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The Evolution of the Human Self: Tracing the Natural History of Self‐Awareness
Abstract
Previous discussions of the evolution of the self have diverged greatly in their estimates of the date at which the capacity for self-thought emerged, the factors that led self-reflection to evolve, and the nature of the evidence offered to support these disparate conclusions. Beginning with the assumption that human self-awareness involves a set of distinct cognitive abilities that evolved at different times to solve different adaptive problems, we trace the evolution of self-awareness from the common ancestor of humans and apes to the beginnings of culture, drawing upon paleontological, anthropological, biological, and psychological evidence. These data converge to suggest that that modern self-thought appeared just prior to the Middle-Upper Paleolithic transition, approximately 60,000 years ago.Recto running head: Evolution of the Self.
... The extended self and the conceptual self are the most highly developed in humans relative to other species (Leary & Buttermore, 2003), and critical for understanding the development of academic self-concepts. The extended self involves an awareness that the self continues across time and integrates past, present, and potential future representations of oneself. ...
... For hominins (ancestors of modern humans), Leary and Buttermore (2003) argued that the extended self emerged with Homo habilis about 2 million years ago, as evidenced by their construction and transport of tools across locations. The latter suggests some forethought and planning and is not found in chimpanzees and thus not likely to have existed in the ancestor common to chimpanzees and humans. ...
... Whatever the mix of selection pressures, the evolutionary advantages of an extended self and the ability to generate mental simulations of potential future states include the ability to plan (e.g., bring tools to a forage site; Leary & Buttermore, 2003) and to generate and rehearse various strategies for bringing about desired outcomes (Geary, 2005). In other words, people can think about themselves at some future time, and this representation can be compared to a mental representation of one's current situation. ...
Schooling is ubiquitous in the modern world and academic development is now a critical aspect of preparation for adulthood. A step back in time to pre-modern societies and an examination of life in remaining traditional societies today reveals that universal formal schooling is an historically recent phenomenon. This evolutionary and historical recency has profound implications for understanding academic development, including how instructional practices modify evolved or biological primary abilities (e.g., spoken language) to create evolutionarily novel or biologically secondary academic competencies (e.g., reading). We propose the development of secondary abilities promotes the emergence of academic self-concepts that in turn are supported by evolved systems for self-awareness and self-knowledge. Unlike some forms of self-knowledge (e.g., relative physical abilities) that appear to be universal and central to many people’s overall self-concept, the relative importance of academic self-concepts are expected to be dependent on explicit social and cultural supports for their valuation. These culturally contingent self-concepts are contrasted with universal social and physical self-concepts, with implications for understanding variation students’ relative valuation of academic competencies and their motivations to engage in academic learning.
... Among the crucial differences between other apes and humans is a highly developed self-awareness, which confers in humans an ability to plan and imagine the future consequences of their actions (Leary & Buttermore 2003, Byrne & Bates 2007. Although glimmers of self-awareness and planning, as well as rudimentary forms of other phenomena I. Jakovlić The missing human baculum discussed below (tools and cultural transmission), can be observed in other great apes and in some other animal species (Povinelli & Cant 1995, Kappeler et al. 2010, Klump et al. 2019, their complexity, plasticity, and sophistication remain unique to humans (Bingham 1999, Leary & Buttermore 2003, Boyd & Richerson 2009). ...
... Among the crucial differences between other apes and humans is a highly developed self-awareness, which confers in humans an ability to plan and imagine the future consequences of their actions (Leary & Buttermore 2003, Byrne & Bates 2007. Although glimmers of self-awareness and planning, as well as rudimentary forms of other phenomena I. Jakovlić The missing human baculum discussed below (tools and cultural transmission), can be observed in other great apes and in some other animal species (Povinelli & Cant 1995, Kappeler et al. 2010, Klump et al. 2019, their complexity, plasticity, and sophistication remain unique to humans (Bingham 1999, Leary & Buttermore 2003, Boyd & Richerson 2009). In hominins, the increased size (ratio) of neocortex and striatum facilitated novel ways of interacting with and exploiting the environment, thereby exposing them to novel selection pressures and facilitating complex adaptive strategies, including not only the use of tools, but also the invention of new behaviour and social learning (Reader & Laland 2002, van Schaik & Burkart 2011. ...
... Due to its prerequisite, relatively well-developed planning ability, the timing of the loss may offer another indirect way to disprove the new hypothesis outlined here. The evolution of human self-awareness remains hypothetical (Shultz et al. 2012), but a detailed attempt to trace it is provided by Leary and Buttermore (2003), who proposed that a strong increase in brain size associated with the appearance of the genus Homo was accompanied by extended self-awareness, and associated the first glimmers of 'modern' self-awareness with Neanderthals (300 thousand years ago). As other great apes do not possess the required I. Jakovlić The missing human baculum ability, and Leary and Buttermore (2003) proposed that self-awareness of Australopiths resembled that of the human-chimp ancestor, in the context of this scenario the baculum should have been present at least in all hominin lineages predating the appearance of the genus Homo, ≈2.4 million years ago (Antón et al. 2014). ...
Unlike most primates and all other great apes, humans Homo sapiens do not possess a baculum (penile bone). I discuss the shortcomings of previous hypotheses to explain the loss of the baculum, argue that they fail to explain it fully, and show that the evolutionary history of this loss remains enigmatic. I also propose a new hypothesis: that conspecific aggression, in combination with the development of self‐awareness, may have played a role in the loss. If the presence of a baculum exacerbated the prevalence and severity of penile injuries resulting from blunt trauma to a flaccid penis, increasing ability to foresee the consequences of their actions would also enable hominins to realise that these injuries are a useful tool in male–male competition. This behavioural innovation, planned conspecific aggression with the goal of temporary exclusion of competitors from the breeding pool, would create an environment in which a genetic mutation for a penis without a baculum (or with an unossified baculum) would strongly increase the fitness of the mutant phenotype. Along with the hominin propensity for social learning and cultural transmission, this hypothetical scenario may explain why this phenotype became fixed in all human populations.
... Construal of self-concept: evolutionary psychology perspective EP proposes that the self-concept of all living organisms falls under three distinct categories (Ajzen, 2005;O'Mara and Gaertner, 2019;Sedikides and Skowronski, 1997): the subjective-self, the objective-self and the symbolic-self. The human species, being the most advanced creature of evolution, possesses selfhood that is conceptualised as the symbolic-self (Leary and Buttermore, 2003). ...
... Notes 1 There are three aspects to the symbolic self: the representational aspect, executive function and reflexive potential Skowronski, 2003, Leary andButtermore, 2003). The representational aspect represents one's personality and characteristics in the memory system including knowledge about goals, values and feelings. ...
Purpose
The purpose of the study is to propose a framework for understanding the dynamism of the human self-system from evolutionary and socio-psychological perspective. The study aims to help scholars interested to use an evolutionary lens for examining consumer behaviour.
Design/methodology/approach
Relying on the principle of self-cybernetics, the study proposed a general framework explaining the operating mechanism of human self-system. The proposed framework incorporates the socio-psychological and the evolutionary perspective of the human self-concept.
Findings
The framework may help consumer scholars to integrate socio-psychological and evolutionary theories to produce novel and testable hypotheses.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt to propose a framework based on the principle of cybernetics to facilitate the use of an evolutionary lens in consumer research.
... One of the most fascinating yet empirically underexplored facets of the human mind is its ability for self-referential capacity, called "self-awareness" or "meta-awareness." In the history of psychology, many attempts have been made to describe (Geary & Xu, 2022) and retrace the origin of this ability (Leary & Buttermore, 2003), and in the last two decades, the study of metacognition has aided this endeavor (Proust, 2019). At its origin, metacognition was mostly conceived as declarative only and related to language skills and metamemory (Flavell, 1979), but it is now considered to also include a procedural or non-conceptual facet that is independent from the declarative facet and from language acquisition (Beran, 2012). ...
Purpose
Despite the presence of mystical-type experiences in psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT), an understanding of the cognitive processes involved is still lacking. Guided by theory and empirical research, we hypothesized a cognitive-grounded perspective based on current metacognition models to promote the understanding of the psychological processes involved in mystical-type experiences induced by psychedelic substances.
Method
The definition of metacognition is reviewed, with a particular focus on its role in psychotherapy and how it is used to understand altered states of consciousness such as meditation, lucid dreaming, and ecstatic epilepsy. We theoretically posited that metacognition is affected by psychedelic substance intake. We used metacognition models to understand the noetic facet of the mystical-type experience potentially induced by psychedelics, focusing on insight processes and proposing a specific definition of the “Aha!”/ “Eureka!” experience as a metacognitive feeling of epistemic gain.
Results
We hypothesized that the noetic feature of the psychedelic-induced mystical-type experience might account for the activation of procedural, performance-based, outcome-related metacognitive feelings, which are metacognitive feelings of epistemic gain.
