thickening the discussion: inspecting constructivist theories of knowledge through a jamesian lens

43

THICKENING THE DISCUSSION: INSPECTING CONSTRUCTMST THEORIES OF

KNOWLEDGE THROUGH A JAMESIAN LENS Bradford S. Woods

University of Alabama

P. Karen Murphy The Ohio State University

The popular notion that “Science” is forced on the mind ab extra, and that our interests have nothing to do with its constructions, is utterly absurd. The craving to believe that the things of the world belong to kinds which are related by inward rationality together, is the parent of Science as well as of sentimental philosophy; and the onginal investigator always preserves a healthy sense of how plastic the materials are in his hands.’

If ever fully realized, the recent ground swell in educational theory that has been led by advocates of constructivism bears profound implications for research and practice in education. The educational research literature has proliferated many forums in which proponents of constructivism have argued that positivist explana- tions of the way in which knowledge is created and disseminated in schools is in need of deconstruction andreexamination. The epistemology forwarded by constructivists, which is reminiscent of existentialist philosophy and exhibits many of the central tenets of postmodernist philosophy, has immeasurable potential for influencing the future course of educational practice. However, from our standpoint, absent from the constructivist dialogue is a consistent effort to explicate thoroughly the writings of seemingly critical forbears of constructivist epistemology. This is problematic; as B.H. Smith notes, “the truths of constructivism are not ontologically prior - already constituted [made up), waiting only to be discovered by the duly alert and acknowledged by the duly astute. Like all other truths, those of constructivism must themselves be constructed.”2

It was our experience of the rather conspicuous absence of William James’s psychological theories from the corpus of literature associated with constructivism that compelled us to place pen to paper in search of reasons why advocates of this wave of educational theory and reform have seemingly overlooked Jamesian psychology and philosophy as a potential foundation of their work. We acknowledge that many constructivists rightly claim the work of John Dewey as part of their intellectual legacy, pointing to the centralization of the subject within the context of society that Dewey’s writings propose. However, we believe that James’s work offers a clarity and incisiveness of thought that predates, and in some respects outstrips, the

1. William James, “Necessary Truths,“ in The Writings of William lames: A Comprehensive Edition, ed. J.J. McDermott (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977), 115. 2. B.H. Smith, “Making (up] the Truth: Constructivist Contributions,” Universityof Toronto Quarterly61, no. 4 (1992): 428.

EDUCATIONAL THEORY / Winter 2002 / Volume 52 / Number 1 0 2002 Board of Trustees / University of Illinois

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postulates of constructivism. For example, James’s philosophy celebrates the rest- lessness of the universe and refutes monisminmuch the same way that constructivists do; however, James admonishes theorists who “play fast and loose” with epistemology and truth-getting - a charge he may well have leveled at constructivists were he here today.

In offering up these comparisons of constructivist theories with Jamesian philosophy and psychology, our goal is effectively to thicken the discussion as we see it. Like the professional dialogue that fuels the advance of technology, Qscussions of constructivism and its implications seem to take on new and exciting hues with every passing m ~ r n e n t . ~ Alas, we profess to make no definitive statement about the promise of constructivism, rather we wish to offer up our own knowledge with regard to a possible line of enriched understanding of constructivism’s possibilities and limitations from a Jamesian pluralistic viewpoint. We are gravely concerned that proponents of constructivism, as it has been applied to our field, have been remiss in their duty to reflect adequately upon the writing of James whose Weltanschuauung was so strikingly similar to that of many of the constructivist theories that we highlight below, and whose work might provide a much-needed source of dialogic enrichment. Simply put, we could no more imagine a discussion of quantum physics being complete without some acknowledgment of the contributions of Albert Einstein, than one of educational psychology or educational philosophy that omits James’s pragmatist, pluralistic philosophy.

A WORD ABOUT EDUCATIONAL THEORY AND REFORM We regard the introduction of new breeds of scholarship in the building of

educational theories to be paramount to the health and continued viability of our domain, and recognize that educational reform is often carried along in its course by the introduction and dissemination of fresh approaches to educational theory. Such introductions are often gilded with promises of facilitating enhanced learning and instruction, and often propose new epistemologies as panaceas. Unfortunately, muchlike the ballyhooed improvements made in commercial products (for example, laundry soap), new and improved educational theory often fails to deliver on its promised “cleaner and brighter” practical results. The predictably woeful outcomes resulting from the implementation of some of the “new and improved” theories may be due, in large part, to the introduction of iterative interpretations of preexisting theory, and inadequate preparation or training of those practitioners for whom the

3. Indeed, we find the technology-as-panacea debate to be of a similar fabric as our own qualms with cure- all educational reform. For a discussion of the technology debate, see Neil Postman, Technopoly (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1992).

