Development of Mental Representation

Theories and Applications

Irving E. Sigel

• Publisher: Psychology Press
• Year: 2013
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135690779
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Developmental Psychology
• Index: Psychology

There is a general and extensive literature in the development of representational thought and symbolic processes because of its centrality in human evolution. However, the umbrella of science and its method does not necessarily lead to a coherent conceptual model, or agreements among scholars. These basic differences among various disciplines have led to the creation of new and exciting realms of research. This book considers how representational or symbolic thought develops for children's use in a wide array of these circumstances.

PART I

Theories of Representation

CHAPTER 1

Approaches to Representation as a Psychological Construct: A Treatise in Diversity

IRVING E. SIGEL

Educational Testing Service

How knowledge is acquired, organized, and made available for use is the basic theme of this volume. The processes involved in such a profound activity require the individual to transform everyday perceptual and sensory experiences into some form of mental representation. This mental activity is a necessary requirement for adapting and functioning effectively in complex and diverse environments.

The challenge for social and behavioral scientists is to understand the nature of this process in a developmental context from the moment of birth, continuing throughout the life span.

The investigators devoted to the problem have to construct a theoretical model and appropriate methodology to zero in on the complex issues inherent in this type of research. A variety of theoretical models ranging from connectionism to constructivism and beyond to radical constructivism is extent (Damon, Kuhn, & Siegler, 1998). At first blush this diversity in concept and method, as well as in the populations studied, is disheartening and disquieting. The fragmentation, the lack of dialogue, and the stringent commitment to a point of view that at times borders on the polemic, would seem to preclude scientific progress. If, however, we are willing to view the field in evolutionary terms, we can expect some points of view to wither on the vine while others prosper. The reasons are too complex to discuss here, but reviews of the history of developmental science by Cairns (1998) and Valsiner (1998) provide perspectives that are more encouraging than despairing.

In this volume, the focus is on diversity and applicability of the psychological construct of mental representation, a central construct generally accepted as basic to knowledge acquisition, organization, and application. (See Damon, Kuhn, & Siegler, 1998, for a review of the various developmental theories that employ the mental representation construct.)

Essentially, the term representation refers to an instance that is equivalent to its referent; for example, the word landscape is equivalent to the three-dimensional natural landscape. Simply put, the word landscape has a meaning similar to not only the natural landscape, but also to a painting or a photograph of a landscape. In fact, each of these three instances (the word, the painting, and the photograph) are equivalent, but not identical. What makes the three instances equivalent is the common meaning attributed to them.

In sum, a representation refers to instances that are equivalent in meaning and in class membership, but different in mode of expression.

Although there is general agreement among most behavioral scientists, philosophers, and educators as to the basic definition, there is disagreement as to the universality, the origins, the developmental course, and the practical use of the term representation. The reasons for such diversity may be due to the aspects of representation that are being studied.

Thus in spite of agreement as to the importance of the representation construct, not only for cognitive functioning, but also for general functioning in the social and physical world, there is still considerable difference among those interested in mental representation, who differ with regard not only to definitions of mental representations but also to developmental course.

Bever (1986) summarized the issues where he wrote:

There are two fundamental processes that occur when we perceive and represent the world. We automatically form representations of what we perceive. We integrate conflicts in those representations by accessing perceptual and conceptual knowledge of a variety of kinds. The integration of such representational conflicts is itself accompanied by a release of emotional energy. These processes are functional in everyday perception, conceptual development, and problem solving. (pp. 325–326)

When this paragraph is read more closely and analyzed for clarification of the meaning for each of the terms (such as automatization or integration or representation), we discover the need to define each of the processes involved to reduce the potential ambiguities in the statement. A reflective analytic process will lead to divergences of opinion because some will argue, for example, about the form images take (or even whether there are images), whereas others might contend that images are representations “housed” in semantic or neural networks. What does integration of conflicts imply? Is there some resolution process involved? If automatic, does it mean we are not in control of these developing representational issues? The meanings of representation and of integration are probably the most contentious because of differences in the basic assumption of how to focus and describe these mental activities. (See Keil, 1997, for a discussion of some of the issues.) As it is written, the devil is in the details.

