Social domain theory (SDT) provides a model for how individuals identify, evaluate, and coordinate domains of social knowledge when judging socially relevant actions. To date, little research has focused on the cognitive processes that underlie these capacities. Utilizing principles from the literature on SDT and the hierarchical competing systems…

Almost half of the US public rejects the idea that humans originated via evolution rather than by supernatural design. Moreover, studies demonstrate that even biology teachers have difficulty teaching their students about evolution, often including creationist explanations as well. A typical response to such findings is the argument that greater…

This theoretical paper discusses some conceptual and methodological obstacles that one encounters when analyzing the contextual determination of thinking in psychology. First, we comment upon the various representations of the "cognitive" individual that have been formed over the years--from the epistemic subject to the psychological subject, and…

Most research on children's conception of death has probed their understanding of its biological aspects: its inevitability, irreversibility and terminal impact. Yet many adults subscribe to a religious conception implying that death marks the beginning of a new life. Two recent empirical studies confirm that in the course of development, children…

This paper discusses the distinct meanings of "internalization" and "interiorization" as ways of rendering intelligible the social constitution of the psychological in a line of research that started with Piaget and extended into a post-Piagetian reformulation of intelligence in successive generations of studies of the relations between social…

Despite being eclipsed in recent years by simulation theory, theory of mind and accounts of executive functioning, social-relational approaches to perspective taking and coordination based on the ideas of Jean Piaget and George Herbert Mead have never completely disappeared from the literature of developmental psychology. According to the…

The assumption of domain specificity has been invaluable to the study of the emergence of biological thought in young children. Yet, domains of thought must be understood within a broader context that explains how those domains relate to the surrounding cultures, to different kinds of cognitive constraints, to framing effects, to abilities to…

Wertsch's clarification of Vygotsky's claims about the role of social interaction in the development of children's thinking made an important contribution to educational research. Revisiting that clarification, I suggest that "talk" instead of "speech" best describes Vygotsky's concern with the functional dynamics of dialogue rather than the…

In his 1979 "Human Development" article reprinted in this anniversary issue, James Wertsch presented an approach to genetic analysis of the shifting regulation of problem-solving behavior in early childhood. In my reflections on Wertsch's seminal contribution, I discuss ways that subsequent inquiry built upon ideas he elaborated in the…

Comments on the article by Parker in this issue. Reviews Parker's discussion of imitation and circular reactions, and discusses the application of Darwin's ideas about evolution to the study of the development of individuals' awareness of the world and the mind. Considers the role of blind trial and error and of selection in evolution. (BC)

Examines Gal'perin's contribution to the analysis of internalization. Notes that Gal'perin believed mental processes are neither internal faculties nor a reflection of brain processes but external object-related actions. States that the concept of internalization can avoid internal-external dualism while emphasizing the human character of mental…

Elaborates some of the ideas of Baldwin and Piaget concerning the self-teaching functions of circular reactions, or self-induced repetition of particular schemes, and imitation. Argues that these functions are means for cognitive constructions. Discusses the evolution of imitation and circular reactions in primates. (BC)

Comments on the article by Arievitch and van der Veer in this issue, focusing on two issues. First, states that replacing the term "internalization" with another term such as "mastery" or "appropriation" is not merely terminological but actually does address distinctions between internal and external processes.…

The implications of the concept of praxis for general and developmental psychology are discussed via illustrations drawn from the writings of Laing and Mao Tse Tung. Different modes of cognitive functioning are presented in terms of both theory and research findings related to the concept of quasirationality. (JMB)

This paper shows how an open-ended nonlinear dialectic process can be depicted as a self-linearizing form which reveals transition structures as nodal points of self-reflection. (MS)