Conclusions
We review the potential implications of this framework within PAT in relation to clinically relevant aspects such as therapeutic preparation, intention setting, and outcome and integration; the use of music; traumatic memory recall; therapists’ self-experience; suggestibility; and spiritual bypassing. Ultimately, we describe different lines of further research.
... Humans are the only animals that can think and pay conscious attention to the abstract idea of 'self ' (Leary and Buttermore, 2003;Rochat, 2018). In their Objective Self-Awareness Theory, Duval and Wicklund (1972) introduced the concept of self-awareness, the act of recognizing and contemplating oneself as an object of attention. ...
Introduction
Previous research has highlighted the duality of self-consciousness, which simultaneously plays adaptive and maladaptive roles. This study aims to develop a measure that categorically distinguishes between different types of self-consciousness styles based on the Regulatory Focus Theory (RFT) and examines their relationship with mental health-related indicators.
Methods
Data were gathered through an online mental health survey conducted at a University Student Counseling Center in Seoul. The study involved exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, and reliability and validity analysis, which resulted in the development of a 14-question Self-Consciousness Type Scale (SCTS).
Results
Both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses validated the two-factor structure of the SCTS. The fit indices of the final model indicated a good fit, with high internal consistency for both sub-factors. Convergent and discriminant validity were confirmed through correlations between the sub-scales. Cluster analysis identified four distinct subtypes of self-consciousness styles: Growth-oriented, Defensive, Ambivalent, and Low-focus self-consciousness. Group difference analysis revealed significant differences in mental health-related variables among the subtypes, supporting the 2 × 2 model of prevention-focused and promotion-focused self-consciousness.
Discussion
The findings support the SCTS as a valid measurement tool capable of distinguishing four distinct types of self-consciousness, aligning with the multidimensional model of self-consciousness. The study’s limitations and implications were discussed based on the results, emphasizing the potential applications of the SCTS in mental health research and practice.
... Individual: This begins at the level of the self. It was probably the power of self-awareness, propelled by self-reflection, that was one of the essential drivers of a remarkably rapid appearance of human civilization 40,000 to 60,000 years ago (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). Self-awareness can also be looked upon as self-consciousness (Fenigstein et al., 1975). ...
Conscious systemic leadership (CSL) is a theoretical construct that draws from Shiva consciousness. Systemic leadership (SL) is an emergent phenomenon that draws on synergies and concerted efforts of several people and institutions operating across several places and levels aspiring to create a purposeful and meaningful existence for us. A consciousness-based approach enables us to undergo a mind-shift from the individual to the collective, from short-term to long-term, from rigidity to fluidity, from holding-on to letting-go, and from results-focus to learning-orientation. The philosophy of Shiva is drawn on to understand that consciousness is the substratum of reality, an insight used to build the theoretical construct of CSL. In Shiva consciousness, reality is embodied in our experience of the world through a transcendental and eternal process of fusion and dance of energies between the opposing archetypes of purusha and prakriti; pure consciousness and the creative force, respectively. Everywhere, in every minute attribute of reality, a “self” is present, which is the universal consciousness of Shiva. CSL demands a set of new thinking and practices to bring the concept to life. CSL makes a new addition to the field of SL as the first attempt in the literature to draw on perspectives from Hindu philosophy.
... Specificities of human self-consciousness have been created during that time. Besides interesting approaches differing from the one proposed here [1], little is known about how these specificities came up [2,3]. We propose here to address that subject with an evolutionary scenario using meaningful representations, identifications with conspecifics and anxiety management. ...
We all agree that our human minds are results of primate evolution. We humans are self-conscious. The separation of our human lineage from the chimpanzee one began about 7MY ago (pan-homo split). Specificities of human self-consciousness have been created during that time. Besides interesting approaches differing from the one proposed here [1], little is known about how these specificities came up [2, 3]. We propose here to address that subject with an evolutionary scenario using meaningful representations, identifications with conspecifics and anxiety management. Taking the beginning of the pan-homo split as a starting point we look at how an evolutionary scenario could have led to our human self-consciousness as object and as subject. An evolutionary anxiety is highlighted as having been a key contributor to the evolutionary scenario with perspectives on a possible future of self-consciousness. Human self-consciousness is defined here as the meaningful representation of one's own entity, with the capability to think and talk about it. The evolutionary scenario proposed here is an extension of a previous version [11] that uses an evolution of meaningful representations introduced in previous works [8]. The scenario starts with two types of meaningful representations carried by our pre-human ancestors: representations of parts of themselves (seen hands, heard shouting, actions, …) and representations of conspecifics as entities existing in the environment. The next step uses elementary versions of intersubjectivity and of identifications with conspecifics that our primate ancestors were capable of. It is proposed that these performances have brought the two types of representations to merge and bring our ancestors to progressively represent their own entity as existing in the environment like conspecifics were represented. We consider that evolutionary approach as introducing an elementary form of self-consciousness as object and as subject, both coming in together. We group them into an "ancestral self-consciousness" which was to evolve into our human self-consciousness [4]. Such approach avoids the need of a pre-reflective self-consciousness [7]. The scenario considers that identifications took place also with suffering or dying conspecifics. These identifications were sources of new fears and anxieties that the scenario groups in an "evolutionary anxiety", source of important mental sufferings that our ancestors had to limit. Different possibilities were available for that. The scenario proposes that the chimpanzee lineage may have limited what was an unbearable mental suffering by stopping the development of identifications with conspecifics, and by this also stopping a possible evolution toward self-consciousness. This would have led to today chimpanzees. On the other side, our human lineage may have developed anxiety limitation tools like caring, pleasure, anticipation, communication and imitation; such tools also favoring the evolution of our lineage toward human minds. This is illustrated in the scenario by the introduction of an "evolutionary engine". In addition, the capacity for anticipation attached to self-consciousness has amplified the evolutionary anxiety, leading it to become an overall "ancestral anxiety" which is still present and active in our human minds (with anxiety limitations as a key constraints to satisfy). The many anxiety limitation processes introduced in our lineage during the pan-homo split were interrelated. Many came up in addition to the few ones listed here above. Most remain in our human minds at an unconscious level and are active in our everyday lives, much more than assumed so far. Considering a possible future of human self-consciousness, nothing tells that human evolution is terminated. Also, the evolutionary scenario introduces the possibility for some anxiety limitation processes to be sources of evil behaviors, more precisely related to a possible pleasure procured by the suffering of others [9]. That (disturbing) background could introduce a better understanding of human mind, and so be an entry point to its future in terms of potential improvements of human nature. The scenario also introduces an evolutionary nature of reflectivity [10] which can question the philosophical need for a pre-reflective self-consciousness. Such perspective can also introduce a naturalization of introspection, and then allow to consciously question the nature and content of our mental states. This could open a path for a tentative naturalization of the "what it is like" question for humans and make available an evolutionary link between self-consciousness and phenomenal consciousness. A last point to highlight is that the proposed evolutionary scenario uses performances of life like inter-subjectivity. This brings to note that a full understanding of the proposed scenario needs an understanding about the nature of life which is not available today. A lot remains to be done on these subjects. Continuations are introduced.
... Al igual que las otras capacidades, el reto consiste en conocer en qué grado se habrían movido los homininos extintos. Autoconciencia y ToM habrían coevolucionado (Cole 2012;Learey et al. 2003) a partir de la habilidad de bucear en la mente propia, hacia la de los demás. Esta capacidad no es exclusiva de los humanos modernos, sino que está presente en muchas otras especies sociales (Call et al. 2008), dadas las ventajas evolutivas que ofrece. ...
RESUMEN: La Arqueología Cognitiva utiliza cons-tructos prestados de la Psicología con el fin de analizar el tipo de mente subyacente a las evidencias del registro arqueológico. En este caso se realizará un breve acerca-miento a las primeras representaciones gráficas rupes-tres paleolíticas, caracterizadas por su color rojo y au-sencia de figuración, bajo la óptica de las capacidades cognitivas de mayor protagonismo en la mente de los hu-manos modernos. Para ello se analizará la naturaleza de las capacidades primarias y su combinación en las emer-gentes, para aplicarlas a las evidencias rupestres. Como conclusión, es posible argumentar que el estilo de algu-nas representaciones está influenciado por nuestras ca-racterísticas neurobiológicas, y que las capacidades cog-nitivas necesarias para llevar a cabo las representacio-nes no figurativas más antiguas ya estarían presentes en Homo neanderthalensis. ABSTRACT: Cognitive Archaeology tends to use borrowed constructs from Psychology in order to analyze the kind of mind which underlies the archaeological record evidence. In this case, a brief approach to the earliest palaeolithic graphic cave representations, characterized by red color and figurativeness absence, will be carried out under the main cognitive capacities' perspective in the modern human mind. To this purpose it will be analyzed the nature of the primary capacities and their combination into the emergent ones, to apply them to the cave art representations. As a conclusión it is possible to support that the style of many representations is influenced by our neurobiological characteristics, and that cognitive capacities neccesary to carry out the earliest non-figurative representations were already present in Homo neanderthalensis.
