Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T13:19:54.416Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

An Alternative Approach to Cognition in the Lower Palaeolithic: The Modular View

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2008

Kate Robson Brown
Kate Robson Brown
Affiliation:
Department of Biological AnthropologyUniversity of CambridgeCambridge CB2 3DZ
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Recent literature has attempted to infer aspects of ‘mind’ from early tool production. It is suggested here that adoption of the modular view of cognition could provide an alternative and complementary approach to that which makes use of Piagetian developmental theory. The modular view, which is concerned with multiple intelligences, permits emphasis on the multiplicity of distinct features involved in spatial cognitive competence, and may provide greater descriptive resolution than is possible with Piagetian schemes. Using an integrated framework to analyze a later Lower Palaeolithic collection from Zhoukoudian, it is suggested that the hominid producers possessed a cognitive capacity for which no current analogue exists

Type
Articles
Information
Cambridge Archaeological Journal , Volume 3 , Issue 2 , October 1993 , pp. 231 - 245
Copyright
Copyright © The McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research 1993

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

Alexander, R., 1989. Evolution of the human psyche, in The Human Revolution, eds. P., Mellars & C., Stringer. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 455–513.Google Scholar
Andersen, R.A., 1988. The neurobiological basis of spatial cognition: role of the parietal lobe, in Spatial Cognition, Brain Bases and Development, eds. J., Stiles-Davis et al. Hillsdale (NJ): Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 57–80.Google Scholar
Appelle, S., 1972. Perception and discrimination as a function of stimulus orientation: the oblique effect in man and animals. Psychological Bulletin 78, 266–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arnheim, R., 1969. Visual Thinking. Berkley (C A): University of California Press.Google Scholar
Bartlett, F.C., 1932. Remembering. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Beck, B., 1974. Baboons, chimpanzees and tools. Journal of Human Evolution 3, 509–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brésard, B., 1988. Primate cognition of space and shapes, in Thought Without Language, ed. L., Weiskrantz. (Oxford Science Publications.) Oxford: Clarendon Press, 396–415.Google Scholar
Butterworth, G., J., Rutkowska & M., Scaife (eds.), 1985. Evolution and Developmental Psychology. Brighton: The Harvester Press.Google Scholar
Cahusac, P.M.B., Miyashita, Y. & Rolls, E.T., 1989. Responses of hippocampal formation neurons in the monkey related to delayed spatial response and object-place memory tasks. Behavioural Brain Research 33(3), 229–34.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Charles, D. et al., 1991. Chimp learns Stone Age use of tools. New Scientist 23, 21.Google Scholar
Cheney, D. & Seyfarth, R., 1990. How Monkeys See the World. Chicago (IL): Chicago University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chevalier-Skolnikoff, S., 1989. Spontaneous tool use and sensorimotor intelligence in Cebus compared with other monkeys and apes. The Behaviour and Brain Sciences 12(3), 561–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clocksin, R., 1980. Perception of surface slant and edge labels from optical flow. Perception 9, 253–69.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cohen, L.B., 1988. An information processing approach to infant cognitive development, in Thought Without Language, ed. L., Weiskrantz. (Oxford Science Publications.) Oxford: Clarendon Press, 211–28.Google Scholar
Corballis, M.C., 1982. Mental rotation: anatomy of a paradigm, in Spatial Abilities, ed. M., Potegal. New York (NY): Academic Press, 172–97.Google Scholar
De Yoe, E.A. & Van Essen, D.C., 1988. Concurrent processing streams in monkey visual cortex. Trends in Neurosciences 11, 219–26.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Finke, R.A., 1990. Principles of Mental Imagery. Cambridge (MA): MIT Press.Google Scholar
Flavell, P., 1963. The Developmental Psychology of Jean Piaget. Princeton (NJ): Van Nostrand.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fodor, J.A., 1983. The Modularity of Mind. Cambridge (MA): MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foley, R., 1987. Another Unique Species. Harlow: Longman Scientific and Technical Press.Google Scholar
Gardner, H., 1981. The Quest for Mind. Chicago (IL) & London: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Gardner, H., 1983. Frames of Mind. London: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Gazzaniga, M., 1989. Organisation of the human brain. Science 245, 947–52.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gibson, K.R., 1985. Has the evolution of intelligence stagnated since Neanderthal Man?, in Evolution and Developmental Psychology, eds. G., Butterworth et al. Brighton: The Harvester Press, 102–14.Google Scholar
Gibson, K.R. & A., Peterson (eds.), 1991. Brain Maturation and Cognitive Development: Comparative and Cross-cultural Perspectives. New York (NY): Aldine de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Gowlett, J., 1984. Mental abilities of early man: a look at some hard evidence, in Hominid Evolution and Community Ecology, ed. R., Foley. New York (NY): Academic Press, 167–92.Google Scholar
Holloway, R.L., 1969. Culture: a human domain. Current Anthropology 10(4), 395–412.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Isaac, G., 1978. The food sharing behaviour of proto human hominids. Scientific American 4 no. 238, 90–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jerison, H.J., 1988. Evolutionary biology of intelligence: the nature of the problem, in Intelligence and Evolutionary Biology, eds. H.J., Jerison & I., Jerison. (NATO ASI Series (G).) New York (NY): Springer Verlag, 1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kritchevsky, M., 1988. Elementary spatial functions of the brain, in Spatial Cognition, Brain Bases and Development, eds. J., Stiles-Davis et al. Hillsdale (NJ): Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 111–40.Google Scholar