In addition, there are differences as to how representation is construed. Mandler (1998) describes the current representation landscape most clearly where she writes, “The diversity of approaches to representation breeds debate as to whether more than one kind of representation is necessary to describe the mind” (p. 256). The debate among developmental psychologists has moved from a conception of representation as the mental manipulation of symbolic forms to a host of other conceptions such as those exemplified within diverse theoretical orientations such as connectionism, symbol systems, and constructivism.

The intrinsic changes in the conception of representation has been the redefinition of the specific topics elected for study, for example, analogical representation and acquisition of declarative and procedural representational systems. Of even greater significance is the study of representation among infants. With this shift, the debates have moved beyond the singular notion of representation in the context of knowledge acquisition and symbolic transformations to the basic questions of “foundations of mind and how to characterize the nature of knowledge in infancy” (Mandler, 1998, p. 256). In spite of the diversity and debate, however (Thelen & Smith, 1994), there is general agreement that representation is central to human cognitive function and further the understanding of its nature will contribute to our unraveling of some of the mysteries of organismic development. The consequence of this interest is a burgeoning literature in the fields of cognitive science, neuropsychology, developmental psychology, education, visual media, and even psychotherapy and social cognition. However, there is no single place where such discussion of these various fields can be found. This volume is especially intended to help developmental psychologists to become acquainted with an array of literature. In this way I see this set of chapters as a sample contributing in three ways: (a) providing new knowledge, (b) encouraging dialogue and helping to move the field forward, and (c) demonstrating the general usefulness of mental representation in practical settings. Thus in the long run such increased awareness of what has been done and what is being done should yield a richer corpus of integrated knowledge (Sigel, 1993).

A BRIEF HISTORY

During the past 100 years, increasing efforts have been made to come to understand the how and why of mental functioning, such as thought and language. Interest in these problems has waxed and waned because of continual changes in epistemologies influencing psychological theory and methods of research. The major shifts were from mentalistic models with introspection to behavioristic strategies eschewing mentalisms while focusing only on actions and behavior. Currently there is acceptance of mental models with an emphasis on mental processes incorporating language and thought (Valsiner, 1998).

The increased interest and proliferation of research in the cognitive genre, however, did lead to an exponential increase in the creation of diverse approaches to the study of the development of representational thought and language. The problems of interest were framed using different epistemologies, theories, and methods. For example, Piaget and his colleagues at the Institute of Genetic Epistemology in Geneva developed a unique and original approach to the studying the development of representational thought with children from infancy to adolescence (Piaget, 1962). Perhaps it is coincidental, but soon after Piaget ‘s work became known in the United States, especially after the publication of Flavell’s major summary of his work in 1963, behavioral scientists began working on developing a new interdiscpinary science of cognition, which they called cognitive science. A framework was developed by which to examine issues such as intelligence, knowledge acquisition, and the utilization and development of language in appropriate ecological settings. Cognitive science evolved into an interdisciplinary science when it became evident that no one field could encompass the complexity of the functioning human mind. So, the field was defined as comprised of “elements of psychology, computer science, linguistics, philosophy and education” (Bobrow & Collins, 1975, p. ix). Central to this science was the development of the theory of representation. (See Bobrow & Collins, 1975, for a review of this early development.)

As the work of Piaget became better known among developmental psychologists, interest turned to cognitive development. Concomitant research activity in the cognitive science field led to considerable research productivity. Add to this the creation of additional mental models of cognitive development in the fields of language, computer science, brain function, and the ecological setting in which all of these cognitive functions evolve, a proliferation of theories and models for research emerged. (See Keil, 1998, for a thorough exposition of the field of cognitive science, including development.) Within each of these, the development of representation has remained of central importance.