... According to the information from the paleontological and archeological records, we probably cannot speculate too much about what features, areas or abilities have been precisely involved in such changes, and the enhancement or specialization of the parietal functions may have spanned from selective filtering to attentional awareness, which are fundamental aspects of inhibition and volition. These same functions are also crucial for the evolution of proper self-perception, involving ecological (physical environment), interpersonal (social), extended (chronological), private (feelings, thoughts and intentions) and conceptual (abstract and symbolic representation) aspects of consciousness (Leary and Buttermore 2003). ...
Brain evolution is a key topic in evolutionary anthropology. Unfortunately, in this sense the fossil record can usually support limited anatomical and behavioral inferences. Nonetheless, information from fossil species is, in any case, particularly valuable, because it represents the only direct proof of cerebral and behavioral changes throughout the human phylogeny. Recently, archeology and psychology have been integrated in the field of cognitive archeology, which aims to interpret current cognitive models according to the evidence we have on extinct human species. In this article, such evidence is reviewed in order to consider whether and to what extent the archeological record can supply information regarding changes of the attentional system in different taxa of the human genus. In particular, behavioral correlates associated with the fronto-parietal system and working memory are employed to consider recent changes in our species, Homo sapiens, and a mismatch between attentional and visuospatial ability is hypothesized. These two functional systems support present-moment awareness and mind-wandering, respectively, and their evolutionary unbalance can explain a structural sensitivity to psychological distress in our species.
... Having a sense of self-a representation of oneself as a unique individual with a personal history-is a central, perhaps distinctive, feature of human experience (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). This notion of self relies, in part, on mental representations of our personal characteristics and past experiences that are stored in long-term memory (Conway, 2005;Klein & Gangi, 2010;Neisser, 1988;Prebble et al., 2013). ...
While the role of autobiographical memory in self-representation is well established, the identity function of future thinking has received much less attention. Yet, most people commonly imagine future events that convey meaningful information about the person they wish or expect to become. In three experiments, we assessed the extent to which thinking about such self-defining future events influences the current content of self-representation
(i.e., the working self-concept). Participants were asked to think about either a past or future self-defining event, or a control topic, before describing aspects of their identity in the form of ‘I am’ statements (Experiments 1 and 3) or completing scales assessing self-related dimensions (Experiments 2 and 3). We found that thinking about a future self-defining event led participants to conceptualize themselves more in terms of their psychological traits, as did thinking about a past self-defining event. Furthermore, thinking about a future self-defining event increased the sense of present-future self-continuity, whereas thinking about a past self-defining event increased the sense of past-present self-continuity. These results suggest that self-representations are fuelled not only by autobiographical memories, but also by projections into the future.
... In their study, Elliott and Coker [34] reported the direct effects of self-reflection on subjective happiness, showing a context similar to the results of this study. Self-reflection becomes the foundation of self-regulation [35] and promotes PTG after overcoming hardship [21]. However, rumina-tive self-reflection can make problems complex and exhaust cognitive resources, which could aggravate unhappiness [36]. ...
During the Coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, several studies were conducted on mental health among various populations; however, only a few studies have focused on post-traumatic growth (PTG) in nursing students. By understanding the PTG involved in coping with emotionally challenging situations, educators, and institutions can prepare nursing students to navigate the demands of their profession and ultimately provide more empathetic and effective patient care. This study aimed to explore whether self-reflection and emotional self-disclosure are associated with PTG. A total of 195 nursing students completed the self-report questionnaire. This study used standardized instruments, including the self-reflection scale, emotional self-disclosure, and the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI). Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, a t-test, Pearson’s correlation coefficient, and hierarchical regression analysis using the SPSS/WIN 25.0 program. The factors influencing PTG included self-reflection (β = 0.36; p < 0.001), emotional self-disclosure (β = 0.24; p < 0.001), grade (β = −0.18; p = 0.008), and religion (β = −0.15; p = 0.013). The explanatory power of these four factors was 31.4%, and self-reflection was found to have the greatest influence on PTG. The results indicated the need for self-reflection and emotional self-disclosure promotion programs to improve PTG, especially for senior and non-religious students.
... Kendi olma kavramına denk düşer. Öz farkındalık liderlik başarısıyla (Leary ve Buttermore 2003) ilişkilendirilmiş önemli bir faktör olarak tanımlanmıştır. Bu da liderlerin aldığı kararları etkilediğini ve liderlerin diğerlerini nasıl etkilediğini gösterir (Crossan vd., 2008). ...
Bu çalışmanın temel amacı, spor yöneticiliği bölümünde okuyan öğrencilerin eğitimlerindeki ve görev aldıkları uygulamalardaki bireysel performans özelliklerine ilişkin anlayışımızı arttırmak ve detaylı bir araştırma modeli ile performans algısının oluşum sürecini açıklığa kavuşturmaktır. Çalışmanın kuramsal altyapısı Öz Farkındalık ve Öz Belirleme kuramlarına dayanmaktadır. Bu kuramlara ve kurulan modele göre, çalışanların içsel tutum ve davranışları ortaya konulduğunda, ortamsal değişkenlerin ve liderlik yaklaşımının doğrudan çıktılar üzerindeki etkilerinin azalacağı düşünülmektedir. Mevcut çalışmada özellikle pozitif psikoloji bakış açısıyla olumlu liderlik ve işte güçlenmenin psikolojik sermaye aracılığıyla bireysel performans algısı üzerindeki etkisi ele alınmıştır. Çalışmanın uygulama kısmında, İstanbul Gedik Üniversitesi Spor Bilimleri Fakültesi Spor Yöneticiliği Bölümü dersi olan "Topluma Hizmet Uygulamaları" dersi kapsamında 2016-2107 akademik yılı bahar döneminde Spor Yöneticiliği Bölümü öğrencilerinin katıldığı Suriyeli ve Türk çocukları kaynaştıran bir eğitim ve futbol uygulaması yapılmıştır. Bölüm öğrencileri uygulamada çocuklara eğitim vermek üzere rol almıştır. Uygulama öncesinde; eğitmenlik yapacak öğrencilerin tümüne "Çocuk Psikolojisi" ve "Çocuk Koruma" eğitimi, Türkiye Futbol Federasyonu tarafından sabah teori öğleden sonra ise saha uygulaması olmak üzere 2 günlük "Gönüllü Liderlik Kursu" verilmiş, eğitim sonrasında öğrencilere ön test uygulanmıştır. Bu öğrencilerin yönlendirmesinde 8 hafta boyunca haftada 3 seans olacak şekilde Türk ve Suriyeli çocuklarla saha uygulaması yapılmış ve uygulama sonunda öğrencilere son test yapılmıştır. Bulgular, öğrencilerin uygulamada eğitmen olarak rol almalarının olumlu liderlik aracılığıyla güçlenmelerini sağlayarak, kendi performanslarını daha yüksek algılamalarına neden olduğunu göstermektedir. Başta aldıkları eğitim sırasında kendilerine motivasyon sağlayan psikolojik sermayenin ise, uygulama sonrasında performans üzerinde etkisinin kalmadığı, öğrencilerin yaptıkları işte güçlenmelerinin performansları için yeterli olduğunu düşündüklerini görülmektedir. Abstract The main aim of this study is to increase our understanding of the individual performance characteristics of the students in the sport management department and to clarify the process of performance perception with a detailed research model. The conceptual background of the study is based on the Self-Awareness and Self-Determination theories. According to the theoretical model, it is thought that the effects of the environmental variables and leadership approach on the direct outputs will decrease when the internal attitudes and behaviors of the employees are revealed. In the present study, positive leadership and positive impact of empowerment on individual performance perception through psychological capital have been discussed. It is thought that an instructor should be included in an effective and robust structured competency management system, so undergraduate students as instructors took part in the practice of giving education to children. The pretest was conducted before the field study. In the field study, a training and football application was made that integrates Syrian and Turkish children participated in the scope of an undergraduate course. Field tests were conducted with Turkish and Syrian children with 3 sessions per week for 8 weeks and the post test was applied to the students at the end of the application. The findings show that students' role as practitioners in practice is strengthened through positive leadership and causes them to perceive their own performances higher. It is seen that psychological capital, which gives them motivation during the training they received, does not have any impact on performance after practice and that students' strengthening in their work is sufficient for their performance. It is seen that management with a positive leadership approach has a positive and sustainable effect on the trainers' perceptions of performance.
