Situated Cognition Perspective Research Articles

Situating person memory: The role of the visual context on memory for behavioral information

Person memory has been mainly investigated as an individual process. In contrast, we argue that person memory results from the interplay between the individual and the context. Thus, the way people acquire and retrieve social information is constrained by the context in which these processes take place. This argument was explored in three experiments. In an impression formation paradigm, we manipulated the meaningfulness of contextual information (objects) for a stereotypical target. Results showed that meaningful contextual information presented during the encoding of behavioral information improved memory for the behavioral information but also for the contextual information (Experiment 1–2); that this memory advantage only occurs when the encoding goal requires some degree of cognitive organization (Experiment 2); and finally, that meaningful contextual information also enhances memory when presented at retrieval (Experiment 3). These results are consistent with a situated cognition perspective according to which the context where cognitive activities take place can be used to facilitate cognitive activity. We discuss the implications of these results for the standard person memory view and identify new routes for future research.

Situated cognition and narrative heuristic: evidence from retail investors and their brokers

In this paper, I discuss how a situated cognition perspective can reveal the socially constructed nature of seemingly psychological heuristics and errors in market actors’ judgements and decisions in financial markets. In doing so, I present a complementary approach to the heuristics and biases research in psychology and behavioural finance. More specifically, I draw on the narrative mode of knowing and explanation in real market settings as a framework to understand the content and the process of socially constructed knowledge in financial markets. Here, narratives of market actors and their underlying frames and causal schemas are assumed to function as a judgement heuristic in processing information flows. I then discuss an application of this approach to a sample of brokerage firms and investment advisers serving retail investors in the Istanbul Stock Exchange (ISE). My findings focus on a shared frame and the associated causal schema about the ISE and global financial markets. This observed interpretive model underpinned my interlocutors’ narrative judgements and forecasts about the ISE's movements and constituted a form of representativeness heuristic and anchoring.

Schema‐Based Sensemaking of the Decision to Participate and its Effects on Job Performance

This paper describes the development and testing of an iterative framework, based on a situated cognition perspective, for uncovering cognitive schemas that people enact in sensemaking processes. The research investigated the cognitive schemas of 167 employees participating in a call center through the elicitation of interpretations and the justifications for those interpretations. Data were analyzed by using a laddering methodology based on means‐end analysis in order to disclose declarative (i.e., concepts) and procedural (i.e., relations between concepts) knowledge. A cognitive cause map and its main indexes were derived, following principles from social network analysis. The results demonstrate how specific contents of cognitive schemas that arise during sensemaking (e.g., fulfillment) are related to job performance. In addition, the schema connecting skills development to improving career prospects and to personal growth was significant, revealing the prominent influence exerted by procedural knowledge in enacting sensemaking and motivating greater performance.

Back to Basics: Socially Facilitated Situated Cognition

A widely ignored finding in social facilitation suggests that the mere presence of others increases the “spreading out” of one's thoughts (Allport, 1920). Here, we revisit this finding and expand upon it using a situated cognition perspective. Experiment 1 approached the spreading-out-of-thought effect using the same free-association task as Allport. Results replicated and extended previous findings. Compared to an alone condition, co-action and mere presence activated more associations, being that these associations are more context-related and more distant in the target word associative network. Assuming that this spreading-out-of-thought effect arises from an increased salience of context-related processing, we tested this hypothesis using the Framed-Line Test paradigm in Experiment 2. Results showed that, as expected, co-action increased accuracy of estimation judgments that required incorporation of contextual information in processing. These results support and extend Allport's view that presence of...

Individuals' Formal Power and their Social Network Accuracy: A Situated Cognition Perspective

Individuals differ in the accuracy of their perceptions of the social environment, but research and theory provide conflicting predictions on whether those with power are more or less accurate than others. Drawing on social network theory and the situated focus theory of power, we examine the relationship between individuals’ formal power and their perceptual accuracy of social network relationships. We propose that individuals’ perceptual accuracy is affected by: 1) their formal power in the organization 2) the type of relationship being perceived (expressive/instrumental, positive/negative) and its relevance to task and goal completion, and 3) the dependence relationship with the target of perception (whether the perceiver is dependent on the perceived to get their work done). Predictions were tested using cognitive social network data collected from a technical call center within a division of a large corporation in the US. Results showed that formal power was linked to increased accuracy for some rela...

