Abstract
The general failure to individuate component causes in cognitive performance suggests the need for an alternative metaphysics. The metaphysics of control hierarchy theory accommodates the fact of self-organization in nature and the possibility that intentional actions are self-organized. One key assumption is that interactions among processes dominate their intrinsic dynamics. Scaling relations in response time variability motivate this assumption in cognitive performance.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Abrams, R. A., & Balota, D. A. (1991). Mental chronometry: Beyond reaction time. Psychological Science, 2 153-157.
Amazeen, P. G., Amazeen, E. L., & Beek, P. J. (2001). Patterns of locomotor-respiratory coupling during manual wheelchair propulsion. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27 1243-1259.
Amazeen, P. G., Amazeen, E. L., & Turvey, M. T. (1998). Dynamics of human intersegmental coordination: Theory and research. In D. A. Rosenbaum & C. E. Collyer (Eds.), Timing of behavior: Neural, computational, and psychological perspectives (pp. 237-259). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Balota, D. A., & Abrams, R.A. (1995). Mental chronometry: Beyond onset latencies in the lexical decision task. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 21 1289-1302.
Bosman, A. M. T., & Van Orden, G. C. (1997). Why spelling is more difficult than reading. C. A. Perfetti, L. Rieben, & M. Fayol (Eds.), Learning to spell (pp. 173-194). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Chen, Y., Ding, M. & Kelso, J. A. S. (1997). Long memory processes (1/fα type) in human coordination. Physical Review Letters, 79 4501-4504.
Chen, Y., Ding, M., & Kelso, J. A. S. (2001). Origins of time errors in human sensorimotor coordination. Journal of Motor Behavior, 33 3-8.
Clayton, K., & Frey, B. B. (1997). Studies of mental “noise. ” Nonlinear Dynamics, Psychology, and Life Sciences, 1 173-180.
Farmer, J. D. (1990). A Rosetta Stone for connectionism. Phys D, 42 153-187.
Farrar, W. T., & Van Orden, G. C. (2001). Errors as multistable response options. Nonlinear Dynamics, Psychology, and Life Sciences, 5 223-265.
Gentilucci, M., Benuzzi, F., Bertolani, L., Daprati, E., Gangitano, M. (2000). Language and motor control. Experimental Brain Research, 133 468-490.
Gibbs, R. (1999). Intentions in the experience of meaning. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Gibbs, R. W., & Van Orden, G. C. (2001). Mental causation and psychological theory: An essay review of “Dynamics in Action: Intentional Behavior in a Complex System” by Alicia Juarrero. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 1999. Human Development, 44 368-374.
Gilden, D. L. (1997). Fluctuations in the time required for elementary decisions. Psychological Science, 8 296-301.
Gilden, D. L. (2001). Cognitive emissions of 1/f noise. Psychological Review, 108 33-56.
Gilden, D. L., Thornton, T., & Mallon, M.W. (1995). 1/f noise in human cognition. Science, 267 1837-1839.
Goldinger, S. D. (1996). Words and voices: Episodic traces in spoken word identification and recognition memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 22 1166-1183.
Goldinger, S. D. (1998). Echoes of echoes? An episodic theory of lexical access. Psychological Review, 105 251-279.
Holden, J. G. (2002). Fractal characteristics of response time variability. Ecological Psychology (in press).
Holden, J. G., Van Orden, G. C., & Turvey, M. T. (2002). Self-organization of cognitive performance. (submitted for publication).
Jensen, H. J. (1998). Self-organized criticality. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Juarrero, A. (1999). Dynamics in action. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Kawamoto, A. H., & Zemblidge, J. (1992). Pronunciation of homographs. Journal of Memory and Language, 31 349-374.
Kelly, A., Heathcote, A., Heath, R., & Longstaff, M. (2001). Response time dynamics: Evidence for linear and low-dimensional nonlinear structure in human choice sequences. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 54A 805-840.