BRADFORD S. WOODS is Assistant Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Alabama, Box 870231, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0231. His primary area of scholarship is educational psychology. P. KAREN MURPHY is Assistant Professor at the Oh10 State University, 29 Woodruff Ave., 139 Ramseyer Hall, Columbus, OH 43210. Her primary areas of scholarship are the relation between philosophy and psychology, and the role of knowledge and beliefs in learning.

WOODS AND MURPHY Inspecting Constructivist Theories 45

new theory is de~eloped.~ We are concerned that this may well be the case with constructivism.

Many a skeptic is sure to surmise that accusations such as these are nothing new, that theory is, after all, theory. We acknowledge that such contentions are not without merit, however our concern is not for the vagaries of theoretical politics, shifting paradigms, or competing research programs. Our concern is rooted in the alarming dearth of citations of foundational thinkers in the research literature supporting these innovations. More specifically, our concern is for the researcher and practitioner who, left to navigate the sea of new and often competing theories, might be apt to follow the newest reform without sufficient information to aid in decisionmaking or refle~tion.~ This possible scenario gives us pause to wonder whether extreme postmodernism has cut such a decisive swath in our collective conscious that we, as researchers, now choose to ignore our research tradition, replacing the time-honored method of knowledge - building through thoughtful reflection on, and citation of, theoretical antecedents with a trend toward simply citing like-minded contemporaries. Is standing on the shoulders of giants passe? We hope not.

In order to usher the works of James to the fore, within this work we will attempt to weave a tapestry of relations between the theories of constructivism and basic elements of James’s psychology in the hopes of introducing this renowned American thinker into the dialogue that emanates from the constructivist literature by: (1) explicating selected psychological writings of James; (2) illustrating the similarities and differences between these theories and the contemporary writings centered on constructivism; and (3 ) arguing the possible influences and contributions that a deeper understanding of James could make to these theories. In short, we seek to establish an intellectual lineage for constructivism by way of James, in the hopes of making some contribution toward curbing repetitive reform. Because we readily acknowledge, per James, that “man’s empirical thought depends on the things he has experienced, but what these shall be is to a large extent determined by his habits of attention,” in the following pages, we will expose James to the reader’s philosophical body of experience in the hopes of sparking some glimmer of insight.6

As such, perhaps it would behoove us to step back at this point and acknowledge that James’s work is not completely absent from the acknowledgments of contemporary theorists. In fact, in the case of one of the more influential collections of writings centered on radical constructivism, Radical Constructivism in Mathemat- ics, von Glasersfeld alludes loosely to theoretical interstices between the writings of

4. For further elucidation of iterative trends in educational reform, see Patricia A. Alexander and Stephanie L. Knight, ”Dimensions of the Interplay between Learning and Teaching,” The Educational Forum 57 (1993): 232-45. See also Larry Cuban, “Reforming Again, Again, and Again,” Educational Researcher 19 (1990): 3-13. 5. Patricia A. Alexander, P. Karen Murphy, and Bradford S. Woods, “Of Squalls and Fathoms: Navigating the Seas of Educational Innovation,” Educational Researcher 25, no. 3 (1996): 31-36,39. 6. William James, “The Stream of Thought,” in McDermott, The Writings of William lames, 72.

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James and the theory of radical constru~tivism.~ While we certainly applaud von Glasersfeld for drawing this parallel, we would hold that this is but the beginning of the story.

Before moving on, it is incumbent that we state that though there are areas within constructivism that we might find philosophically questionable, we do not intend to use this forum for injecting these observations or criticisms. Rather, we take the position of Dewey that such endeavors should not rely on an “increase of erudite scholarship about the past that throws no light upon the issues now troubling mankind.”s Similarly, we will not be offering James as an alternative to any of the aforementioned theories because it is not necessary to throw the proverbial baby out with the bath water. Moreover, we acknowledge that such exercises can only be useful if they do, indeed, serve the common cause of bettering our perspective in matters that we, and undoubtedly others in our field, hold to be the pinnacle of our individual and mutual endeavors.