Low Hopes, High Expectations

This article revisits two classical issues in experimental methodology: experimenter bias and demand characteristics. We report a content analysis of the method section of experiments reported in two psychology journals (Psychological Science and the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology), focusing on aspects of the procedure associated with these two phenomena, such as mention of the presence of the experimenter, suspicion probing, and handling of deception. We note that such information is very often absent, which prevents observers from gauging the extent to which such factors influence the results. We consider the reasons that may explain this omission, including the automatization of psychology experiments, the evolution of research topics, and, most important, a view of research participants as passive receptacles of stimuli. Using a situated social cognition perspective, we emphasize the importance of integrating the social context of experiments in the explanation of psychological phenomena. We illustrate this argument via a controversy on stereotype-based behavioral priming effects.

Review of The mind in context.

The Mind in Context, by Batja Mesquita, Lisa Feldman Barrett, and Eliot R. Smith (Eds.). New York: The Guilford Press, 2010, 372 Pages (ISBN 978-1-60623-553-9, US $50.00 Hardcover) The purpose of this edited volume is to challenge a predominant tendency toward an error of essentialism, or the attempt to explain psychological phenomena in terms of internal, static mental entities that are independent of and seemingly hermetically sealed from the outside world. Instead the introductory chapter of The Mind in Context advances the principle: that mental processes and behaviour emerge from a profound and complex interaction between person and environment. It is important to note at the outset that a reader seeking an abstracted, sterilized, encyclopaedic list of essential elements making up this perspective would be well advised to look elsewhere. Rather, and in keeping with the theme of the book, the editors have assembled a lively collection of exemplars: chapters by prominent scholars each exploring the influence of in a focused area of interest. The disadvantage of this approach is that the book can feel somewhat overextended. The significant advantage, however, is that the reader experiences each chapter in the of the others, a juxtaposition that allows for the emergence of resonances, themes, and common principles across domains. In elaborating on the principle the contributors to this book emphasise the mind's mechanisms, situation-sensitivity, and agency over its content, permanence, and passivity. While written in large part by and for social psychologists, the volume should be of interest to any scholar fascinated by the mind's ecological nature. The early chapters examine the principle within physiologically oriented domains of inquiry. Chapter 2 discusses how epigenetic factors, reflecting the impact of physical and social contexts and experiences, can have an enduring influence on gene expression. In Chapter 3 the authors examine patterns of connectivity in the brain, making the point that cognitive complexity is not reducible to activation of isolated brain areas but rather that activity in any one region is sensitive to its neural context of changes in other parts of the brain. Chapter 4 deals with the field of social neuroendocrinology. Through a review of illustrative findings ranging from child upbringing to sexual behaviour, the authors describe how evolved physiological responses, such as increases or decreases in testosterone or prolactin, are sensitively tuned to specific social contexts. The next set of chapters concentrates on social and cognitive psychology. In Chapter 5, emotion is conceptualised as an interactive process, with emotions enacted in a relational context. The functional character of is examined, along with a discussion of how its meaning and dynamics are constrained by the interpersonal and cultural milieu including norms, communicative goals, and the emoting of others. In Chapter 6, we are reminded that contexts can make some thoughts easier to think than others. The author explores the incidental feeling accompanying metacognition, such as the degree of processing fluency experienced during memory recall or thought generation. Contextual influences on how these metacognitive factors are attributed can shape judgments, for example when familiarity of a belief is mistaken for credibility, or easily processed stimuli are judged as pleasing. Chapter 7 offers an overview of the situated cognition perspective in social psychology, highlighting key processes whereby social cognition unfolds in the moment, in the here and now of motivated action within a specific environment. Because of this interdependence of mind and the attitudes, expectations, norms, and goals of interaction partners can constrain private thought and overt behaviour. The middle chapters of the book examine situated views of the person. …

Exploring and developing graduate teaching assistants' pedagogies via lesson study

Graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) teach many undergraduates in introductory science courses in the USA. Previous literature suggests that GTAs would prefer more context-dependent opportunities to learn to teach more effectively. This study explores the impact of participation in a lesson study cycle with GTAs responsible for an undergraduate introductory course in Earth Science. Data were analyzed via a theoretical perspective of situated cognition and lesson study. Findings indicate GTAs felt limited by current contexts in the degree to which they could change the laboratory, their talk about teaching largely focused on logistical issues, yet via the lesson study process they began to discuss the learner in their seminars. Implications are presented that explore the applicability of lesson study in this context, the role of a science educator as a facilitator for reform in college science teaching, and the potential impact of this process on GTAs’ relationships with other faculty.

An Eye for Possibilities in the Development of Children with Cerebral Palsy: Neurobiology and Neuropsychology in a Cultural-Historical Dynamic Understanding

Taking children with Cerebral Palsy (CP) as an example, the article seeks an understanding ofchildren with disabilities that connects neuropsychological theories of neural development withthe situated cognition perspective and the child as an active participant in its social practices. Theearly brain lesion of CP is reconceptualised as a neurobiological constraint that exists in therelations between the neural, cognitive and social levels. Through a multi-method study of twochildren with CP, it is analysed how neurobiological constraints arise, evolve and sometimes areresolved through local matches between the child and its social practices. The result is discussedas support of a developmental science approach that includes processes at the social practice levelalong with knowledge of biological processes.

Contextualizing person perception: Distributed social cognition.

Research on person perception typically emphasizes cognitive processes of information selection and interpretation within the individual perceiver and the nature of the resulting mental representations. The authors focus instead on the ways person perception processes create, and are influenced by, the patterns of impressions that are socially constructed, transmitted, and filtered through social networks. As the socially situated cognition perspective (E. R. Smith & G. R. Semin, 2004) suggests, it is necessary to supplement consideration of intra-individual cognitive processes with an examination of the social context. The authors describe a theoretical model of processes of distributed social cognition that takes account of 3 levels: the individual perceiver, the interacting dyad, and the social network in which they are embedded. The authors' model assumes that perceivers elicit or create as well as interpret impression-relevant information in dyadic interaction and that perceivers obtain information from 3rd-party sources who are linked to perceivers and targets in social networks. The authors also present results of a multiagent simulation of a subset of these processes. Implications of the theoretical model are discussed, for the possibility of correcting biases in person perception and for the nature of underlying mental representations of persons.

Problem-Based Learning at the Faculty of Medicine of the Université de Montréal: A Situated Cognition Perspective

Purpose: This study describes the typical case of problem-based learning (PBL) application at the Faculty of Medicine of the Université de Montréal and its analysis from the perspective of situated cognition.Method: I used a typical case study to determine the general model of PBL application and performed my analysis by a global processing of information, against to the conceptual model of situated cognition.Results: A typical PBL tutorial case consists of a meeting of a group of about 8 students with a tutor to discuss a medical problem. Learning objectives are predetermined by faculty and recorded in the tutor’s handbook. Broadly speaking, the analysis revealed a certain kind of scaffolding within a “zone of proximal development” (ZPD).Conclusion: The adaptation of PBL at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Montreal is hybrid, original, and can be related to the model of cognitive apprenticeship, but the tutor’s role, however, does not fit the model of cognitive apprenticeship completely.

Toward Enriched Conceptions of Work Learning: Participation, Expansion, and Translation Among Individuals With/In Activity

This article argues that understandings of work learning within human resource development (HRD) theory can be fruitfully enriched by more fully incorporating practice-based perspectives. Three contemporary theories that analyze learning as a relation of individuals with and/or in activity are discussed: the participational perspective of situated cognition, the notion of expansion from cultural-historical activity theory, and the constructs of translation and mobilization presented by actor-network theory. These are not new to HRD, but this brings them together with published empirical workplace research, employing their constructs to highlight selected dynamics that may be useful tools for HRD theory development. One element in particular is read across the three theories: the dialectic of “flying” and “grounding,” or lines of discontinuity and continuity characterising work-learning. The argument is theory driven, drawing from HRD literature of work-learning and practice-based theories of social activity and knowledge production.

Feelings, Fit, and Funny Effects: A Situated Cognition Perspective

Recent research has documented numerous, apparently irrational influences on consumer judgment and choice, from the influence of temporary moods and metacognitive experiences to the role of “feeling right” about a decision strategy. From the metatheoretical perspective of situated cognition, such findings reflect the pragmatic, situated, and embodied nature of human cognition, which usually serves people well. Avnet and Higgins's (2006) target article extends the understanding of these processes by identifying the metacognitive experience of feeling right and by emphasizing the role of self-regulatory focus in judgment and decision making.

Constructivism, the So-Called Semantic Learning Theories, and Situated Cognition versus the Psychological Learning Theories

In this paper, the perspective of situated cognition, which gave rise both to the pragmatic theories and the so-called semantic theories of learning and has probably become the most representative standpoint of constructivism, is examined. We consider the claim of situated cognition to provide alternative explanations of the learning phenomenon to those of psychology and, especially, to those of the symbolic perspective, currently predominant in cognitive psychology. The level of analysis of situated cognition (i.e., global interactive systems) is considered an inappropriate approach to the problem of learning. From our analysis, it is concluded that the pragmatic theories and the so-called semantic theories of learning which originated in situated cognition can hardly be considered alternatives to the psychological learning theories, and they are unlikely to add anything of interest to the learning theory or to contribute to the improvement of our knowledge about the learning phenomenon.

Self-directedness, integration and higher cognition

In this paper, I discuss connections between self-directedness, integration and higher cognition. I present a model of self-directedness as a basis for approaching higher cognition from a situated cognition perspective. According to this model increases in sensorimotor complexity create pressure for integrative higher order control and learning processes for acquiring information about the context in which action occurs. This generates complex articulated abstractive information processing, which forms the major basis for higher cognition. I present evidence that indicates that the same integrative characteristics found in lower cognitive process such as motor adaptation are present in a range of higher cognitive process, including conceptual learning. This account helps explain situated cognition phenomena in humans because the integrative processes by which the brain adapts to control interaction are relatively agnostic concerning the source of the structure participating in the process. Thus, from the perspective of the motor control system using a tool is not fundamentally different to simply controlling an arm.

Developing a Laboratory Model for the Professional Preparation of Future Science Teachers: A Situated Cognition Perspective

Although laboratory activities are widely acknowledged as being fundamental to the teaching of science, many secondary science school teachers have limited knowledge of how to design and run effective teaching laboratories. Utilising a situated cognition theoretical framework, we discuss our collaborative efforts to develop a laboratory based model for the professional preparation of secondary level science teachers. Findings from the study suggest that the learning which occurs in the laboratory context may be transferred (with appropriate modifications) to the secondary science classroom. Implications also are presented for science teacher preparation, ongoing professional development, and further study.

Editorial

Editorial

The emergence of complex cognition during a unit on static electricity

This paper takes a situated cognition perspective on learning and cognitive development. According to situated cognition, knowledge is ultimately grounded in each individual's actions with the material and the social world. On the basis of this and other empirical investigations done in the Institute of Physics Education (IPE), a detailed framework that includes operationalizations for levels of situated learning is developed. This framework allows a quantification of certain aspects of the development of situated cognition in terms of complexity. A case study is provided describing the dynamics of individual processes of situated cognition development in the domain of electricity. The case study (a) provides a detail description of individual processes of cognitive development during learning electrostatics on different time‐scales, (b) describes general rules about the dynamic of individual cognitive processes and (c) portrays the influence of interactions on these processes.

Alternative approaches to teaching, learning and assessing mathematics

In this article I describe two different models of teaching mathematics and the different forms of knowledge that students developed in response to these. Five different assessments were used to assess students in two schools, as part of a longitudinal, ethnographic study of mathematics learning. The outcomes of these assessments are reported alongside the students' reflections of their knowledge use, within and outside school. Students at a ‘traditional’ school are shown to have developed an inert knowledge that, they claimed, was of no use to them in the ‘real world’. Students at a school using ‘progressive’ methods are shown to have developed more flexible and useful forms of knowledge that they were able to use in a range of settings. The results of the three-year study are used, both to problematise traditional models of teaching and assessing and to inform the perspective of situated cognition.

Student-centred instruction and learning processes in physics

During the 1970s, student-centred instruction—that is, “play orientation in physics education” (Spielorientierter Unterricht)—was at the centre of curriculum development at the Institute of Physics Education in Bremen. During the past decade, we investigated this kind of instruction with a particular focus on students' learning processes using a situated cognition perspective. Our research group at the Institute conducted several empirical studies of physics learning for different age groups. The aim of these case studies was to construct detailed understandings of how individual learning processes unfold. On the basis of these studies, we attempt to design physics lessons more effectively than they have been in the past. This paper exemplifies our approach providing information about the theoretical and methodological frameworks, the main outcomes of our studies; and reflections about the possibilities for “more effective” student-centred instruction.