Do Apes Read Minds? by Andrews Kristin;

Author:Andrews, Kristin; [Andrews, Kristin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 3339472
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

8

The Science of Folk Psychological Explanation

Child: Mommy, I always ask why. Why do I always ask why?

Parent: Because you are curious about things.

Child: What is curious?

—Maureen Callanan and Lisa Oakes

Aspects of Explanation

In the last chapter, I suggested that theories of FP explanation are descriptive theories, unlike the normative theories of scientific explanation. I described paradigmatic FP explanation as consisting of three distinct elements: a curiosity state regarding a person or her behavior, the explanation seeking, and the generation of an acceptable explanation that resolves the affective tension that drove the explanation seeking in the first place. An FP explanation is information about the social domain that leads one to experience aha! (or at least leads to a decrease in the discomfort associated with cognitive dissonance).

In this chapter, I review the empirical research on explanatory behavior in children and adults to further undermine the claim that folk psychology requires the attribution of the propositional attitudes. We will see that in both children and adults, many explanations of intentional behavior make no reference to propositional attitudes. These data also undermine the idea that the folk think that propositional attitudes are the cause of all intentional behavior. We find that the folk think that some behaviors are caused by moods, emotions, traits, and other nonpropositional features. But we also find that some explanations do not cite causal features at all.

This discussion of what the folk actually do when they engage in explanatory behavior will help to form the account of FP explanation that is developed in the next chapter. With a greater understanding of what we in fact do when we explain behavior, we will be in a better position to answer the four questions regarding what a good theory of FP explanation must consist of.

We can begin by looking at the development of explanation seeking in children. As we will see, infants are already engaged in FP explanatory practices, and young verbal children begin to offer explanations of human behavior before they have much understanding of representational belief.

Explanation Seeking in Children

Infants

When do children begin to wonder why? In many accounts, infants are almost immediate wonderers. Long before they develop the ability to ask why-questions, infants engage in exploratory behaviors and make facial expressions such as pursed mouths and furrowed brows that some developmental psychologists interpret as expressing puzzlement and distress (Gopnik 2000). For Piaget (1936/1952), infants’ early exploration of their environment and their interest in novelty stem from the child’s need to make sense of the world in which she finds herself. The affective state of curiosity has motivational force (Berlyne 1960; Keller 1987) and drives exploratory behavior (Voss and Keller 1986). Infants’ early exploratory behavior is a sign of a curiosity state, and I argue that exploratory behavior in the social domain is an early form of FP explanation seeking.

Prelinguistic infants engage in many exploratory behaviors from an early age. According to some accounts, children are already

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