... Precisely why personhood arose in evolution is still a contested question. Leary and Buttermore (2003) argued that: ...
That robots might become persons is increasingly explored in popular fiction and films and is receiving growing academic analysis. Here, I ask what would be necessary for robots not to become persons at some point. After examining the meanings of “robots” and “persons,” I discuss whether robots might not become persons from a range of perspectives: evolution (which has led over time from species that do not exhibit personhood to species that do), development (personhood is something into which each of us grows), chemistry (must persons be carbon‐based and must robots be non–carbon‐based?), history (we now consider more entities to be persons than was once the case), and theology (are humans privileged over the rest of creation, and how relevant is panpsychism?). I end by considering some of the implications if/once robots do become persons.
... İnsanın kendisi hakkında karmaşık, soyut ve bilinçli yollarla düşünme yeteneği (Leary ve Buttermore, 2003) onun kendisine ilişkin farkındalık kazanmasını sağlamakta (Ghasemipour, Robinson ve Ghorbani, 2013) ve bireyin kendi deneyimlerinin farkında olması psikolojik uyum sürecinin temeli olarak görülmektedir (Ghorbani, Cunningham ve Watson, 2010). ...
In this study, it is aimed to examine the relationship between women’s self ambivalence
and integrative self-knowledge levels. In addition, whether women’s self-ambivalence and
integrative self-knowledge levels differ according to psychological problems, psychological
help, marital status, place of which one lives most and monthly income. This research is a
descriptive survey model. Data were collected online via the snowball sampling method. A total
of 382 women, 274 of whom were not married and 107 of whom were married, participated in
the study. In the study, Personal Information Form, Self-Ambivalence Scale, Integrative SelfKnowledge Scale were used. In this study, Pearson Correlation, One Way ANOVA, at Test for
Independent Groups were used. Research findings; It was found that there was a significant
negative relationship between women’s self dilemma and integrative self-knowledge scores.
According to psychological problems and marital status, there is a statistically significant
difference between women’s self ambivalence total and self ambivalence sub-scales scores;
among scores of integrative self-knowledge according to the place where most of life is spent;
among the scores of integrative self-knowledge and public self-consciousness according
to monthly income and among scores of self-worth according to the situation of getting
psychological help, there were significant differences. The findings are discussed in the light of
the relevant literature.
... Individual: This begins at the level of the self. It was probably the power of self-awareness, propelled by self-reflection, that was one of the essential drivers of a remarkably rapid appearance of human civilization 40,000 to 60,000 years ago (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). Self-awareness can also be looked upon as self-consciousness (Fenigstein et al., 1975). ...
Conscious systemic leadership (CSL) is a theoretical construct that draws from Shiva consciousness. Through major parts of history, theories and narratives have taken an individualistic approach to leadership focusing on the person as a leader. However, systemic leadership (SL) is an emergent phenomenon that draws on synergies and concerted efforts of several people and institutions operating across several places and levels to create a more purposeful and meaningful existence for us. If SL is about shifting the focus from the self to the wider scheme of existence, a consciousness-based approach is necessary. A consciousness-based approach enables us to undergo a mind-shift from the individual to the collective, from short-term to long-term, from rigidity to fluidity, from holding-on to letting-go, and from results-focus to learning-orientation. The philosophy of Shiva is drawn on to understand that consciousness is the substratum of reality, an insight used to build the theoretical construct of CSL. In Shiva consciousness, reality is embodied in our experience of the world through a transcendental and eternal process of fusion and dance of energies between the opposing archetypes of the purusha and prakriti; pure consciousness and the creative force, respectively. Everywhere, in each minute attribute of reality, a “self” is present, which is the universal consciousness of Shiva. CSL demands a set of new thinking and practices to bring this concept to life. With the integration of consciousness, CSL makes a new addition to the field of SL as the first attempt in the literature to draw on perspectives from Hindu philosophy, more specifically the Shiva philosophy.
... However, we argue that there is variability among men in the extent to which they are aware of their privilege despite the general tendency that advantaged groups stay blind to their privilege. Men's self-awareness to recognize the benefits they receive from the current social hierarchy motivates them to reflect on diverse aspects of themselves (e.g., who they are and what they are doing as individuals) and their own behaviors and tendencies (i.e., engaging in male allyship behaviors) even when such reflection is contrary to their "default" inclination to engage in ingroup favoritism (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). Accordingly, scholars and practitioners have recently paid increased attention to privilege awareness as an outgroup-focused motivation that leads advantaged group members to be attentive to the interests of disadvantaged group members and engage in outgroup-favoring (rather than ingroup-favoring) behaviors (Fath et al., 2022;Scully et al., 2018; see Radke et al., 2020 for a review). ...
To address long-standing gender inequity in the workplace, scholars and practitioners have called for men to enact ally work to better support and advocate for women at work. Integrating prior research on allyship with positive organizational scholarship, we propose an enrichment-based perspective on allyship that suggests that male allyship is a mechanism by which male privilege awareness translates into relational well-being at
work. We theorize that the relational benefits of male allyship could offset the previously studied costs of engaging in allyship at work. While past research has highlighted barriers to men’s involvement in gender-parity initiatives, we find that men can mobilize social support by engaging in intergroup helping behaviors at work. Using a sample of male supervisors in the United States, Study 1 finds that male privilege awareness
has a positive impact on male allyship at work. In addition, Study 2 shows that male allyship mediates the relationship between male privilege awareness and men’s relational well-being at work. All in all, our study shows that men can reap relational benefits following their enactment of allyship and that male privilege
awareness is an important antecedent in this process. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings.
... Apart from considering explicit cognitive abilities, another possibility is to investigate the evolution of wider and more transversal cognitive aspects, like for example consciousness and self-awareness (Leary and Buttermore 2003). It is clear, nonetheless, that the vaster the cognitive domain, the more difficult the target is. ...
The relationship between anthropology and neuroscience has always been friendly but controversial, because they embrace inclusive common topics (human beings and their brains) although following distinct approaches, often more holistic and speculative in the former field, more reductionist and quantitative in the latter. In recent decades, novel disciplines have been proposed to bridge the gap between anthropology and neuroscience, mostly taking into account their common interest in human evolution. Paleoneurology deals with the study of brain anatomy in extinct species. Neuroarchaeology concerns the study of brain functions associated with behaviours that are of interest according to the archaeological record. Cognitive archaeology investigates the evolution of those behaviours following methods and theories in psychology. These new fields can provide quantitative and experimental support to topics that, to date, have been largely discussed only on a theoretical basis. Nonetheless, working with extinct species necessarily involves many limitations. Consistent theories on the evolution of our cognitive abilities must rely on the integration of different sources of information, on parallel and independent evidence from different fields, and on a proper attitude: openness and caution.
... Theory and research suggest that abstract representations provide a crucial cognitive toolkit that humans can use to make future plans and navigate decision-making at a distance (Fujita, 2011;Gilead et al., 2019;Hofmann & Kotabe, 2012;Leary & Buttermore, 2003;Soderberg et al., 2015;Trope & Liberman, 2010;Wakslak et al., 2008). Importantly, summarized preferences are relatively abstract: They reflect people's generalized evaluations of a trait, abstracted away from any one particular target or experience (Eastwick et al., 2019;Ledgerwood et al., 2018Ledgerwood et al., , 2020. ...
People have ideas about the attributes (i.e., traits or characteristics that vary along a dimension) that they like in others (e.g., “I like intelligence in a romantic partner”), and these ideas about liking are called summarized attribute preferences (Ledgerwood et al., 2018). But where do summarized preferences come from, and what do they predict? Across four studies, we examined how people form summarized attribute preferences and whether they predict situation selection. We showed participants a series of photographs of faces and assessed both their experienced liking for an attribute (or functional attribute preference) as well as their inference about how much they liked the attribute in the abstract (their summarized attribute preference). Our results suggest that summarized attribute preferences—despite being (weakly) grounded in functional attribute preferences—were affected by incidental aspects of the context in which people learn about them (i.e., the overall likeability of the pool of faces). Furthermore, we observed a double dissociation in the predictive validity of summarized and functional attribute preferences: Whereas summarized attribute preferences predicted situation selection at a distance (e.g., whether to join a new dating website based on a description of it), functional attribute preferences predicted situation selection with experience (e.g., whether to join a new dating website after sampling it). We discuss theoretical and methodological implications for the interdisciplinary science of human evaluation.
... He describes a dynamic boundary of the organism reflected in the structure of the brain (and therefore the mind) within which the stability of the interior is maintained. Whilst not disregarding the vast neuroscientific and philosophical literature on types and levels of self-awareness (Neisser 1988;Leary & Buttermore 2003;Vogeley & Fink 2003;Morin 2006), the focus of my interest here is on boundary phenomena of the self, the development of the self/other distinction and the disruptions of the self/other boundary in narcissistic disorders. ...