THE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

For James, the centerpiece of psychological ruminations is, necessarily, thought; accordingly, “[tlhe only thing which psychology has a right to postulate at the outset is the fact of thinking itself, and that must be first taken up and analy~ed.”~ Working from this assumption, James believed the nature and essence of thoughts to be as particular and peculiar as the varieties of personal consciousness attached to them. Thus, James held, there is no sameness of thought, only sameness of object of thought, and ”[tlhe breach between such thoughts are the most absolute breaches in nature.”lD While personal choice in discriminating attention among knowable objects in the environment makes cognitive differences all the more profound, James nonetheless allows for likeness of interest, and the building of communities of thought: ”in my mind and your mind the rejected portions and the selected portions of the original world-stuff are to a great extent the same. The human race as a whole largely agrees as to what it shall name and notice, and what not.”“

On the level of the individual, choice, selection, attention, and interest are touchstones of James’s psychological theory. Critical elements, these, for their linkage with the environment surrounding a given personal consciousness provides the fuel that fires the continuously changing nature of thought. The mind, constantly involved with acting upon its environment, is thus streamlike: “Consciousness, then, does not appear to itself chopped up in bits.. . .It is nothing jointed; it flows. A river’ or a ‘stream’ are the metaphors by which it is most naturally described.”’2

7. Emst von Glasersfeld, Radical Constructivism in MathematicsEducation (Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer, 1991), 40, 42-43, 77-78, 93.

8. John Dewey, Reconstruction in Philosophy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1948), vi.

9. “Habit,“ in McDermott, The Writings of William fumes, 21.

10. James, “Stream of Thought,” 23.

11. James, “Necessary Truths and the Effects of Experience,” 74.

12. James, “Stream of Thought,” 33


In this stream, asserts James, we tend to take notice of things not as they are, but as they interrupt or contrast our own flow of experiences. The Jamesian mind is constantly processing, moving onward from one cognitive mooring point to the next in a dance of selective attention, choreographed by our habits of attention. Like thunder, perceptual interruptions to our cognitive flow are fleeting, and will not recur in such a way that can be said to be an exact replication.

Each episode of cognitive engagement is significantly different from any other, and though we have memory of previous encounters, we are influenced by the situation at hand. Just as carousel riders are afforded repeated opportunities to grasp the mythical brass ring, though their mount may rise and fall, shifting the physical nearness of the prize, so the object-to-be-known is never twice apprehended in the same light. Often, this is to the knower’s disadvantage, for we tend to ignore the transitional period between cognitive thunderclaps, and are thus deprived of an appreciation of the naturally occurring relations that fashion themselves around the event. What James strove to illustrate was that the relations and the event were of equal weight, and constituted the rich fabric of continuous cognitive activity.

The focal point of James’s notion of the stream of consciousness is experience, reflecting homage to his own philosophical roots: ”Experience is remolding us every moment, and our mental reaction on every given thing is really a resultant of our experience of the whole worldup to that date.”13For James, thevery stateof existence is perpetually creative, a wholly malleable phenomenon, the result of which is that humans are able to ruminate and create. At times inspired to verse by the sight of a familiar tree in autumn, at others times puzzling over the behavior of an acquain- tance, the flow of sensations allows us to form connections with nature, indeed the cosmos. Though James doubts the recurrence of exact experiences, he allows for the accretion of experiential relations resulting in a cognitive matrix upon which we build and frame personal recollections and memory.

