可建立在概念和逻辑、价值观和意识形态、修辞与叙事以及实践和应用的水平上     

Intertheory relations from unified theories

The concept of unified theory is defined in logical and abstract semantic terms, and employed in the analysis of relations between empirical scientific theories. The conceptual framework of the approach applies to binary relations such as the reduction or replacement of one theory by another, and to multiple intertheory relations. Historically, unified theories tend to arise within the contexts of scientific conflicts which they may show susceptible of solution even in the most controversial cases of the logical incompatibility or conceptual incommensurability of competing theories. These conclusions are exemplified by the Planck-Einstein quantum theory of thermal radiation. The analysis shows in which sense it can, and in which it cannot, be said that this theory unifies Wien's law and the Rayleigh-Jeans law of black-body radiation.     

Is there a Science of the Processes Underlying Health and Illness Behaviors? A Comment on Maes and Karoly

Maes and Karoly (2005) provide thorough overview of many of the current theoretical models and much of the empirical data describing application of self-regulation concepts to chronic illness management. They make clear that much of theory and data focuses on remote and proximal goals involved in the self-regulation process. The review makes clear, however, that few models and studies conceptualise and examine how individuals create goals and evaluate progress. Knowledge of these processes is essential for the development of effective interventions. We argue that understanding these processes is essential for understanding the interplay of concrete experience and conceptual processes. Concepts in this area are central for understanding how top-down and bottom-up processes integrate in generating self-regulatory behaviors to affect somatic experience. We discuss theoretical frameworks that can generate research paths that will lead to effective interventions.     

Bridging theory and practice: conceptual understanding of treatments for children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), autism, and depression

Serves as an introduction to a special edition of the journal on bridging theory and clinical practice for childhood disorders. Issues concerning the current trend of developing and evaluating new treatments devoid of a theoretical perspective are discussed. A conceptual model of child psychopathology is presented to illustrate the relevance and interplay between theory and the design and evaluation of treatments with particular emphasis on the selection and measurement of target behaviors. The means by which theory and empirical evidence interact and their relevance to understanding particular childhood disorders are discussed and emphasize the need for theoretical and conceptual models that describe the linkages among hypothesized brain substrates, cognitive function, behavior, and the environment to augment the development of potent biological and psychological interventions.     

Investigating Emotions Philosophically1

Among today's philosophers of emotion there are, on the one hand, those that do “conceptual analysis” and, on the other hand, those that oppose such an approach as empirically naïve, as sanctifying our ordinary use of words and as based on an analytic/synthetic distinction and an outmoded theory of meaning. This paper is an attempt to show why this critique is misplaced and to clarify how conceptual investigations of emotions relate to empirical investigations.     

JAMES B. ASHBROOK AND HIS HOLISTIC WORLD: TOWARD A “UNIFIED FIELD THEORY” OF MIND,BRAIN, SELF,WORLD, AND GOD

James B. Ashbrook's “new natural theology in an empirical mode” pursued an integrated understanding of the spiritual, psychological, and neurological dimensions of spiritual life. Knowledge of neuroscience and personality theory was central to his quest, and his understandings were necessarily revised and amplified as scientific findings emerged. As a result, Ashbrook's legacy may serve as a case example of how to do religion‐and‐science in a milieu of scientific change. The constant in the quest was Ashbrook's core belief in the basic holism of brain, mind, personality, the nature of reality, and the underlying reality of God.     

Making Time Matter: A Review of Research on Time and Meaning

In this conceptual article, we review three decades of research on time and meaning in consumer research and psychology to identify key themes that have emerged, build frameworks that integrate past research, and reveal areas of potential for future empirical exploration. We begin by carving out a conceptual understanding of meaning in life and identifying time as a key lens through which the pursuit of meaning can be viewed. We then review extant research on how to spend and construe time in ways that enhance meaning, relying on two frameworks—one anchored in three dimensions of meaning (purpose, mattering, and comprehension) and the other in three levels of time (momentary, day‐to‐day, and lifetime). We conclude by outlining several directions for future research focused on deepening our understanding of how consumers can think about and use their time in ways that boost their sense of meaning in life.