That debates in the cognitive development arena still prevail speaks to its vitality. These discussions are exegeses of different theories and methods, all directed at the same set of processes and functions inherent in Bever’s (1986) aforementioned quotation. What makes the debates so complex is that each investigator unpacks the concept of representation by differentionally targeting representational systems, for example, words, pictures, music, or mathematics. The particular choice an investigator makes leads to findings relative to that particular system only, so that representation as a singular overall process is elaborated or explained. Thus there is the question as to whether the findings from a particular study (e.g., representational understanding of media) allow for universal generalization to other systems such as words or musical notations or are they particular to that system. Or, to frame the question in developmental terms, does understanding the course of development of picture comprehension inform us about the course of the development of verbal language? Similarly, are generalizations obtained in the study of children’s comprehension of language comprehension applicable to children’s developing representational competence in general (Sigel, 1993)?

Ernst von Glasersfeld (1987) addressed the basic question of representational generalizations. The essential meaning that undergirds the various uses of representation from an essential perspective, irrespective of context or content, is that a representation stands for something other than itself. As von Glasersfeld has indicated, its identity is relative to its referent. It is not an independent entity. As a painting is a representation of a landscape, that landscape, even if material, is a representative of landscapes. In this case it is an instance of a population of landscapes. So, in a sense, every instance is a representative of its class. We never see the whole. If it is the case that representation or representativeness (or the synonym replica) is beset with so many definitional concerns, then is representation a useful scientific concept because it fails to meet the criterion of specificity and particularity? From a positivistic view, a definition requires these criteria so an operation can instantiate the definition. In effect, the definition becomes an operation of the concept in question. However, such definitions do not necessarily disambiguate the term because operational definitions are intrinsically verbal and/or actions that cannot avoid ambiguity.

Von Glasersfeld (1987) went further when he developed definitional problems where he wrote about conceptualizing representation: “The situation is particularly complicated because the word ‘representation’ is fraught with ambiguity that, for the most part, remains hidden and thus creates untold conceptual confusion. As so often, however, ambiguities surface and become quite obvious when we translate into another language” (p. 216). Later on, von Glasersfeld (1995) continued his analysis of problems of representation, where he argued that there is no a device to decide what meaning is to be conveyed. For meaning to be shared it is necessary for the writer to specify the referents if mutual understanding is to occur.

Definitions of the word representation usually assume a common referent so that the meaning of the concept is shared. Yet, in the psychological literature, the term representation is often used without providing any context. Thus in psychological parlance, invoking the term representation alone does not provide a common referent, thereby leading to misunderstanding and miscommunication. It seems to be the case that the meaning is dependent on the epistemological orientation of the user. If the reader of the text employing the term does not share the epistemological base or the referents for the term, it then results in misunderstanding. For example, for Piaget (1951), representation is used in two ways: (a) as the common meaning of something standing for something else, such as a picture of a flower standing for the three-dimensional living flower, and (b) as referring to general intelligence. In the latter case, the referents are ambiguous and not specified, so the reader is left to his or her own interpretive differences. For now, each one is dedicated to the search for understanding how knowledge is organized, represented, and utilized within his or her conceptual system with little interest in mutual engagement..

Representation as described previously implies a one-way process; that is, the child assimilates an experience that forms an internal image or a verbal representation. However, the process does not stop there. When the child uses this internal representation in the service of solving a problem, uttering a statement, or drawing a picture, he or she is re-presenting that experience. The form in which the experience is represented may be in a form other than its original. For example, the child reads a story and then creates a narrative. The words that were read silently are now transformed into oral language. This interactive process is how representation usually functions in our daily lives. In fact, Hillary Putnam (1988) stated it so well when he wrote:

What makes it plausible that the mind (or brain) thinks (or “computes”) using representations is that all the thinking we know about uses representations. But none of the methods of representation that we know about—speech, writing, painting, carving in stone, etc.—has the magical property that there cannot be different representations with the same meaning. None of the methods of representation that we know about has the property that representations intrinsically refer to whatever it is that they are used to refer to. All of the representations we know about have an association with their referent which is contingent, and capable of changing as the culture changes or as the world changes. This by itself should be enough to make one highly suspicious of theories that postulate a realm of “representations.”…(pp. 21–22)

These representations are all mental, but it is important to realize that the ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction: From Terra Incognita to Terra Cognita: The Science of Representation
• I Theories of Representation
• II Application of Representation in Practice
• III Visual Representation as Pictorial
• Author Index
• Subject Index