Ready to Teach or Ready to Learn: A Critique of the Natural Pedagogy Theory

Nakao, Hisashi; Andrews, Kristin

doi:10.1007/s13164-014-0187-2

Cited by 16 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 49 publications

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“…The first reason arises from a study by Pinkham and Jaswal (2011), who showed that in spite of seeing a hands-free demonstration in a communicative context, 18-month-old infants do not imitate head touching when they have had the opportunity before the demonstration to discover through their own efforts that touching the box with their hands switches on the light. As Nakao and Andrews (2014) pointed out, this finding suggests that in infancy even rational imitation does not trump or overwrite individual learning in a way that would allow culturally accumulated wisdom to be passed down from one generation to the next without corruption.…”

Section: The Componentsmentioning

confidence: 86%

“…Similarly, they said that infants “conceive gaze shifts as referential acts” (Csibra & Gergely, 2006, p. 10) and described infant imitation as “rational” (Gergely, Bekkering, & Király, 2002). As a consequence of this ambiguity, the theory of natural pedagogy has been criticized both for being too lean—placing too much emphasis on automatic processes (Nakao & Andrews, 2014)—and for being too rich—attributing to infants inferential feats that are likely to be beyond their cognitive power (Beisert et al, 2012).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Born Pupils? Natural Pedagogy and Cultural Pedagogy

Heyes

2016

Perspect Psychol Sci

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The theory of natural pedagogy is an important focus of research on the evolution and development of cultural learning. It proposes that we are born pupils; that human children genetically inherit a package of psychological adaptations that make them receptive to teaching. In this article, I first examine the components of the package-eye contact, contingencies, infant-directed speech, gaze cuing, and rational imitation-asking in each case whether current evidence indicates that the component is a reliable feature of infant behavior and a genetic adaptation for teaching. I then discuss three fundamental insights embodied in the theory: Imitation is not enough for cumulative cultural inheritance, the extra comes from blind trust, and tweaking is a powerful source of cognitive change. Combining the results of the empirical review with these insights, I argue that human receptivity to teaching is founded on nonspecific genetic adaptations for social bonding and social learning and acquires its species- and functionally specific features through the operation of domain-general processes of learning in sociocultural contexts. We engage, not in natural pedagogy, but in cultural pedagogy.

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Section: The Componentsmentioning

confidence: 86%

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confidence: 99%

Born Pupils? Natural Pedagogy and Cultural Pedagogy

Heyes

2016

Perspect Psychol Sci

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“…In our opinion, previous experimental research has focused on very specific pragmatic frames (mostly labeling) and described their functions for a specific kind of learning. What is still lacking, however, is a broader perspective that accounts for other learning situations ( Nakao and Andrews, 2014 ) and thus other possible pragmatic frames. One interesting recent study was conducted by Moore et al (2013) .…”

Section: Pragmatic Frames—an Introduction and Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

An Alternative to Mapping a Word onto a Concept in Language Acquisition: Pragmatic Frames

et al. 2016

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The classic mapping metaphor posits that children learn a word by mapping it onto a concept of an object or event. However, we believe that a mapping metaphor cannot account for word learning, because even though children focus attention on objects, they do not necessarily remember the connection between the word and the referent unless it is framed pragmatically, that is, within a task. Our theoretical paper proposes an alternative mechanism for word learning. Our main premise is that word learning occurs as children accomplish a goal in cooperation with a partner. We follow Bruner’s (1983) idea and further specify pragmatic frames as the learning units that drive language acquisition and cognitive development. These units consist of a sequence of actions and verbal behaviors that are co-constructed with a partner to achieve a joint goal. We elaborate on this alternative, offer some initial parametrizations of the concept, and embed it in current language learning approaches.

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“…When a child wants something that she is usually permitted, an adult's refusal doesn't just cause the child to be upset that she didn't get what she wanted; the child gets mad at the adult. And when a child comes to trust an adult, she uses that adult as a model for how she should act—she will imitate that adult even when the behaviors appears to be causally inefficient, thinking that this is how the action should be performed (see Nakao and Andrews ).…”

Section: Normativity In Pluralistic Folk Psychologymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Folk Psychological Spiral: Explanation, Regulation, and Language

Andrews¹

2015

The Southern J of Philosophy

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In this paper I intend to argue that an explanatory role for folk psychology is also a regulative role, and that language is not required for these regulative functions. I will start by drawing out the relationship between prediction, explanation, and regulation of behavior according to both mindreading approaches to folk psychology and the pluralistic account I defend. I will argue that social cognition does not take the form of causal reasoning so much as it does normative reasoning, and will introduce the folk psychological spiral. Then I will examine the cognitive resources necessary for participating in the folk psychological spiral, and I will argue that these cognitive resources can be had without language. There is preliminary evidence that some other species understand one another through a normative lens that, through looping effects, creates expectations that community members strive to live up to.

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Ready to Teach or Ready to Learn: A Critique of the Natural Pedagogy Theory

Cited by 16 publications

References 49 publications

Born Pupils? Natural Pedagogy and Cultural Pedagogy

Born Pupils? Natural Pedagogy and Cultural Pedagogy

An Alternative to Mapping a Word onto a Concept in Language Acquisition: Pragmatic Frames

The Folk Psychological Spiral: Explanation, Regulation, and Language

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