This paper compares presentations of disorders of the sense of body ownership and agency from psychoanalytic and neurological perspectives to demonstrate similarities in symptomatology proposing these similarities arise from adjustments in Friston's generative model of self-organization and selfhood. The implications for the analytic model of the Self, for clinical practice and for neuroscience research are considered. Patients with narcissistic disorders use projective defences resulting in a disordered sense of what belongs to whom. This applies to mind and body of self and other and is central to understanding transference and countertransference. Clinical observations of this disordered sense of ownership and agency mirror findings in neurological disorders. This paper proposes that in both neurological and psychological disorders Friston's 'internal generative model' of selfhood is adjusted. Further to this whilst this adjustment may be either neurogenic or psychogenic, the final neural mechanism and symptomatic outcome are similar. On the basis of these observations the paper compares the concept of the Self from Jungian and psychoanalytic perspectives. Finally, the implications for the concept of the death instinct and Britton's concept of Xenophobia are explored along with the implications of these observations for clinical practice.
... This second process deals with the ability to recognize the current contents of consciousness (Schooler et al., 2011). In 2003, Leary and Buttermore published a very detailed and comprehensive perspective review on the evolution of self-awareness in hominids, taking into account a large and well documented set of paleontological and archaeological information (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). According to the terminology introduced by Neisser (1988), they tentatively proposed that early Homo and then Neandertals present evidence of enhanced extended self-ability (the capacity to represent the self over time), H. erectus may have evolved a private self-ability (the capacity to perceive one's own feeling, thoughts, and intentions), but only with modern humans we find also a conceptual self-ability (abstract and symbolic representation of the organism). ...
Attention might be considered a key component of intelligence, and its cognitive and neurobiological mechanisms probably underwent profound changes in the course of human evolution. Attention can be conceived as a “limiting factor” for general intelligence (g), as the ability to maintain a selective coordination of specific cognitive processes through time regardless of conflicting stimuli. In this perspective review, we consider the paleontological and archaeological evidence that may supply information on the evolution of the attention system in the human genus. In terms of anatomy, the paleoneurological record suggests that the parietal cortex experienced a relative enlargement in Neandertals and, most prominently, in modern humans. These anatomical variations match cultural changes associated with technological and social complexity. Inferences in cognitive archaeology indicate that Homo sapiens is also specialized for working memory and visuospatial integration, when compared with extinct human taxa. These features are likely associated with changes in the attention system, and in cognitive processes dealing with meta-awareness, conscious control of mind wandering, resistance to distractors, and management of emotional clues. Although these inferences are inevitably speculative, they might stimulate a comprehensive interpretation of the technological and social behaviours associated with the evolution of the human genus, bridging together psychology and evolutionary anthropology.
... Yet the number of neurons increased more in the cerebellum than in the cerebral cortex (Herculano-Houzel, 2016), which suggests that complex linkages formed between memory storage and the selection and activation of behavior (Strick et al., 2009). Moreover, executive functions presuppose self as agent, able to imagine future scenarios, compute outcomes, and select between alternative courses of action; and it is unlikely that such a developed concept of self as agent evolved any earlier (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). That conjunction is more likely to have occurred in the early Upper Paleolithic, facilitated by extended working memory (Welshon, 2010). ...
Eörs Szathmáry and John Maynard Smith famously argued that the evolution of life on earth has been marked by a series of transitions to greater complexity, the last being from primate to human societies. I argue that this last transition, covering all of human evolutionary history, in turn comprises two phases: the first defined by increases in the capacity of the human brain/mind to structurally integrate causal inferences and selectively apply them to construct increasingly sophisticated sociocultural niches; the second defined by manipulation of the universal Darwinian mechanisms driving sociocultural evolution. During the first phase, hominin cognitive structure passed through three key transitions to produce the brain/mind of archaic Homo sapiens. The fourth transition, to fully modern Homo sapiens sapiens equipped with symbolic cognition and language, marks the fulcrum that leveraged the second phase in which changes in the scope and rate of niche construction were primarily driven by manipulation of sociocultural evolutionary mechanisms. The fifth transition to sedentary living enabled new selection pressures to be exerted through the concentration and application of social power, while the sixth transition multiplied the cognitive variation available to construct more elaborate sociocultural niches. Finally I note that decreasing intervals between transitions creates a pattern of accelerating sociocultural change.
... The ability to form mental representations of the self is a central, perhaps distinguishing, feature of the human mind. Certain other species-and even some robots (Bongard et al. 2006)possess rudimentary self-models that allow them to distinguish themselves from their environment, but there is no certainty that they think about themselves in abstract and symbolic ways as humans routinely do (Sedikides and Skowronski 1997;Leary and Buttermore 2003). We possess many different ideas and beliefs about who we are and what we are like-our traits, abilities, preferences, and goals-and how we feel and behave is strongly influenced by these self-conceptions, for better and worse (Leary 2004). ...
Mécanismes de l'anosognosie, une étude sémiologique et par imagerie fonctionnelle. Thèse présentée en vue de l'obtention du titre de docteur en sciences médicales. 2013.
... Not only does the self function as a social actor defined by traits, and a motivated agent defined by goals and values, but also as an autobiographical author mining personally significant experiences to construct a life story connecting the present self to the remembered past and the imagined future (McAdams, 2013a(McAdams, , 2015McAdams & McLean, 2013). Human beings evolved to make sense of themselves and their worlds through language and storytelling (Donald, 1991;Dor, 2015;Leary & Buttermore, 2003;McAdams & Cowan, 2020;McAdams., 2019). Psychological research has found that life stories not only record the facts of our lives, but also provide our lives with meaning, purpose, and continuity through time (Adler, Lodi-Smith, Philippe, & Houle, 2016;McAdams, 2013a;McAdams & McLean, 2013). ...
Individuals with schizophrenia-spectrum disorders face profound challenges as they attempt to maintain identity through the course of illness. Narrative identity—the study of internalized, evolving life stories—provides a rich theoretical and empirical perspective on these challenges. Based on evidence from a systematic review of narrative identity in the psychosis spectrum (30 studies, combined N = 3859), we argue that the narrative identities of individuals with schizophrenia-spectrum disorders are distinguished by three features: disjointed structure, a focus on suffering, and detached narration. Psychotic disorders typically begin to emerge during adolescence and emerging adulthood, which are formative developmental stages for narrative identity, so it is particularly informative to understand identity disturbances from a developmental perspective. We propose a developmental model in which a focus on suffering emerges in childhood; disjointed structure emerges in middle and late adolescence; and detached narration emerges before or around the time of a first psychotic episode. Further research with imminent risk and early course psychosis populations would be needed to test these predictions. The disrupted life stories of individuals on the psychosis spectrum provide multiple rich avenues for further research to understand narrative self-disturbances.
... Archer (2019, p. 37) cites Harry Frankfurt equating consciousness with self-consciousness. Certainly, if we think of what Leary and Buttermore (2003) call ecological consciousness -the ability to navigate oneself through an environment, which may include eluding predators, some sense of self is implicit in all sentient creatures even prior to language (see as well Archer 2000, p. 124). Any creature capable of fear fears for itself as a whole. ...
... Public self-awareness: Self-awareness or the nature of the mind is the knowledge and perception that one has of himself. In other words, self-awareness involves our knowledge of ourselves and its increase means that a person has a clear picture of his qualities, values, attitudes, interests and needs; and his sense of consciousness is the ability to consciously think about himself, including features that are unique to one (Leary & Buttermore, 2003). Publicly self-conscious persons are especially concerned about the impression they make on others. ...
Nowadays, companies and organizations are increasingly looking for ways to create strong emotional attachment through their brand with consumers. One way to accomplish this is to match the brand personality with the consumer's self. In this regard, the first purpose of this research is to measure the effect of brand personality congruity with customer's self-concept and to further clarify the impact of ideal and actual-self on emotional brand attachment of customers and how variables such as self-esteem, service engagement and public self-awareness affect the emotional attachment to the brand of Parsian bank in Tehran, Iran. To do this, a questionnaire was designed and distributed among the customers of Parsian Bank and 380 usable questionnaires were returned. The research method in this study is descriptive-correlation. To test the hypotheses and to answer the research questions, the "Structural Equation Modeling" test has been used. In line with the research hypotheses, the study has shown that the brand personality's consistency with the self-image of individuals (customers) has a positive effect on emotional attachment to the brand and the effect of actual self-congruity is greater than ideal self-congruence. According to the results, it's necessary to match the marketing and advertising activities of organizations with the self-concept of audiences. This research aims to make an advance on the marketing territory and moreover, seeks to be of utility to scholars and practitioners of corporate marketing, organizations and companies. Although several studies have been conducted to understand the factors influencing consumer's emotional brand attachment, this study has been trying to expand on both consumer psychology and marketing perspective, besides, it has been carried out in the service (banking) sector.
