Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T10:19:24.177Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Is psychological essentialism an inherent feature of human cognition?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2014

Christopher Y. Olivola  and
Edouard Machery
Christopher Y. Olivola
Affiliation:
Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA [email protected]://sites.google.com/site/chrisolivola/
Edouard Machery
Affiliation:
Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260. [email protected]://www.pitt.edu/~machery/
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Recent evidence shows that psychological essentialism is neither a universal nor stable feature of human cognition. The extent to which people report essentialist intuitions varies enormously across cultures and education levels, and is also influenced by subtle, normatively irrelevant contextual manipulations. These results challenge the notion that the human mind is “fitted” with a built-in inherence heuristic that produces essentialist intuitions.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 37 , Issue 5 , October 2014 , pp. 499
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Giles, J., Legare, C. H. & Samson, J. (2008) Psychological essentialism and cultural variation: Children's beliefs about aggression in the United States and South Africa. Infant and Child Development 17:137–50.Google Scholar
Machery, E., Mallon, R., Nichols, S. & Stich, S. P. (2004) Semantics, cross-cultural style. Cognition 92:B1–B12.Google Scholar
Machery, E., Olivola, C. Y., Cheon, H., Kurniawan, I. T., Mauro, C., Struchiner, N. & Susianto, H. (submitted) Is folk essentialism a fundamental feature of human cognition? Google Scholar
Machery, E., Olivola, C. Y. & de Blanc, M. (2009) Linguistic and metalinguistic intuitions in the philosophy of language. Analysis 69:689–94.Google Scholar
Mahalingam, R. (2003a) Essentialism, culture, and beliefs about gender among the Aravanis of Tamil Nadu, India. Sex Roles 49:489–96.Google Scholar
Mahalingam, R. (2003b) Essentialism, culture, and power representations of social class. Journal of Social Issues 59:733–49.Google Scholar
Pereira, M. E., Estramiana, J. L. A. & Gallo, I. S. (2010) Essentialism and the expression of social stereotypes: A comparative study of Spain, Brazil and England. Spanish Journal of Psychology 13:808–17.Google Scholar
Pfeffer, K., Cole, B. & Dada, K. (1998) Attributions for youth crime among British and Nigerian primary school children. Journal of Social Psychology 138:251–53.Google Scholar