Kelso, J.A. S. (1995). Dynamic patterns: The self-organization of brain and behavior. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Kugler, P.N., & Turvey, M. T. (1987). Information, natural law, and the self-assembly of rhythmic movement. Hillsdale, NJ: LEA.
Larochelle, S., Richard, S., & Soulières, I. (2000). What some effects might not be: The time to verify membership in “well-defined” categories. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 53A, 929-961.
Luce, R. D. (1986). Response times: Their role in inferring elementary mental organization. New York: Oxford University Press.
Lumsden, C. J. (1997). Holism and reduction. In C. Lumsden, W. Brandts, & L. Trainor (Eds.). Physical theory in biology (pp. 17-44). River Edge, NJ: World Scientific.
Markman, A. B., & Dietrich, E. (2000). In defense of representation. Cognitive Psychology, 40 138-171.
Masson, M. E. J. (1995). A distributed memory model of semantic priming. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 21 509-514.
Montroll, E.W., & Shlesinger, M. F. (1982). On 1/ f noise and other distributions with long tails. Proc. of the Natl. Acad. of Sci. USA, 79 3380-3383.
Nicolis, G. (1989). Physics of far-from-equilibium systems and self-organisation. In P. Davies (Ed.) The new physics (316-347). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Pattee, H. H. (1973). The physical basis and origin of hierarchical control theory, in H. Pattee, ed., The Challenge of Complex Systems (pp. 73-108). New York: George Braziller.
Pennington, B. F. (1991). Diagnosing learning disorders: Aneuro psychological framework. New York: Guilford Press.
Schmidt, R. C., Beek, P. J., Treffner, P. J., & Turvey, M. T. (1991). Dynamical substructure of coordinated rhythmic movements. Journal of Experimental Psychology: HumanPerception and Performance, 17 636-651.
Schroeder, M. (1991). Fractals, chaos, power laws: Minutes from an infinite paradise. New York: Freeman.
Searle, J. R. (1992). The rediscovery of the mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Shaw, R. E., & Turvey, M. T. (1999). Ecological foundations of cognition II. Degrees of freedom and conserved quantities in animal-environment systems. In R. Núñez & W. J. Freeman (Eds.), Reclaiming cognition (pp. 111-123). Bowling Green, OH: Imprint Academic.
Simon, H. A. (1973). The organization of complex systems, in H. H. Pattee, ed., Hierarchy theory: The challenge of complex systems (pp. 1-27). New York: George Braziller.
Sternberg, S. (1969). The discovery of processing stages: Extensions of Donders' method. Acta Psychologica, 30 276-315.
Ulrich, R., & Miller, J. (1993). Information processing models generating lognormally distributed reaction times. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 37 513-525.
Uyeda, K. M., & Mandler, G. (1980). Prototypicality norms for 28 semantic categories. Behavior Research Methods & Instrumentation, 12 587-595.
Van Orden, G. C., & Holden, J. G. (2002). Intentional contents and self control. Ecological Psychology (in press).
Van Orden, G. C., Holden, J. G., Podgornik, M. N., & Aitchison, C. S. (1999). What swimming says about reading: Coordination, context, and homophone errors. Ecological Psychology, 11 45-79.
Van Orden, G.C., Pennington, B. F., & Stone, G.O. (2001). What do double dissociations prove? Cognitive Science, 25 111-172.
Van Zandt, T. (2000). How to fit a response time distribution. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 7 424-465.
West, B. J., & Deering, B. (1995). The lure of modern science. River Edge, NJ: Word Scientific.
Zelinsky, G. J., & Murphy, G. L. (2000). Synchronizing visual and language processing: Aneffect of object name length on eye movements. Psychological Science, 11 125-131.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Van Orden, G.C., Moreno, M.A. & Holden, J.G. A Proper Metaphysics for Cognitive Performance. Nonlinear Dynamics Psychol Life Sci 7, 49–60 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1020462025387
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1020462025387