Situated Cognition and LearningBeomKyu Choi

Department of Educational PsychologyThe Cognition, Instruction andLearning Technology Program

Context matters…

What is Cognition?

Thinking?

internal system?

Perception?

Action?

Problem solving?

comprehension?

sensation?

Reasoning?Decision-making?

awareness?

Traditional view of cognitive system• A function as taking in information, processing it, and

storing and retrieving it• A mental process for constructing and manipulating

symbolic representation in the form of memory or schema

• The locus of cognition is in the individual head• Has much to do with computational model in favor of

knowledge acquisition

Weight watcher program (Lave, 1989)• Dieters were asked to prepare their lunch to meet

specifications laid out by the observer. In this case, they were to fix a serving of cottage cheese, supposing that the amount allotted for the meal was three-quarters of the two-thirds cup the program allowed. The problem solver began the task muttering that he had taken a calculus course in college. Then after a pause he suddenly announced that he had 'got it!' He filled a measuring cup two-thirds full of cottage cheese, dumped it out on a cutting board, patted it into a circle, marked a cross on it, scooped away one quadrant, and served the rest

Yucatec Midwives (Lave & Wenger, 1991)• A Maya girl who eventually becomes a midwife most likely has a

mother or grandmother who is a midwife, since midwifery is handed down in family lines…Girls in such families, without being identified as apprentice midwives, absorb the essence of midwifery practice as well as specific knowledge about many procedures, simply in the process of growing up. The know what the life of a midwife is like, what kinds of stories the women and men who come to consult her tell, what kinds of herbs and other remedies need to be collected, and the the like. As young children they might be sitting quietly in a corner as their mother administers a prenatal massage; they would hear stories of difficult cases, of miraculous outcomes, and the like. As they grow older, they ma by passing messages, running errands, getting needed supplies….Eventually she may even administer prenatal massages to selected clients.

Everyday Cognition: How we really think? • Draw heavily on the interaction with the context, surroundings, and/or environments socially and physically.

• Cognition is really connected with the environment.

We cannot fully understand without regard to the context

Context more than influences...

Context co-determines images

Surroundings co-determine images

Moon illusion

Context, environment, surroundings really matters…• Without accounting for the interaction within the context, we cannot fully understand how our cognitive system really works.

As such….

Thinking and learning is always situated in activities bound to social, physical, and cultural environment or context, not just being mediated by our internal metal representation.

The locus of Cognition• The goal of psychology is to explain our behavior.

EnvironmentIndividualIndividual

+Environment

C BS

In the state of perturbation• 1950’s cognitive revolution

• symbolic processing approach to cognition• Human as a computer

• 1990’s opposing arguments in favor of situated cognition• Robotics, Anthropology, Critical theory, Socio-cultural theory

Opposing arguments- symbolic processing and manipulation programmed robot cognition

does not work very well (Beer, 1991)- novice practitioners become expert in the community through a

gradual socialization process in the context, not through an individual manipulation of internal representations in one’s head (Lave & Wenger, 1991)

• “We have gradually lost appreciation of the differences between today’s computer models and the everyday capabilities of human beings (Clancey, 1992, p. 3)

• “We would do better by conceiving of cognition as it is involving in the practical doings of “just plain folks” rather than in the formal operations of computers (Lave, 1988).

In the symbolic-processing view, mind/cognition is generally conceived to be inside the head, whereas in situated approach, mind/cognition is an aspect of person-environment interaction itself.

• What is knowledge?• How do we come to know?• What is the role of our cognitive system?• What is learning?• Implication of instruction?

Questions today…

1. Knowing What vs. Knowing how• Non-situated Cognition

• Product, fact, representation, memory• A storehouse of mental representation• A process of manipulating representation

• Situated Cognition• Process, tool, functional value, information pickup• Competence bound to the context• Knowing is inseparable from doing

Context-independent concept vs. Context dependent concept

•So knowing, as situated cognition theorists view, are completely determined by the context (Barsalou, 1982).

