Furthering our understanding of what humans understand

Author(s): Goodwyn, S.

Journal/Book: Hum Develop. 1997; 40: Allschwilerstrasse 10, CH-4009 Basel, Switzerland. Karger. 25-31.

Abstract: As the above quote indicates, the notion that there is something uniquely human about pointing behavior will not come as a total surprise to those whose business it is to elucidate the stages of language development in infants. What may come as a surprise, however, is the wonderful way Tomasello and Camaioni have been able to throw this conclusion into bold relief by juxtaposing observations from four quite disparate populations: chimps in the wild, chimps raised by humans, normal human infants, and autistic children. Moreover, by carefully parsing the deictic act into contrasting characteristics (e.g., dyadic vs. Triadic, imperative vs. Declarative, ritualized vs. Imitated), they provide readers with a framework that makes it easy not only to grasp the differences among these groups, but also to appreciate what these differences imply about both phylogenesis and ontogenesis. In these days when even those among us interested in the development of cognitive processes barely have time to talk to those interested in adult cognitive processes, it is exceedingly rare to be provided the kind of cross-disciplinary - and cross-species - perspective we see here. And yet, as Tomasello and Camaioni show so clearly, the old essay question instruction to 'compare and contrast' is as valid an avenue to important insights as it ever was. In fact, should any reader of Human Development be tempted to dismiss a paper about chimps as only tangentially relevant to human infants, it might help to remember that not too long ago similar comparisons yielded important insights about another domain of cognition - the appreciation of numerousity. Readers might remember comparisons highlighted by Gelman among others [e.g., Gelman and Gallistel, 1978], contrasting the finding that chimps do not take readily to the notion of number [Premack, 1976] with the fact that an appreciation of number seems to bubble forth unbidden from human children in every corner of the world. In fact, numerousity, like pointing, seems to be appreciated within the first year of human life, a conclusion most recently supported by Wynn [1996] who reports that B-month-old infants spontaneously enumerate physical actions experienced in sequence, not just visible objects presented simultaneously. The topic in this case is also characteristic of human infants from every culture, namely, the onset of the production (not just comprehension) of gestures that are simultaneously triadic, distal, and declarative. By showing the apparent absence of such gestures among chimps in the wild and among autistic children, despite an intact ability to produce dyadic, proximal, imperative gestures, Tomasello and Camaioni lead us directly to the realization that the former category is worthy of special scrutiny. Something unique is going on here, and that 'something' according to Tomasello and Camaioni, is a recognition by normal human infants that the recipient of one's gestural communications is an intentional, contemplative being too. Added to this picture is the very intriguing observation that chimps who are raised by humans, and presumably the recipients of intense 'scaffolding', do a bit better at triadic gestures than chimps in the wild. We have here, in other words, just the kind of interplay between nature and nurture that comes in handy for teaching undergraduates not to expect either/or explanations for developmental phenomena. The picture with which Tomasello and Camaioni leave us, however intriguing and seemingly complete, actually leads directly to new challenges, a fact the authors themselves acknowledge in their conclusion. Knowing that sometime between 9 and 13 months, normal human infants cross a line into a qualitatively different understanding of human exchange leaves us with at least two obvious questions - where did this understanding come from and where does it lead? In other words, we can both look backward in time to ask what factors give rise to an appreciation of others as intentional beings, and look forward in time to ask what developmental changes have their roots in this marvelous achievement. Let us briefly speculate on these one at a time.

Note: Editorial Acredolo L, Univ Calif Davis, Dept Psychol, Davis,CA 95616 USA

Keyword(s): communication; gestures; language; social cognition; theory of mind; PERSPECTIVE; LOCOMOTION

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