M.A. (Psychology) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

Cette thèse s’inscrit dans une approche incarnée de la cognition sociale, selon laquelle la capacité à comprendre les états mentaux d’autres individus ne nécessite aucune inférence mais repose plutôt sur l’expérience immédiate des informations sensori-motrices perçues lors d’interactions sociales. D’importantes limites ont été formulées à l’encontre de cette approche. Il est notamment considéré qu’elle ne peut rendre compte de phénomènes dits de « hauts niveaux » de mentalisation, comme l’inférence d’intentions sociales, puisqu’il n’existe pas de relations systématiques entre ces dernières et les systèmes de la perception et de l’action. A travers les études de cette thèse, nous avons tout d’abord mis en évidence des altérations systèmatiques de la cinématique de mouvements volontaires selon les intentions sociales poursuivies. Précisément, lorsqu’une action est produite avec l’intention de servir à un partenaire, ses caractéristiques spatio-temporelles sont amplifiées. Ensuite, nous avons démontré que ces déformations cinématiques étaient fonction des propriétés physiques, et particulièrement de la hauteur des yeux du partenaire. Enfin, nos résultats montrent que ces déformations cinématiques sont implicitement traitées lors d’interactions sociales et qu’elles entraînent l’inférence spontanée d’intention sociale. De façon intéressante, la capacité des participants à accéder à ces informations privées à partir de variations cinématiques était fortement liée à leurs capacités explicites de mentalisation. Ainsi, cette thèse fournit les premières évidences expérimentales soutenant la possibilité d’accéder spontanément aux intentions sociales d’autres personnes à partir de processus perceptifs et moteurs. / This thesis assumes a grounded approach to social cognition, which defends that our abilities to understand others’ mental states rely on our immediate experience of sensori-motor informations in social interactions and do not need any inference processes. Some critical theorethical limits have been addressed to this approach to social cognition. Typically, it is considered that this conception can not explain high order mentalization, as, for example, the inference of social intentions, because there are not systematic links between those cognitive constructs and the systems of perception and action. Through the studies of this thesis, we have in a first time showed that the kinematics of voluntary movements are influenced by the type of social intention that is endorsed by participants. Precisely, when an action is produced for a partner, its spatio-temporal characteristics are amplified. Then, we have demonstrated that these kinematic variations are influenced by the physical properties of the partner, and particularly by the eyes’ level. Finally, our results showed that these typical kinematic variations are implicitly processed during social interaction and that they can trigger spontaneous social intention attribution. Interestingly, the ability of participants to access others’ mental states from motor action variations is strongly related to their explicit mentalizing performances. In sum, this thesis provides the first experimental evidences supporting the possibility to spontaneously access to others’ social intentions from perceptive and motor processes.

Fung Yau-Fong. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 80-85). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / List of Tables --- p.v / List of Figures --- p.vi / Abstract (English) --- p.ix / Abstract (Chinese) --- p.x / Chapter CHAPTER ONE --- Introduction --- p.1 / """Knowing That One Knows""" / """Knowing"" versus ""Guessing""" / Theory of Mind: Self versus Other / "Children's ""Theory of Knowing How""" / "Children's ""Theory of Knowing That""" / Chapter CHAPTER TWO --- Experiment1 / Method --- p.17 / Participants / Materials / Procedure / Results and Discussion --- p.23 / "Pre-Exposure ""Knowing How"" and ""Knowing That""" / "Post-exposure ""Knowing How"" and ""Knowing That""" / False Belief Task / "Overall Performance on Knowing How, Knowing That, and False Belief" / Chapter CHPATER THREE --- Experiment2 / Method --- p.35 / Participants / Materials / Procedure / Results and Discussion --- p.41 / "Discriminate Measure of ""Knowing How,"" ""Knowing That""" / Performance as an Indicator for Knowing / False Belief Task / "Overall Performance on Knowing How, Knowing That, and False Belief" / Chapter CHAPTER FOUR --- Experiment3 / Method --- p.55 / Participants / Materials / Procedure / Results and Discussion --- p.59 / "Pre-Exposure ""Knowing How"" and ""Knowing That""" / "Overall Performance on Knowing How, Knowing That, and False belief" / Chapter CHAPTER FIVE --- General Discussion --- p.65 / Children's Understanding of Self-Knowledge and Other-Knowledge / "Children's Understandings of ""Knowing That´ح and ""Knowing How""" / Chapter i) --- "Pre-Exposure """"Knowing How"" and """"Knowing That ´ح" / Chapter ii) --- "Awareness of a Transition from ""Not Knowing"" to ""Knowing""" / Chapter iii) --- The Role of Informational Access in Knowledge Formation / Chapter iv) --- The Role of Performance Outcome in Knowledge Attribution / "Children's Understandings of ""Knowing That"" and ""False Belief""" / REFERENCES --- p.80 / APPENDIX / Record Sheets of Experiment 1 --- p.86 / Record Sheets of Experiment 2 --- p.92 / Record Sheets of Experiment 3 --- p.102

by Maggie Wai Ling Poon. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 70-78). / Abstract and questionnaire also in Chinese. / Chapter 1. --- ABSTRACT --- p.3 / Chapter 2. --- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS --- p.4 / Chapter 3. --- INTRODUCTION --- p.5 / Cognitive factors / The content specificity hypothesis / Empirical support of the cognitive model / Purpose of the present study / Chapter 4. --- METHOD --- p.21 / Subjects / Measures / Chapter 5. --- RESULTS --- p.28 / Psychometric properties / Correlational analysis / Hierarchical regression analyses / Chapter 6. --- DISCUSSION --- p.53 / Psychometric properties of instruments / Empirical support to the cognitive model / Implications of the study / Summary and conclusion / Comments and future direction / Chapter 7. --- REFERENCES --- p.70 / Chapter 8. --- APPENDICES --- p.79

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Cheung, Chi Ngai. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 243-250). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Chapter CHAPTER ONE: --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Overarching questions of the thesis --- p.4 / Chapter 1.2 --- Study One: The block-balancing experiment --- p.5 / Chapter 1.3 --- Study Two: The probability-estimation experiment --- p.9 / Chapter CHAPTER TWO: --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.13 / Chapter 2.1 --- Approaches for studying conceptual development --- p.13 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- Direction of development and its implications for the study of conceptual development --- p.17 / Chapter 2.1.1.1 --- Top-down: The Adaptive Control of Thought model (The ACT model) --- p.18 / Chapter 2.1.1.2 --- Bottom-up: The Representational Redescription model (The RR model) --- p.20 / Chapter 2.2 --- The Representational Redescription model --- p.23 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Theoretical development of the RR model --- p.23 / Chapter 2.2.2 --- The RR model in Beyond Modularity --- p.24 / Chapter 2.2.2.1 --- The role of representational redescription in development: The physics domain --- p.26 / Chapter 2.2.2.2 --- The role of representational redescription in development: The domain of mathematics --- p.29 / Chapter 2.2.2.3 --- Important concept of the RR model: development beyond behaviour mastery --- p.31 / Chapter 2.2.3 --- Remarks on the RR model and the representational redescription process --- p.35 / Chapter 2.2.4 --- Remarks on the meaning of the top-down and bottom-up directions of development --- p.36 / Chapter 2.3 --- Empirical evidence related to the RR model in the linguistic domain --- p.38 / Chapter 2.3.1 --- Support for the explicit-implicit distinction --- p.38 / Chapter 2.3.2 --- Spelling development --- p.40 / Chapter 2.4 --- Empirical evidence related to the RR model in the field of strategy development --- p.43 / Chapter 2.4.1 --- Siegler´ةs research on strategy: behavioural changes precede insights --- p.43 / Chapter 2.4.2 --- Dixon´ةs research of the representational redescription process --- p.46 / Chapter 2.5 --- Empirical evidence related to the RR model in the physics domain: The block balancing problem --- p.52 / Chapter 2.5.1 --- The original experiment --- p.52 / Chapter 2.5.2 --- Later research --- p.55 / Chapter 2.6 --- The RR model and the conceptual development of probability --- p.71 / Chapter 2.6.1 --- Piaget´ةs theory of conceptual development of probability --- p.71 / Chapter 2.6.2 --- Coexistence of the higher level and lower level representations --- p.73 / Chapter 2.6.3 --- Direction of development: Bottom-up --- p.74 / Chapter 2.7 --- The RR model