Towards an Expansive Hybrid Psychology: Integrating Theories of the Mediated Mind

Abstract

This article develops an integrative theory of the mind by examining how the mind, understood as a set of skills and dispositions, depends upon four sources of mediators. Harré's hybrid psychology is taken as a meta-theoretical starting point, but is expanded significantly by including the four sources of mediators that are the brain, the body, social practices and technological artefacts. It is argued that the mind is normative in the sense that mental processes do not simply happen, but can be done more or less well, and thus are subject to normative appraisal. The expanded hybrid psychology is meant to assist in integrating theoretical perspectives and research interests that are often thought of as incompatible, among them neuroscience, phenomenology of the body, social practice theory and technology studies. A main point of the article is that these perspectives each are necessary for an integrative approach to the human mind.