Abstract
Focusing in experimental study of human behavior, this article discusses the concepts of information and mental representation aiming the integration of their biological, computational, and semantic aspects. Assuming that the objective of any communication process is ultimately to modify the receiver’s state, the term correlational information is proposed as a measure of how changes occurring in external world correlate with changes occurring inside an individual. Mental representations are conceptualized as a special case of information processing in which correlational information is received, recorded, but also modified by a complex emergent process of associating new elements. In humans, the acquisition of information and creation of mental representations occurs in a two-step process. First, a sufficiently complex brain structure is necessary to establishing internal states capable to co-vary with external events. Second, the validity or meaning of these representations must be gradually achieved by confronting them with the environment. This contextualization can be considered as part of the process of ascribing meaning to information and representations. The hypothesis introduced here is that the sophisticated psychological constructs classically associated with the concept of mental representation are essentially of the same nature of simple interactive behaviors. The capacity of generating elaborated mental phenomena like beliefs and desires emerges gradually during evolution and, in a given individual, by learning and social interaction.
Highlights
The construction of comprehensive explanatory models of human behavior requires constant review and improvement of concepts in order to integrate different types of structures and levels of implementation
CONCLUDING REMARKS This article aimed to address some questions about the use of the representation and information concepts in the context of experimental research in cognitive sciences
The focus in the “information based on the receiver” proposed here is justified by the interest of developing objective approaches to the study of human behavior in biological and semantic terms
Summary
The construction of comprehensive explanatory models of human behavior requires constant review and improvement of concepts in order to integrate different types of structures and levels of implementation In this sense, this article discuss two concepts frequently used for modeling different aspects of human behavior in biological, psychological, philosophical, physical, and computational explanatory theories. The idea of representation discussed here is related to the brain’s capacity of developing inner states, in the form of relatively stable patterns of neuronal activity, that keep some kind of relationship with events occurring in external world In many cases, these representations start by simple reactions to external stimuli but, due to brain’s organizational characteristics, evolve by incorporating many other elements than those directly apprehensible from the direct contact with the environment. This capacity of constructing complex mental representations results from a long evolutionary process but its basic constituents can be identified in the neuronal activity of simpler organisms in the form of reactive or conditioned behaviors, for example
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