and the distinction of explicit-implicit memory --- p.77 / Chapter CHAPTER THREE: --- METHOD --- p.83 / Chapter 3.1 --- Study One: The block-balancing experiment --- p.83 / Chapter 3.1.1 --- Research questions --- p.85 / Chapter 3.1.2 --- Participants --- p.86 / Chapter 3.1.3 --- Materials --- p.87 / Chapter 3.1.4 --- Design and procedure --- p.90 / Chapter 3.1.5 --- Analysis --- p.94 / Chapter 3.1.5.1 --- Behavioural performance --- p.95 / Chapter 3.1.5.2 --- Performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.99 / Chapter 3.1.5.3 --- Comparison of behavioural performance and performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.104 / Chapter 3.2 --- Study Two: The probability-estimation experiment --- p.108 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- Research questions --- p.109 / Chapter 3.2.2 --- Participants --- p.111 / Chapter 3.2.3 --- Materials --- p.112 / Chapter 3.2.4 --- Design and procedure --- p.116 / Chapter 3.2.4.1 --- The pretest --- p.117 / Chapter 3.2.4.2 --- The training phase --- p.120 / Chapter 3.2.4.3 --- The posttest --- p.121 / Chapter 3.2.5 --- Analysis --- p.124 / Chapter 3.2.5.1 --- Behavioural performance --- p.124 / Chapter 3.2.5.2 --- Performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.126 / Chapter 3.2.5.3 --- Comparison of behavioural performance and performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.132 / Chapter 3.3 --- Notes about feedback in the two experiments --- p.133 / Chapter 3.4 --- The pilot study and amendments made after the pilot study --- p.134 / Chapter CHAPTER FOUR: --- RESULTS AND DISCUSSION OF STUDY ONE --- p.138 / Chapter 4.1 --- Outline --- p.138 / Chapter 4.1.1 --- Notes on the participant code --- p.139 / Chapter 4.2 --- Behavioural performance --- p.139 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Success Score --- p.139 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- Initial Middle Placement Score --- p.141 / Chapter 4.2.3 --- Geometric Centre Area Placement Score (GCP Score) --- p.143 / Chapter 4.2.4 --- Comparison between the three behavioural measures --- p.145 / Chapter 4.2.5 --- Behavioural pattern --- p.147 / Chapter 4.2.5.1 --- Behavioural pattern of the geometric-centre theory (BGeo) --- p.147 / Chapter 4.2.5.2 --- Behavioural pattern reflecting the naive version of the law of torque (BTorque) --- p.149 / Chapter 4.3 --- Performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.150 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- Prediction Task --- p.150 / Chapter 4.3.1.1 --- Comparing the Prediction Score with the Success Score --- p.154 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Explanation types --- p.155 / Chapter 4.4 --- Comparison of behavioural performance and performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.162 / Chapter 4.4.1 --- Geometric-centre theory --- p.162 / Chapter 4.4.1.1 --- Implicit geometric-centre theory and explicit geometric-centre theory --- p.163 / Chapter 4.4.1.2 --- Implicit geometric-centre theory: level-I or El? --- p.164 / Chapter 4.4.2 --- Development from top-down and bottom-up --- p.167 / Chapter 4.4.2.1 --- Relationship between success in balancing individual blocks and the correct explanation --- p.167 / Chapter 4.4.2.2 --- Relationship between the behavioural pattern that agrees with the naive version of the law of torque and the explicit verbalization of the naive version of the law of torque --- p.170 / Chapter 4.5 --- Summary --- p.172 / Chapter 4.5.1 --- List of important findings related to the RR model --- p.172 / Chapter 4.5.2 --- List of important findings related to the age-related development of the block-balancing task --- p.175 / Chapter 4.5.3 --- Responding to key research questions in a nutshell --- p.177 / Chapter CHAPTER FIVE: --- RESULTS AND DISCUSSION OF STUDY TWO --- p.178 / Chapter 5.1 --- Outline --- p.178 / Chapter 5.1.1 --- Notes on participants' background knowledge --- p.178 / Chapter 5.2 --- Behavioural performance --- p.179 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Overall accuracy score --- p.179 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- Pretest and posttest score --- p.182 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Behavioural adherence of the half rule --- p.186 / Chapter 5.3 --- Performance that demonstrates explicit understanding --- p.188 / Chapter 5.3.1 --- Verbal explanations --- p.188 / Chapter 5.3.1.1 --- Explanation type F (Division/Fraction) --- p.190 / Chapter 5.3.1.2 --- Explanation type H (Half rule) --- p.192 / Chapter 5.3.1.3 --- Explanation