... The relevance of self-awareness cannot be overstated. In fact, Leary and Buttermore (2003) theorize that the capacity for self-reflection may have been one of essential drivers for the remarkably rapid appearance of human civilization 40,000 -60,000 years ago. Leary and Buttermore attribute the explosive growth in human culture and technological advances during this time to a nascent capacity to think symbolically and abstractly about oneself and to ponder the changes required to move toward a better future. ...
A growing body of empirical research suggests that self-awareness is associated with successful leadership. Although self-awareness research has generated a number of scales to measure self-awareness, none have done so with the explicit focus of leadership. The present research is a summary of three studies designed to develop and begin validation for a scale to measure self-awareness in the context of leadership and leader development. The result of Study 1 and 2 was a 54-item self-awareness scale. A confirmatory factor analysis provided evidence for a marginal fit. Predictive validity was assessed in Study 3 by looking for associations between self-awareness and outcomes from an MBA capstone course designed in part to improve communication, foster teamwork, and increase self-awareness. Self-awareness was the independent variable. The dependent variables were the graded, videotaped outcomes of two types of structured role-playing exercises designed to meet course objectives and involved students working in dyads or in small groups. Positive associations were found between the new scale and some group context measures of performance, but not for the dyad measures. Implications and suggestions for future research are provided.
... Lewis et al. [76] and Kounev et al. [70] apply these five levels of self-awareness to computational systems. However, current work towards self-awareness in psychology investigates the importance of interactions within a social system [45,72]. In order to perform the social interactions that would facilitate the development of self-awareness, each system would benefit from awareness that each other system is also self-aware. ...
Cyber-physical systems operate in our real world, constantly interacting with the environment and collaborating with other systems. The increasing number of devices will make it infeasible to control each one individually. It will also be infeasible to prepare each of them for every imaginable rapidly unfolding situation. Therefore, we must increase the autonomy of future Cyber-physical Systems. Making these systems self-aware allows them to reason about their own capabilities and their immediate environment. In this article, we extend the idea of the self-awareness of individual systems toward networked self-awareness. This gives systems the ability to reason about how they are being affected by the actions and interactions of others within their perceived environment, as well as in the extended environment that is beyond their direct perception. We propose that different levels of networked self-awareness can develop over time in systems as they do in humans. Furthermore, we propose that this could have the same benefits for networks of systems that it has had for communities of humans, increasing performance and adaptability.
Our knowledge of how and why various biological and ecological traits relate (scale) to body size has grown at a rapid pace. In this exploratory analysis, I aim to further advance our knowledge of biological scaling by arguing that individuality and selfhood increase along a size spectrum from tiny microbes to huge trees and whales, as driven by a gradient of decreasing mortality. According to a proposed size–self spectrum (SSS) model, tiny short-lived organisms are continuously engaged in relatively rapid, all-consuming, selfless reproduction, whereas large long-lived organisms have evolved relatively high levels of individuality and self-preservation. Grades of individuality in organisms along the SSS are recognized by their levels of development of (a) protective boundaries between their inner and outer environments, (b) autonomy and identity preservation, and (c) self-awareness and regulation. Paradoxically, as increasingly large organisms have evolved increased independence from their external environments, they have also exerted greater per-capita impacts on them. With increasing body size, the prevailing direction of influence of an individual organism’s internal versus external environments switches from inward in small ‘exocentric’ species to outward in large ‘endocentric’ species. Implications of the SSS model for understanding the nature and environmental impact of humans, who are relatively large organisms, as well as various other controversial biological, ecological, and philosophical issues are discussed.
So far, I have dealt with numerous animal thought processes that are good candidates for attribution of consciousness. These are thought processes that are usually not possible in humans without consciousness; they include logical reasoning, creative tool use and production, causal understanding and insightful problem-solving, volitional action, time travel (episodic memory, planning), metacognition, and perspective taking. (This list is not exhaustive; one could add imitation, teaching, mirror self-recognition, quantity estimation, abstraction, categorisation, and concept formation to the list.) But before I try to answer the question of whether animals act consciously in the aforementioned thought processes, I should first clarify what I mean by the term “consciousness”. This term has many meanings and, above all, very strong connotations for human science and everyday language.
The world is set against the backdrop of complexity that is characterized by local rules, nonlinearity, unpredictability, and volatility. Various approaches of understanding complexity are presented including the Cynefin framework. Systems thinking is an overarching term that refers to perspectives, concepts, frameworks, approaches, methodologies, and interventions that are pinned on the understanding of interrelationships between constituent parts in a context that give rise to emergent behaviors of the whole. As the world grapples with increasing complexities posed by wars, pandemics, macro-economic volatility, data colonization, and climate change, systems thinking offers the frameworks and methodologies to understand and address such situations. The historical development of systems thinking is traced beginning with Alexander Bogdanov’s tektology that, in many ways, sowed the intellectual seeds of the discipline, as we know it. The journey of systems thinking is discussed through the waves metaphor of hard, soft, and critical systems thinking. An alternative to the waves, the system of systems methodologies (SOSM) is presented that helps in understanding different systems traditions by plotting an array of systems methodologies in an ideal-typical grid intersecting between the nature of the participants and the nature of the system.
This pioneering study investigates the transformative shift in the nature of education during the Neolithic revolution, utilising Göbekli Tepe’s role as an archaic open school that attested to this change. This exploration is underpinned by the premise that “if education is a process of acculturation, its origins must be sought in the cultural revolution of humans.” Beyond the conceptual boundaries of the dominant western ontology, the open schooling role of Göbekli Tepe considers indigenous social ontology. In this study, the educational role of Göbekli Tepe has been examined in the symbolism of local culture, its special pilgrimage and storytelling traditions. This study hypothesises that Göbekli Tepe is an archaic open school that was a testament to the cultural revolution of humans.
The ability for self-related thought is historically considered to be a uniquely human characteristic. Nonetheless, as technological knowledge advances, it comes as no surprise that the plausibility of humanoid self-awareness is not only theoretically explored but also engineered. Could the emerging behavioural and cognitive capabilities in artificial agents be comparable to humans? By employing a cross-disciplinary approach, the present essay aims to address this question by providing a comparative overview on the emergence of self-awareness as demonstrated in early childhood and robotics. It argues that developmental psychologists can gain invaluable theoretical and methodological insights by considering the relevance of artificial agents in better understanding the behavioural manifestations of human self-consciousness.
Evolutionary anthropology relies on both neontological and paleontological information. In the latter case, fields such as paleoneurology, neuroarchaeology, and cognitive archaeology are supplying new perspectives in prehistory and neuroscience. Cognitive archaeology, in particular, investigates the behaviors associated with extinct species or cultures according to specific psychological models. For example, changes in working memory, attention, or visuospatial integration can be postulated when related behavioral changes are described in the archaeological record. However, cognition is a process based on different and partially independent functional elements, and extinct species could hence have evolved distinct combinations of cognitive abilities or features, based on both quantitative and qualitative differences. Accordingly, differences in working memory can lead to more conceptual or more holistic mindsets, with important changes in the perception and management of the mental experience. The parietal cortex is particularly interesting, in this sense, being involved in functions associated with body–tool integration, attention, and visual imaging. In some cases, evolutionary mismatches among these elements can induce drawbacks that, despite their positive effects on natural selection, can introduce important constraints in our own mental skills. Beyond the theoretical background, some hypotheses can be tested following methods in experimental psychology. In any case, theories in cognitive evolution must acknowledge that, beyond the brain and its biology, the human mind is also deeply rooted in body perception, in social networks, and in technological extension.
My account of neoclassical choice theory, NCT, differs from yours. If not, it is not worth pondering. My perspective is broad, including risk, uncertainty, and beliefs. Everything you care about is included, plus all your constraints. Individual plants, machines, and animals might be economici. Humans? This chapter emphasizes the assumptions and definitions: standard ones are deconstructed, and implicit ones are identified. They and what follows from their different subsets is the focus of this chapter, not judgment.
The present study is aimed at finding the relationship of birth order position and intelligence quotient among students of College of Medicine and Allied health sciences in Federal University Dutse, Jigawa state. A total number of 250 students which comprise 124 males and 126 females were assessed using questionnaires. Data was analyzed using “SPSS statistics version 20”. The variable measurements were presented as mean ± SD. The differences between the two groups that is males and females were compared by using “independent sample t-test”. The correlation between the variables were found using Pearson’s and Partial correlation. Values of p < 0.05 were deemed as level of significant. The present study shows negative or no relationship between birth order position and intelligent quotient in the population study. Independent sample t-test for sexual dimorphism of the variables shows that no significant difference. Keywords: relationship, birth order position, intelligent quotient, students
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The present study is aimed at finding the relationship of birth order position and intelligence quotient among students of College of Medicine and Allied health sciences in Federal University Dutse, Jigawa state. A total number of 250 students which comprise 124 males and 126 females were assessed using questionnaires. Data was analyzed using "SPSS statistics version 20". The variable measurements were presented as mean ± SD. The differences between the two groups that is males and females were compared by using "independent sample t-test". The correlation between the variables were found using Pearson's and Partial correlation. Values of p < 0.05 were deemed as level of significant. The present study shows negative or no relationship between birth order position and intelligent quotient in the population study. Independent sample t-test for sexual dimorphism of the variables shows that no significant difference.