•Knowing is inseparable from doing (Brown et al., 1989)

2. Acquisition vs. Participation• Non-situated Cognition: Acquisition metaphor

• knowledge is acquired, gained, accumulated and developed from the outside (knowledge transmission)

• A process to fill up the given information into our head in the form of memory

• Once acquired, the knowledge may now be retrieved, transferred and applied, and shared with others.

• Situated Cognition: Participation metaphor• knowledge is created, reflected, and evolved as a form of

functioned value, tool (participation in social activities)• A process of becoming a member of a certain community • Transforming identity from the novice to the expert

3. Computer vs. Detector• Non-situated Cognition: human as an info-processor

• A function as taking in, processing, storing and retrieving information • Brain-based computational model(three phases): input-processing-

output (engine of thought)• Storing and retrieving is the central to cognitive system • Action is taken only after thinking

• Situated Cognition: human as a Thermostat• Control system in favor of direct perception and action • A function as detecting sameness and difference across the

environment (information pickup)• Perception and action (two phases) is the central to cognitive system.

We become to know and think without reference to manipulation of representation

Situatedness of Cognition

Are all actions/behaviors remembered and played out the same in every context??

• Our thinking, knowing, and acting happen and exist in situ, inseparable from the context, activity and culture in which it emerges; all knowledge and thinking, namely, our cognition is situated and much more directly and intimately connected to the the context.

Learning is an enculturation process• Learning is not an accumulation of information, but a transformation of the individual who is moving toward full membership in the professional community.

• Newcomers (novices) become oldtimers (experts) as a result of actively participation within a community of practice—i.e., being increasingly competent in the practice. (Stolen Knowledge)

A Definition of Learning

According to Tom Shuell, 1986

Learning is an enduring change in behavior, or in the capacity to behave in a given fashion, which results from practice or other forms of experience.

4. Cognitive architecture vs. membership• Non-situated Cognition

• Change in an individual mental representation• Knowledge transmission in the head

• Situated Cognition• Change in membership or identity in the social practice • A process of identity formation, moving from novice to

expert• Active meaning making process of the context

Learning thus is inherently a socially-dialogical process within the context.

5. Principles of Instruction (Young, 2000)• Learners are self-directed by personal goals and intentions.

• Learning improves with practice.• Learning improves with feedback.

Learning = education of Intention and Attention

Education of Intention• The first task is to induce learners to have goals related to

the materials and learning environment • Video, authentic real-world and online experience and

stories have proven effective in inducing students to adopt new goals that they did not come to class with. (creating time for telling)

Education of Attention• Instruction should be organized to enable to close

coupling of the novice with someone more experienced and knowledgeable (Scaffolding system)

• Learner can detect similar functional value in the environment that more experienced and knowledgeable one can do, which is previously unperceived to the novice.

Instructional Implications• When designing our instruction, we take into

consideration that anchors all learning activities in authentic contexts;

• Present information in a variety of different ways;• Engage learners in social practices with others, more

experiences learners (i.e., peer, PC materials)

Authentic context and socially organized activity are the key to SitCog ID

• Learning as apprenticeship, i.e., teaching and learning at the elbow of an expert.• “learning-through-guided-experience on cognitive

and metacognitive skills and processes” (Collins et al., 1989, p. 456)

• how to teach experts’ cognitive skills and how to use such skills in authentic activities are at the heart of cognitive apprenticeship

• how to leverage modeling, coaching, scaffolding, articulation, reflection, and exploration in teaching and learning.

Cognitive Apprenticeship (Collins et al., 1989)

Anchored Instruction (CTGV, 1990)• Technology-based learning designed to use knowledge as

tools in an attempt to overcome inert knowledge problem.• Using an interactive video material as an “anchor”, which

is thought of as “macro-contexts” made up of realistic stories that encourage students and teachers to pose and solve complex, realistic problems from many perspectives.• Authenticity • Enabling students identify and define problems.

A Final Word• SitCog is a different worldview against traditional symbolic approach to cognition.

• It requires us to shift the locus of cognition from ‘individual head’ to ‘person and environment interaction’

• Central to cognitive system is more or less direct perceiving-acting dynamics over storing and retrieving

“Ask not what’s inside of your head but what your head’s inside of” (Mace,

1997)

QUESTIONS?beomkyu.choi@uconn.edu