Logothetis, N.K., 1989. Subjective perception. Science 246, 727.Google Scholar
Logothetis, N.K. & Schall, J.D., 1989. Neuronal correlates of subjective visual perception. Science 245, 761.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McGrew, W.C., 1974. Tool using by wild chimpanzees feeding upon driver ants. Journal of Human Evolution 3, 501–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mandler, J.M., 1988. The development of spatial cognition: on topological and euclidean representation, in Spatial Cognition, Brain Bases and Development, eds. J., Stiles-Davis et al. Hillsdale (NJ): Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 423–32.Google Scholar
Mesulam, M.M., 1981. A cortical network for directed attention and unilateral neglect. Annals of Neurology 10, 309–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mithen, S.J., 1988. Looking and learning: Upper Palaeolithic art and information gathering. World Archaeology 19, 297–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O'Keefe, J. & Nadel, L., 1978. The Hippocampus as Cognitive Map. Oxford: Oxford University Press (Clarendon).Google Scholar
Olson, D.R. & Bialystok, E., 1983. Spatial Cognition. Hillsdale (NJ): Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Parker, S., 1985. Higher intelligence as adaptation for social and technological strategies in early Homo sapiens, in Evolution and Developmental Psychology, eds. G., Butterworth et al. Brighton: The Harvester Press, 83–101.Google Scholar
Parker, S. & Gibson, K., 1979. A developmental model for the evolution of language and intelligence in early hominids. Behavioural and Brain Sciences 2, 367–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piaget, J. & Inhelder, B., 1956. The Child's Conception of Space. New York (NY): Norton.Google Scholar
Plomin, R. & Ho, H., 1991. Brain, behavior, and developmental genetics, in Brain Maturation and Cognitive Development: Comparative and Cross-cultural Perspectives, eds. K.R., Gibson & A., Peterson. New York (NY): Aldine de Gryter, 65–90.Google Scholar
Posner, M.I., Petersen, S.E., Fox, P.T. & Raichle, M.E., 1988. Localisation of cognitive operations in the human brain. Science 240, 1627–31.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Premack, D.P., 1988. Minds without language, in Thought Without Language, ed. L., Weiskrantz. (Oxford Science Publications.) Oxford: Clarendon Press, 46–65.Google Scholar
Pylyshyn, Z.W., 1981. The imagery debate: analogue media versus tacit knowledge. Psychological Review 87, 16–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ratcliff, G., 1979. Spatial thought, mental rotation and the right cerebral hemisphere. Neuropsychologia 17, 49–54.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rudel, R.G., 1982. The oblique mystery, in Spatial Abilities, ed. M., Potegal. New York (NY): Academic Press, 129–45.Google Scholar
Schmidt, R.A., 1975. A schema theory of discrete motor skill learning. Psychological Review 82, 225–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sedgewick, H.A., 1982. Visual modes of spatial orientation, in Spatial Abilities, ed. M., Potegal. New York (NY): Academic Press, 3–31.Google Scholar
Segal, S.J.. & Fusella, V., 1970. Influence of imaged pictures and sounds on detection of visual and auditory signals. Journal of Experimental Psychology 83(3), 458–64.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sekuler, R. & Blake, R., 1990. Perception. New York (NY) & London: McGraw-Hill International Editions.Google Scholar
Shepard, R.H., 1988. Transformations in spatial cognition, in Spatial Cognition, Brain Bases and Development, eds. J., Stiles-Davis et al. Hillsdale (NJ): Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 81–110.Google Scholar
Shepard, R.H. & Metzler, J., 1971. Mental rotation of 3D objects. Science 171, 701–3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smyth, P. et al, 1987. Cognition in Action. Hillsdale (NJ): Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Spearman, C., 1927. The Abilities of Man: Their Nature and Measurement. New York (NY): Macmillan.Google Scholar
Toth, N., 1985. The Oldowan reassessed: A close look at early stone artefacts. Journal of Archaeological Science 12, 101–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Toth, N., Schick, K.D., Savage-Rumbaugh, E.S., Sevcik, R.A. & Rumbaugh, D.M., 1993. Pan the tool-maker: investigations into the stone tool-making and tool-using capabilities of bonobos (Pan paniscus). Journal of Archaeological Science 20, 81–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weiskrantz, L. & Saunders, R.C., 1984. Impairments of visual object transforms in monkeys. Brain 107, 1033–74.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Weiskrantz, L. (ed.), 1988. Thought Without Language. (Oxford Science Publications.) Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Wertheimer, M., 1967. Laws of organisation in perceptual forms, in A Source Book of Gestaldt Psychology, by W.D., Ellis. New York (NY): Humanities Press, 71–86.Google Scholar
Wynn, T., 1979. The intelligence of later Acheulean hominids. Man 14, 371–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wynn, T., 1981. The intelligence of Oldowan hominids. Journal of Human Evolution 10, 529–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wynn, T., 1985. Piaget, stone tools and the evolution of human intelligence. World Archaeology 17, 32–43.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wynn, T., 1988. Tools and the evolution of human intelligence, in Machiavellian Intelligence, eds. R.W., Byrne & A., Whiten. (Oxford Science Publications.) Oxford: Clarendon Press, 217–84.Google Scholar
Wynn, T., 1989. The Evolution of Spatial Competence. Urbana (IL): University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Wynn, T., 1991. Archaeological evidence for modern intelligence, in The Origins of Human Behaviour, ed. R., Foley. London: Unwin Hyman & World Archaeology Press, 52–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wynn, T. & Tierson, F., 1990. Regional comparison of the shapes of later Acheulean handaxes. American Anthropologist 92, 73–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar