Imagination, ecologized and enacted: driven by the historicity of affordance competition.
Caroline Stankozi
Frontiers in Psychology 2024 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1369820 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Neuroplasticity |
| Keywords | Affordance competition Affordances Ecological psychology Enactivism Historicity Imagination Priming |
| Citations | 2 |
| Key points | Proposes that imagination is driven by affordance competition and resolves stand-offs between competing affordances, with synaptic plasticity as the underlying mechanism. |
Abstract
Together, ecological psychology and enactivism can explain imagination as being driven by affordance competition. This paper presents synaptic plasticity as a hotspot for the respective historicity. First, (i) affordances are introduced as directly perceptible on the ecological view, and as co-created by an individual on the enactive view. After pointing out their compatibility, (ii) empirical underpinnings of the historicity of affordance competition are summarized and followed by a non-representational interpretation thereof. They are used to explain: (iii) What affords imagining? After discussing both van Dijk and Rietveld's in 2020 non-representational answer and McClelland's in 2020 representational one, I propose a more general explanation: a stand-off between competing affordances can be resolved by imagination, driven by affordance competition. Arguably, (iv) the sensorimotor traces of previous interactions (e.g., strengthened synapses) can be repurposed as representations - grounding even representational explanations in an ecologized enactive framework.
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Citations in the library
Cited by 2
Cites 6
- The Oxford Handbook of 4E Cognition Oxford University Press eBooks September 13, 2018
- Radicalizing Enactivism The MIT Press eBooks December 14, 2012
- General ecological information supports engagement with affordances for ‘higher’ cognition Synthese February 12, 2018
- Agency From a Radical Embodied Standpoint: An Ecological-Enactive Proposal. Frontiers in Psychology 2020
- Making Sense of Sense-Making: Reflections on Enactive and Extended Mind Theories March 1, 2009
and 1 more in the library