This chapter takes an evolutionary approach to self-compassion. As such, it considers the evolution of compassion as it emerged out of mammalian caring behavior and is transformed into compassion by the evolution of a range of complex cognitive competencies. These include competencies to reason, mentalize, and have consciousness of being conscious that support self-awareness. These competencies are used in specialist ways for different types of social relationship (social mentalities) and are crucial for our abilities to understand the nature of our suffering and how to address it compassionately, that is, deliberately, courageously, and wisely.KeywordsCompassionEvolutionMentalityMentalizationSelf-awarenessSelf-compassion
The paper deals with the key psychological factors of professional realization and social success of people participating in executive training programs in the field of management in the adulthood. The modern concept of continuing education needs to investigate the psychological and economic problems of adult learning. This research is devoted to the study of the self-concept as an important and insufficiently studied mechanism for regulating human behavior. The choice of training in MBA programs is considered as a manifestation of an active strategy of human adaptation to dynamic social and economic conditions. The study centers on the personal-activity and competenced-based approaches. The purpose of the study is to analyze the features of selfesteem and its role in the professional adaptation of adult students of executive programs (Master of Business Administration). The study used well-known psychological questionnaires and methods of descriptive and multidimensional analysis of data processing. The study revealed that the self-concept of students of Master of Business Administration programs plays a significant role in the choice of training as a way of professional development of managers. The inclusion of the emotional-evaluative component of the self-concept in the personal potential of students was statistically confirmed. The results indicate possible intrapersonal conflicts of students in the process of learning management as a significant field of professional activity. The study identified such factors as “problematic introversion”, “problematic creativity”, “problematic adaptability” and “self-critical leadership” which show the importance of accuracy of self-assessment for the choice of the content of training and the direction of self-development. The results of the study are important for understanding of the personal mechanisms of professional and career selfrealization of adults in the context of continuing education as well as for assessment of the effectiveness of receiving executive education.
This first chapter of Part II outlines the key features of Stage 1 and shares a selection of helpful concepts, frameworks, and tools for gaining greater self-insight. Opportunities will be provided for you to have a go at some for yourself. An understanding of how to use this stage to good effect will be gained, providing the basis for Stage 2 and the rest of the model.
Empathy has gained prominence within Evolutionary Psychology. It consists of sharing emotions and understanding the other's point of view and tends to differ between men and women. However, it is still unclear what are its evolutionary advantages. Clinical and mental health factors may also influence the expression of empathy. Therefore, the aim of this study was to compare empathy between male and female undergraduate students, as well as the clinical and mental health profiles in individuals with low and high empathy scores. We applied online the “Escala Multidimensional de Reatividade Interpessoal” (EMRI), to measure empathy, and the "ConVid - Pesquisa de Comportamentos'' to assess the emotional states and clinical profile of 155 students from the Federal University of Goiás. In total, there were 69 male participants (23.85 ± 3.72 years) and 86 female participants (24.29 ± 5.55 years). The scores of the empathy subscales were compared between genders using Student's t-test (p<0.05). Higher scores of Empathic Concern (p<0.0001), Personal Distress (p=0.0051) and Global Empathy Score (p=0.0002) were found for women compared to men. Moreover, more empathic people have higher levels of self-perception of their emotional states (p=0.0026). The results confirm the findings in the literature, which indicate that women tend to be more empathic than men. The study of the subject in other contexts are still important for a more precise understanding of the evolutionary phenomenon of empathy.
There is interest in neuroscience in investigating the connection between the brain and movement, which is evident with studies with athletes. More recently, studies investigating this connection emerged in dance. Based on evolutionary psychology studies, dance highlights the connection of movement, art, mind, brain, and its functions. From this background, the authors seek to understand whether dance can influence the brain, its functions, and, ultimately, human development. With Bronfenbrenner's ecological theory, they investigate dance context and skills developed by dancers. Resorting to research on the effects of dance on the brain, they noticed that dance impacts brain structure and functions and that it can aid human development.
Moore answers the question ‘The Wellbeing of What?’ by defending the claim in this chapter that the ‘person’ is the proper target of our concerns about individual wellbeing. He contrasts the person with the ‘self’ and other candidates for our concerns. He argues that the person is not only missing from theories of wellbeing but in psychology in general. The case for centring the person in accounts of wellbeing begins by Moore arguing for recognition of the importance of features of our personal experience such as that we have a sense that all our experiences are ‘my’ experiences. He then presents a detailed account of Peter Strawson’s famous analysis of the concept of ‘person’ as a ‘logically primitive’ concept.
Genetic and neurobiological research is reviewed as related to controversy over the extent to which neocortical organization and associated cognitive functions are genetically constrained or emerge through patterns of developmental experience. An evolutionary framework that accommodates genetic constraint and experiential modification of brain organization and cognitive function is then proposed. The authors argue that 4 forms of modularity and 3 forms of neural and cognitive plasticity define the relation between genetic constraint and the influence of developmental experience. For humans, the result is the ontogenetic emergence of functional modules in the domains of folk psychology, folk biology, and folk physics. The authors present a taxonomy of these modules and review associated research relating to brain and cognitive plasticity in these domains.
After prolonged exposure to their reflected images in mirrors, chimpanzees marked with red dye showed evidence of being able
to recognize their own reflections. Monkeys did not appear to have this capacity.
Describes the evolution of humans. Focuses on the brain and discusses cognition and symbolism, and language and the emergence of human cognition. (YDS)
Self-Awareness in Animals and Humans, a collection of original articles on self-awareness in monkeys, apes, humans, and other species, focuses on controversies about how to measure self-awareness, which species are capable of self-awareness and which are not, and why. Several chapters focus on the controversial question of whether gorillas, like other great apes and human infants, are capable of mirror self-recognition (MSR) or whether they are anomalously unable to do so. Other chapters focus on whether macaque monkeys are capable of MSR. The focus of the chapters is both comparative and developmental: several contributors explore the value of frameworks from human developmental psychology for comparative studies. This dual focus - comparative and developmental - reflects the interdisciplinary nature of the volume, which brings together biological anthropologists, comparative and developmental psychologists, and cognitive scientists from Japan, France, Spain, Hungary, New Zealand, Scotland and the United States.
What is the place of language in human cognition? Do we sometimes think in natural language? Or is language for purposes of interpersonal communication only? Although these questions have been much debated in the past, they have almost dropped from sight in recent decades amongst those interested in the cognitive sciences. Language and Thought is intended to persuade such people to think again. It brings together essays by a distinguished interdisciplinary team of philosophers and psychologists, who discuss various ways in which language may be implicated in human cognition. The editors have provided an introduction which lays out the basic terms and history of the debate, and a consolidated bibliography which will provide a valuable reference resource for all those interested in this area. The volume will be of great interest to all researchers and students interested in language and its place in cognition.
Self-Awareness in Animals and Humans, a collection of original articles on self-awareness in monkeys, apes, humans, and other species, focuses on controversies about how to measure self-awareness, which species are capable of self-awareness and which are not, and why. Several chapters focus on the controversial question of whether gorillas, like other great apes and human infants, are capable of mirror self-recognition (MSR) or whether they are anomalously unable to do so. Other chapters focus on whether macaque monkeys are capable of MSR. The focus of the chapters is both comparative and developmental: several contributors explore the value of frameworks from human developmental psychology for comparative studies. This dual focus - comparative and developmental - reflects the interdisciplinary nature of the volume, which brings together biological anthropologists, comparative and developmental psychologists, and cognitive scientists from Japan, France, Spain, Hungary, New Zealand, Scotland and the United States.
How did our minds evolve? Can evolutionary considerations illuminate the question of the basic architecture of the human mind? These are two of the main questions addressed in Evolution and the Human Mind by a distinguished interdisciplinary team of philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists and archaeologists. The essays focus especially on issues to do with modularity of mind, the evolution and significance of natural language, and the evolution of our capacity for meta-cognition (thought about thought), together with its implications for consciousness. The editors have provided an introduction that lays out the background to the questions which the essays address, and a consolidated bibliography that will be a valuable reference resource for all those interested in this area. The volume will be of great interest to all researchers and students interested in the evolution and nature of the mind.
