Excerpt: To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Berger and Luckmann’s book The Social Construction of Reality, one of the most cited sociological books of the 20th century, is an absolute must – and truly deserving such appreciation. Proclaiming “social constructivism” a paradigm, however, as done by the title of this anniversary publication – although tentatively and with a question mark – seems fairly courageous, and this is so for several reasons: First, the label “social constructivism” covers a multiplicity of different theoretical approaches and, therefore, has many different meanings and connotations – can it be re-specified to just one of them? Second, both Berger and Luckmann distance themselves explicitly from constructivism; Luckmann said that they both were “very much annoyed” when “being labeled ‘social constructivists’” (Dreher & Vera 2016: 31). Is it apt, then, to call their approach “social constructivism”? Third, we have been witnessing a countermovement during the last decade in philosophy as well as in the social sciences – social constructivism has come under attack. How big is the chance to revive and consolidate it in spite of these criticisms? The goal of this chapter is to respond to these questions by shedding some light on the variations of constructivism (while keeping Berger and Luckmann’s approach center stage).

In everyday life we often act adequately, yet without deliberation. For instance, we immediately obtain and maintain an appropriate distance from others in an elevator. The notion of normativity implied here is a very basic one, namely distinguishing adequate from inadequate, correct from incorrect, or better from worse in the context of a particular situation. In the first part of this paper I investigate such ‘situated normativity’ by focusing on unreflective expert action. More particularly, I use Wittgenstein’s examples of craftsmen (tailors and architects) absorbed in action to introduce situated normativity. Situated normativity can be understood as the normative aspect of embodied cognition in unreflective skillful action. I develop Wittgenstein’s insight that a peculiar type of affective behaviour, ‘directed discontent’, is essential for getting things right without reflection. Directed discontent is a reaction of appreciation in action and is introduced as a paradigmatic expression of situated normativity. In the second part I discuss Wittgenstein’s ideas on the normativity of what he calls ‘blind’ rule-following and the ‘bedrock’ of immediate action. What matters for understanding the normativity of (even ‘blind’) rule-following, is not that one has the capacity for linguistic articulation or reflection but that one is reliably participating in a communal custom. In the third part I further investigate the complex relationships between unreflective skillful action, perception, emotion, and normativity. Part of this entails an account of the link between normativity at the level of the expert’s socio-cultural practice and the individual’s situated and lived normativity.

In this paper we explore in what sense we can claim that affordances, the objects of perception for ecological psychology, are related to normativity. First, we offer an account of normativity and provide some examples of how it is understood in the specialized literature. Affordances, we claim, lack correctness criteria and, hence, the possibility of error is not among their necessary conditions. For this reason we will oppose Chemero’s (2009) normative theory of affordances. Finally, we will show that there is a way in which taking advantage of affordances could be considered as possessing a normative character, but only when they are evaluated within the framework of social normative standards in particular situations. This reinforces our claim that affordances, per se, lack normativity and can only be taken to be rule-governed in relation to established normative practices.

Key words: Affordances, normativity, perception, ecological psychology

It is becoming apparent in modern cognitive science that the lack of knowledge about human experiential landscape implies the loss of a very important element, perhaps the very essence. Consequently, a rather new area of research has emerged recently: an attempt at a systematic observation and study of experience. This is the so-called phenomenologically inspired research (or just phenomenological research). Part of this article aims to present this new area of research – it describes the common fundaments of the field and some of its characteristic methodological derivates, relating them to the possibility of studying decision making from the first-person point-of-view, i.e. decision making as an experiential phenomenon (and not as a neurological or behavioural process). The article also presents some of the findings phenomenological studies have led to and some theoretical reflexions encouraged by these insights.

Key words: experience, experiencing, phenomenology, phenomenological research, reason, first-person.

Excerpt: Educational programs designed to help children to overcome prejudice offer some hope to understanding the emergence of harmony in human relations. One aim of such programs is to facilitate the development of mutual respect and responsibility towards others. In the present paper I review ways in which a series of programs designed to train trainers to work constructively changed over an eight year period. Each program was an intervention study designed to provide opportunities in classrooms to young children aged between 5 and 12 years of age to reconsider their prejudices (e.g., Gash, 1995a). In particular, recursive changes have been driven by tensions involved in designing a training system to facilitate the emergence of constructivist practices.

Key words: cognition, computation, artificial intelligence

Excerpt: Als “Väter” des Konstruktivismus werden häufig die chilenischen Biologen H. Maturana und F. Varela genannt. Sie interessieren sich für eine Biologie des Erkennens, wozu die sinnliche Wahrnehmung, das Denken, das Fühlen und auch das Lernen gehört. Sie vertreten eine Sicht, “…die das Erkennen nicht als eine Repräsentation der ‘Welt da draußen’ versteht, sondern als ein andauerndes Hervorbringen einer Welt durch den Prozeß des Lebens selbst” (MaturanaNarela 1987, S. 7) Diese neurobiologische Erkenntnistheorie hat auch das sozialwissenschaftliche Denken beeinflußt. In der Literatur- und Geschichtswissenschaft, in der Sozialarbeit und Psychotherapie häufen sich die Verweise auf den Konstruktivismus. In der Erwachsenenbildung haben Tietgens (1981) und Schäffter (1985) zwar schon in den 80er Jahren auf konstruktivistische Sichtweisen hingewiesen, aber erst in jüngster Zeit scheint das Interesse an diesem Ansatz zuzunehmen (Arnold 1994).

Hypnotische Phänomene sind illusorische oder halluzinatorische Verstörungen der „normalen“ Wirklichkeitskonstruktion, welche bei hochhypnotisierbaren Personen vergleichsweise leicht und meist auf sehr direkte Weise induziert werden können. Personen mit mittlerer Hypnotisierbarkeit benötigen elaboriertere Induktionen, wie sie u. a. auch in den indirekten Techniken der Erickson‛schen Hypnotherapie dargelegt sind. Im Kontext des radikalen Konstruktivismus sind Kriterien beschrieben worden, welche für die „normale“ Wirklichkeitskonstruktion als wesentlich gelten. Die planvolle Anwendung dieser syntaktischen, semantischen und pragmatischen Kriterien kann helfen, hypnotische Phänomene auch bei jenen Personen zu induzieren, die nicht zu den Hochhypnotisierbaren gehören.