I have reviewed a couple of other Tomasello books on this blog: The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition and Becoming Human. Tomasello, who is professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke as well as emeritus director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, has drawn on neo-Vygotskian theory to discuss the evolution of human cognition in those past books. In this one, he tackles a related issue: The evolution of agency.
Agency is a term that is often used in the social sciences and humanities, but not as often defined. In Chapter 1, Tomasello defines it: “Agency is thus not about the many and varied things that organisms do … but rather about how they do them. Individuals acting as agents direct and control their own actions, whatever those actions may be specifically” (p.2). Agentive beings are distinguished “by a special type of behavioral organization [which is] feedback control organization in which the individual directs its behavior toward goals … controlling or even self-regulating the process through informed decision-making and behavioral self-monitoring” (p.2). Indeed, “the concept of agency … represents the dividing line between biological and psychological approaches to behavior” since biology explains some complex processes, while psychology explains others. Tomasello’s goal in this book “is to reconstruct the evolutionary pathway to human psychological agency” (p.9), and he identifies four types of agency in human ancestors:
“Goal-directed agency in ancient vertebrates”
“Intentional agency in ancient mammals”
“Rational agency in ancient great apes”
“Socially normative agency in ancient human beings” (p.10)
(I mentioned earlier that Tomasello had drawn on neo-Vygotskian thought in his previous books. Vygotsky, of course, was very interested in self-control via psychological mediation, in which the individual learned and applied their culture’s tools. Tomasello doesn’t talk about that directly, but the links are there to be made.)
In Chapter 2, Tomasello provides a feedback control model of agency. He argues that an agent
Directs or plans actions toward goals, attending to situations
Controls or executively self-regulates its actions via informed decisions in an unfolding situation (p.11)
Since ancient vertebrates, mammals, etc. are not on offer, Tomasello uses the methods of comparative biology (examining fossils to understand physiology and evolutionary trajectories) to find extant organisms to use as models (p.13). These extant organisms are lizards, squirrels, chimpanzees, and (of course) humans (p.24).
Moving on, he discusses the feedback control mechanism of behavior, which “comprises a hierarchy of systems, each with three central components: (i) a reference value or goal, (ii) a sensing device or perception, and (iii) a device for comparing perception and goal so as to make and execute a behavioral decision” (p.19). He asserts that this really is the only possible model “for generating flexibly intelligent, agentive behavior” (p.19).
Tomasello also argues that “changes in the agentive organization of action lead to changes in the types of things the agent may experience. … Therefore a further dimension of agency … [is] the experiential niche of the organism” (p.22).
In Chapter 3, he discusses ancient vertebrates as goal-directed agents. At this level, the organism acts flexibly toward a goal even in novel contexts (p.27). For an agentive organization, the individual’s goals and actions determine their experimental niche, guided by attention (i.e., goal-directed perception) (p.36). Objects are not relevant to that attention, but situations are (p.36). Meanwhile, goals are “perceptually imagined situations” (p.38). And effective actions can play a causal role in the process of evolutionary change (p.41).
In Chapter 4, he discusses ancient mammals as intentional agents. At this level, “mammals direct their actions toward goals just flexibly but intentionally, as they cognitively stimulate possible action plans toward their goal before actually acting. And they control their behavior not just by making go-no-go decisions but also by making either-or behavioral choices as they evaluate the possible plans’ likely outcomes and control behavioral execution as it unfolds” (p.43). This new mode – “intentional agency” – emerges from “more flexible emotions and motivations that can be overridden as needed” (p.43). Early mammals have three new capabilities:
New ways to motivate action: more flexible motivations and emotions (p.45)
Cognitive capabilities for social competition, allowing them to plan and then act (p.46)
New ontogenetic pattern, allowing more learning (p.46), including instrumental learning in which they can understand how actions causally affect outcomes (p.47).
Here, we get executive functions and executive decision-making (p.51).
In Chapter 5, he discusses ancient apes as rational agents. Apes operate logically and reflectively, understanding why things happen; they to some degree understand causality and intentionality (p.67). Due to social competition, apes forage in small bands, producing social organization (p.70). They use cognitive simulations; their causal orientation means they can use tools; their intentional orientation means they engage in intentional communication and social learning (p.71). All of this yields rational agency (p.71).
In Chapter 6, we get to ancient humans as socially normative agents. Here, we get joint agency in collaboration, such as coordinating during a hunt to produce a collaborative benefit. This joint agency means that they develop interdependence – something that involves choosing partners based on competence and collaborative motivation (p.93). Such humans had to
Form a joint goal (p.95) by forming joint agency, pursuing a joint goal, and using joint attention and cooperative communication (p.96)
Coordinate roles by learning each others’ roles (p.97) and using their collaborative motivations to make inferences (p.99).
Collaboratively self-regulate the collaboration via partner control (making the partner behave better, p.99). That is, they became normative: through protests, the joint agency regulates itself (p.100).
Tomasello asserts that when we talk about feeling responsibility, deserving something, excusing our behavior, apologizing for behavior, or feeling guilt, we are discussing “shared normative standards by which ‘we’ evaluate and self-regulate ‘your’ and ‘my’ actions as coequal partners” (p.104). He adds that great apes don’t do these things because they have not evolved to cooperate in joint agency.
He adds that this behavior began in paired collaborations, then scaled up to larger social groups about 150,000 years ago, eventually yielding different cultural groups oriented to scaled-up collective intentionality (p.105). Groups fractionate at about 150 (he name-checks Dunbar’s number here, p.105), yielding tribal societies (p.106). We get in-groups and out-groups (p.108), with homophily as the psychological basis of human culture (p.109) and a new basis of cultural common ground that allows collaboration among those who don’t previously know each other (p.110). This cultural common ground is “recursive mind-reading” in that in-group members conform to conventional practices (p.110). We get specialized division of labor tied to commonly understood special rights and responsibilities (p.111).
In Chapter 7, Tomasello presents several conclusions:
“The ‘backbone’ of behavioral agency is feedback control organization.” (p.122)
“The ecological challenges leading to the evolution of behavioral agency all involve one or another form of unpredictability in the environment.” (p.123)
“Despite the plethora of specific behavioral and psychological adaptations across species, only a few basic types of psychological Bauplans exist for the agentive organization of behavior.” (p.124; see the summary table, p.127)
“The evolutionary emergence of new forms of behavioral organization involves both ‘hierarchical modularity’ and ‘trickle-down selection’” (p.128)
“Changes in the agentive organization of a species’ behavior and psychology lead to changes in the types of experience it is capable of having (its experiential niche)” (p.130)
“The decision-making agent is necessary, and it is not a homunculus, at least not in a bad way” (p.132)
Quite a book! It’s based on an extraordinarily broad base of knowledge, and it covers a broad sweep of time and behavior. I’m neither an evolutionary biologist nor a psychologist, so I’m not confident in my ability to evaluate it, but it does read compellingly and pull a complex discussion into a clearly related framework. For me, it also provides another angle for thinking about the social and cultural psychology that I do know, particularly Vygotskian and activity theory approaches. If you’re interested in agency in any form, definitely pick up this book.
(2003).
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