type P (Plus minus) --- p.195 / Chapter 5.3.1.4 --- Explanation type C (Comparison) --- p.200 / Chapter 5.3.1.5 --- Explanation type L (Last question) and I (Implicit) --- p.203 / Chapter 5.3.1.6 --- Explanation type O (Others ´ؤ Idiosyncratic) --- p.205 / Chapter 5.3.2 --- Responses to the general questions after the posttest --- p.205 / Chapter 5.3.3 --- Counter suggestions in the posttest --- p.209 / Chapter 5.4 --- Comparison of behavioural performance and the performance that demonstrated explicit understanding --- p.216 / Chapter 5.4.1 --- Accuracy score of explanation type I --- p.216 / Chapter 5.4.2 --- Changes in the pretest and posttest performance of the group of 4 to 5 year olds --- p.217 / Chapter 5.4.3 --- Comparing the behavioural adherence of half rule with the performance of explanation type H --- p.219 / Chapter 5.5 --- Summary --- p.221 / Chapter 5.5.1 --- List of important findings related to the RR model --- p.221 / Chapter 5.5.2 --- List of important findings related to the age-related development of the probability-estimation task --- p.223 / Chapter 5.5.3 --- Responding to key research questions in a nutshell --- p.225 / Chapter CHAPTER SIX: --- CONCLUSION --- p.226 / Chapter 6.1 --- Summary of findings in Experiments One and Two --- p.226 / Chapter 6.1.1 --- Performance difference that reflects the distinction between implicit and explicit representations --- p.226 / Chapter 6.1.2 --- Top-down or bottom-up learning --- p.230 / Chapter 6.1.3 --- Is there a U-shaped performance curve? --- p.231 / Chapter 6.1.4 --- Other findings --- p.232 / Chapter 6.1.5 --- Summary --- p.233 / Chapter 6.2 --- Implications --- p.234 / Chapter 6.3 --- Limitations --- p.238 / Chapter 6.4 --- Suggestions for further studies --- p.240 / REFERENCES --- p.243

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Cognitive Science is at a crossroad. Since its inception, the prevailing paradigm in Cognitive Science (and associated fields such as Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive Psychology, and Linguistics), has been a formal, computer-based model of cognition - often termed the Symbol Processing System model (SPS) or cognitivism. This view, while still accepted by the majority of researchers, has been dogged by persistent and cutting criticism by various authors over many years. As well, the initial over-inflated promises made by the early practitioners within these fields have not come to fruition, and the initial enthusiasm has in many cases been reduced to frustration.Many researchers have looked to the field of connectionism as a solution, and this discipline has found a new lease of life after a serious setback in the early 1970s. The major emphasis within this area has been on feed-forward neural networks (FFNN), but this paradigm also has its detractors.In this thesis we critically evaluate both of these research programs, especially that of SPS. We propose a new model of human and animal cognition, termed Adaptive Behavioral Cognition (ABC), which integrates many current views on cognition, and provides a single-architecture, biologically-feasible theory that overcomes many of the problems associated with current models. As well as being an accurate description of the processes relevant to the new model, the term ABC is a none-too-subtle reference to the fact that we need to closely re-examine the aims and achievements of Cognitive Science and return to basic empirical findings in developing a theory of cognition.The new model synthesises, unifies and links together many previously disjoint ideas and observations, from the neural level through to neurological structures and to observed behaviour. The claims that we make of the model are that it is biologically and ++ / neurologically consistent and reasonable, and that it has properties more closely associated with the actual brain than either the computational (cognitivist) approach, or the simplistic FFNN. Further, the model is internally consistent and self-similar, and is consistent with the observed neuroanatomical structures of the cortex. It also provides for massive parallelism, yet retains a serial component through its use of temporal sequences.The ABC proposal outlined in this thesis takes the view that the processes of the brain are to learn associated and temporally connected sequences, rather than 'facts' or 'representations', and that the learned behaviours resulting from the associated temporal sequences are the means of cognition, rather than computational operations on representations.

Bibliography: leaves 347-361.