Descripción del proyecto
Una nueva teoría examina preguntas fundamentales en psicología social
Albedrío (influencia, ingenio, autoridad) y comunión (benevolencia, prosocialidad, honestidad) son las dos dimensiones más básicas de la cognición, el autoconcepto y la personalidad. Conocidos como los «dos grandes», el albedrío se refiere a alcanzar objetivos y prosperar, mientras que la comunión implica formar vínculos y llevarse bien con los demás. El objetivo del proyecto ACT, financiado por el Consejo Europeo de Investigación, es proponer y probar la teoría del albedrío-comunión (ACT, por sus siglas en inglés) para responder por qué los dos grandes son importantes para las personas. Para tal fin, se realizarán experimentos de laboratorio y se emplearán modelos evolutivos formales, datos masivos y estudios de grupos. Según la ACT, los dos grandes son componentes fundamentales de los esfuerzos culturales de las personas y sus notables logros evolutivos.
Objetivo
The Big Two of agency (influence, resourcefulness, authority) and communion (benevolence, prosociality, honesty) are fundamental to human social cognition, the self-concept, and personality. The Big Two must have a tremendously important function for humans, otherwise they were not that fundamental to human psychology. Yet, what is this function? State-of-the-art answers explain the function of the Big Two either in social cognition or in the self-concept or in personality and those answers contradict each other in critical ways. Here, I propose the first all-encompassing answer to the functional question of the Big Two in social cognition and the self-concept and personality. My answer comes in the form of a novel theory: Agency-Communion Theory (ACT) of Social Learning and Cultural Activity. According to ACT, the Big Two are the chief enablers of high-fidelity social learning. Never before have the Big Two been considered relevant for high-fidelity social learning, but the latter is widely seen as the reason for humans’ capacity to build culture and thrive by cultural activity—humans’ most powerful evolutionary strategy. Thus, ACT considers the Big Two the essential building blocks of human cultural activity and, ultimately, of humans’ extraordinary evolutionary success. ACT’s novel portrayal of the Big Two entails a wide variety of previously unforeseen behavioural consequences, including a novel account of social influence. The state-of-the-art account presupposes the existence of an innate tendency to conform to majority norms. ACT questions the existence of such an innate tendency and offers an alternative with far-reaching implications for many theories across social sciences and urgent societal challenges in the sphere of social influence. My interdisciplinary team will empirically test ACT and its novel account of social influence. We will use new, tailor-made methodology in laboratory experiments, formal evolutionary models, Big Data, and panel studies.
Ámbito científico
Programa(s)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Régimen de financiación
HORIZON-AG - HORIZON Action Grant Budget-BasedInstitución de acogida
68161 Mannheim
Alemania