Human beings are unique in their ability to think consciously about themselves. Because they have a capacity for self-awareness not shared by other animals, people can imagine themselves in the future, anticipate consequences, plan ahead, improve themselves, and perform many other behaviors that are uniquely characteristic of human beings. Yet, despite the obvious advantages of self-reflection, the capacity for self-thought comes at a high price as people's lives are adversely affected and their inner chatter interferes with their success, pollutes their relationships, and undermines their happiness. Indeed, self-relevant thought is responsible for most of the personal and social difficulties that human beings face as individuals and as a species. Among other things, the capacity for self-reflection distorts people's perceptions, leading them to make bad decisions based on faulty information. The self conjures up a great deal of personal suffering in the form of depression, anxiety, anger, envy, and other negative emotions by allowing people to ruminate about the past or imagine the future. Egocentrism and egotism blind people to their own shortcomings, promote self-serving biases, and undermine their relationships with others. The ability to self-reflect also underlies social conflict by leading people to separate themselves into ingroups and outgroups. Ironically, many sources of personal unhappiness - such as addictions, overeating, unsafe sex, infidelity, and domestic violence - are due to people's inability to exert self-control. For those inclined toward religion and spirituality, visionaries throughout history have proclaimed that the egoic self stymies the quest for spiritual fulfillment and leads to immoral behavior.
Sir John Eccles, a distinguished scientist and Nobel Prize winner who has devoted his scientific life to the study of the mammalian brain, tells the story of how we came to be, not only as animals at the end of the hominid evolutionary line, but also as human persons possessed of reflective consciousness.
Des pieces gravees provenant du Paleolithique moyen d'un site d'Israel demontrent l'existence de representations en contexte Levallois-mousterien realisees par l'Homo Neandertalien ou des humains anatomiquement modernes
This book examines the behaviour, social interactions/organization and habitat of the bonobo (Pan paniscus), a close relative to humans and a sibling species of the chimpanzee. P. paniscus is entirely restricted to an area south of the Zaire River. Behavioural aspects are compared to chimpanzees, evolutionary implications are also examined. Intelligence is reviewed. Interviews with bonobo researchers are reproduced. Sexual behaviour is covered in some detail. Conservation and survival prospects are also touched on. The volume is richly illustrated throughout (both wild and captive subjects).
The human capacity for recognizing categorical forms and their defining characterstics extends to a recognition of natural forms and shapes that may suggest these categories. The issue is raised below by the analysis of an archaic figure from the Levant in which a natural form was apparently intentionally modified to produce an enhanced human image.
Middle Pleistocene erectus skulls differ from ours in fifteen discrete traits, primary among which are their smaller cranial capacities, flatter and more strongly constructed braincases, larger and more anteriorly projecting faces, and inflected mastoid processes. Back to 40,000 years ago all fossil hominids are of the sapiens desing, while all those clearly older show the erectus pattern. Except for their large brains, Neandertals are of the erectus type. The sapiens differences (many of them mal-adaptive in themselves) follow directly, for biomechanical reasons, from an elongation of the pharynx and indicate full development of speech as the delivery system for laguage. The archeological record at the same time showns a worldwide change of increased tool complexity, geographical localization of desings, and increased rate of change. Faster and easier transmission of information by the vocal medium would increase culture content and would facilitate building flexible social organizations. The final step in developing vocal language would be the phonemic priciple of using meaningless sounds in meaningful combinations. This invention would transform vocalizations from calls with fixed meanings into a more flexible and rapid form of communication. Phonemic speech would spread by diffusion because all erectus would be able to use it to some degree. All populations would then select for the same vocal anatomy and consequent cranial changes that best facilitate speech behavior. This accounts for the speed of transformation and the continuity of line traits through it.
A. I. Hallowell tried to turn anthropology towards a sociobiology while the former field was still strongly opposed to any consideration of the evolution of human behavior. His work is of more than historical interest, however, because he stressed the evolution of the human ability to internalize social norms and evaluate self and others in terms of them. This ability is the basis of our species's trait of cultural rather than biological adaptation to diverse ecological settings. Sociobiologists have dealt with the evolution of norm acquisition under the rubric of "altruism." Insofar as adherence to norms either directly increases the fitnes of kin (kin selection) or indirectly increases the fitness of all participants (reciprocal altruism), both Hamilton and Trivers have offered explanations for adherence to social norms. Hallowell's approach permits the building of a thrid but complementary explanation based on selection for the ability to internalize others and to attend to their representations even i...
In the time interval between approximately 2.5 million years and 1.5 million years ago and against a background of changing environmental conditions and the emergence of highly diversified populations of early hominids, the earliest archaeological occurrences have been documented from a number of localities in the Rift Valley of East Africa. These have been attributed to the Oldowan Industrial Complex. More recently, broadly comparable archaeological occurrences have been discovered from Hadar and the Middle Awash located in adjacent areas of the Afar, in Ethiopia. This paper summarizes the age, context and characteristics of these occurrences and offers preliminary comments on their contribution to greater understanding of early hominid adaptive patterns of behavior.
Numerous articles have appeared in the past decade that have portrayed Neandertals in a dehumanized, almost non-cultural fashion. Re-examination of the arguments and data indicates that such portrayals are more extreme than warranted. There are reasonable indications for some specialized and structured use of space; for the construction of shelters; for the use of a sophisticated technology involving standardized tools, economically rational behavior and foresight; for the ability to make basic bone tools, evolved stone blades and other complex tools; for the existence of rituals; for the existence of symbolic burials; and for the existence of cultural differences between regions. It is suggested that some of these characteristics probably originate among Preneandertal populations, become more elaborate in some classic Neandertal populations and persist into or become even more elaborate in the Upper Paleolithic. Finally, a model is proposed capable of explaining differences between Middle and Upper Paleolithic art in technological and economic terms rather than biological terms.
Examen critique des donnees de 30 sites du Pleistocene inferieur et moyen d'Afrique, Asie et Europe, concernant l'utilisation du feu chez les premiers hominides. Les donnees anterieures aux neandertaliens sont equivoques. Discussion du role des processus naturels dans la production du feu. Presentation d'une methode d'evaluation des donnees
Self‐knowledge is based on several different forms of information, so distinct that each one essentially establishes a different ‘self. The ecological self is the self as directly perceived with respect to the immediate physical environment; the interpersonal self, also directly perceived, is established by species‐specific signals of emotional rapport and communication; the extended self is based on memory and anticipation; the private self appears when we discover that our conscious experiences are exclusively our own; the conceptual self or ‘self‐concept’ draws its meaning from a network of socially‐based assumptions and theories about human nature in general and ourselves in particular. Although these selves are rarely experienced as distinct (because they are held together by specific forms of stimulus information), they differ in their developmental histories, in the accuracy with which we can know them, in the pathologies to which they are subject, and generally in what they contribute to human experience.
Paleoneurology must be viewed within the wider context of hominid evolution. Since then, the theory of punctuated equilibria has had an impact on hominid paleontology, as has the question of whether or not A. afarensis constitutes one or more species of early hominid. Also, in the past 6yr, serious questions have been raised about what if any role brain evolution had in the origin and adaptive radiation of the first hominids. These developments have influenced recent paleoneurological research on a) specific fossils or species of early hominids, b) interpretations of changes in brain size over time, and c) proposed scenarios that account for hominid brain evolution.-from Author
Human Evolution, Paleolithic archaeology
How did our minds evolve? Can evolutionary considerations illuminate the question of the basic architecture of the human mind? These are two of the main questions addressed in Evolution and the Human Mind by a distinguished interdisciplinary team of philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists and archaeologists. The essays focus especially on issues to do with modularity of mind, the evolution and significance of natural language, and the evolution of our capacity for meta-cognition (thought about thought), together with its implications for consciousness. The editors have provided an introduction that lays out the background to the questions which the essays address, and a consolidated bibliography that will be a valuable reference resource for all those interested in this area. The volume will be of great interest to all researchers and students interested in the evolution and nature of the mind.
The origin of anatomically modern Homo sapiens and the fate of Neanderthals have been fundamental questions in human evolutionary studies for over a century. A key barrier to the resolution of these questions has been the lack of substantial and accurately dated African hominid fossils from between 100,000 and 300,000 years ago. Here we describe fossilized hominid crania from Herto, Middle Awash, Ethiopia, that fill this gap and provide crucial evidence on the location, timing and contextual circumstances of the emergence of Homo sapiens. Radioisotopically dated to between 160,000 and 154,000 years ago, these new fossils predate classic Neanderthals and lack their derived features. The Herto hominids are morphologically and chronologically intermediate between archaic African fossils and later anatomically modern Late Pleistocene humans. They therefore represent the probable immediate ancestors of anatomically modern humans. Their anatomy and antiquity constitute strong evidence of modern-human emergence in Africa.