In simple terms, James’s stream of consciousness is a psychological accounting of the way in which the world enters upon our awareness and becomes part of our cognitive makeup; it is a story of perception and possibility. The flow of sensations is continuous and of no single source, as is our experience of it, and it is through the lens of our experiences that we selectively attend to the ordering of the chaos around us. AccorQng to James, we are afforded fringes, or halos, by objects in the realm of the senses, and we distill the sum of our experiences into an assemblage that we can cognitively cope with:

Relation, then, to OUT topic or interest is constantly felt in the fringe, and particularly the relation of harmony and discord, of furtherance or hindrance of the topic .... Provided we only feel it to have a place in the scheme of relations in which the interesting topic also lies, that is quite sufficient to make of it a relevant and appropriate portion of our train of ideas.14

The knowing of an object is to have a relation with that object, and in selectively forming relations, we set up the aforementioned mooring points in the stream of

13. Ibid., 29.

14. Ibid., 49

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consciousness, a sort of trail of cognitive bread crumbs by which we retain the distant through ”intermediaries and associates.” These relations are all that we are allowed in James’s conceptualization, and though we are granted fleeting glimpses of meaning, we are denied any whisper of certitude as the very project of inquiry pushes the boundaries of meaning to just beyond the reach and scope of human ability to know.15 In groping for truth, some aspects of experience in the “teeming multiplic- ity” of the stream become less conspicuous for the individual seeking understanding.

The overlooked experiences often comprise transitional states between the self and the object, the cognitive cement of relations. The act of cognition, of grappling for meaning with our environment, creates consequences of oversight that lend to the creation of tension between the desire to know, to grasp the Platonic form, and the human predilection toward a will to believe. James warns against making false connections in the effort to reconcile this tension, and granting any more weight to objects than that bestowed by cognitive construction. In formulating theories to “dichotomize the Kosmos” we are performing an adaptive feat rather than one that will reveal ultimate truths.

In performing this adaptive feat, we often look to language to capture and store the understandings that we have gained. Furthermore, we have historically placed a great deal of trust in the capacity of language to capture and preserve truths. While James would doubtless agree that truth is a property of language, his brand of pragmatism stands in opposition to a strict correspondence theory of truth. As Richard Wilshire explains,

Only when we understand that the experienceable world is the ultimate presupposition of all inquiry can we grasp James’s pragmatic theory of truth. Correspondence theorists presume that statements or judgments stand on their own and, when corresponding to the ”outer or objective world,” possesses the property of truth whether we know it or not. This, James believes, is addictive verbalism that conceals the ground of meaning making in the world.16

In sum, for James, the correspondence theory of truth amounts to “intellectualism,” and intellectualism undermines faith in percepts that do not necessarily match rational or empirical evidence. James recognized the ontological comfort that allegiance to correspondence theory offers, but demurred at the epistemological horseplay that equated simple grammatical statements with phusis. In the intellec- tualist worldview, then, James’s stream of consciousness may still flow, but there is a serious threat of drought.

To summarize this explication of James’s stream of consciousness theory, we offer the following summative points for consideration:

1. James held the nature and essence of thoughts to be as particular and peculiar as the varieties of personal consciousness that create them. 2. In the stream of consciousness we tend to take notice of things not as they are, but as they interrupt or contrast with our own experience.

15. John J. McDermott, ”Introduction,” in McDermott, The Writings of William James, xxix. 16. Richard Wilshire, “The Breathtaking Intimacy of the Material World: William James’s Last Thoughts,” In The Cambridge Companion to William James, ed. Ruth Anna Putnam (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 115.


3 . The knowing of an object is to have a relation with that object, and in selectively forming relations, we set up mooring points in the stream of consciousness. 4. In formulating theories to "dichotomize the Kosmos" we are performing an adaptive feat rather thanone that will revealultimate truths, and while language plays a role in this process, it is little more than a bookmark of experience.

CONSIDERING CONSTRUCTIVISM

Contemporary theories of constructivism have followed in the wake of postmodern forbears in an attempt to reconceptualize the way in which epistemology is viewed: "This attitude is characterized by the deliberate redefinition of the concept of knowledge as an adaptive functi~n."~' Consequently, in order to understand constructivism fully, one must first come to terms with the nomenclature and theoretical structure advocated by its adherents. Indeed, understanding the wordplay among thesevarious intellectual camps is a critical first step toward the deconstruction of the impasse that habitual reform presents, for this blockage restricts the acquisi- tion of a higher level of interpretation and understanding of theory, past and present.'*

In political terms, constructivism seeks to enfranchise voices that have long been quieted by what constructivist theorists view as dominant paradigms of thought which have relegated the knowledge and opinions of some communities to the periphery of the production and dissemination of metanarrative. Like postmodern thought, constructivist accounts of knowledge are a direct response to Enlighten- ment and modernist philosophy and the emergence of behaviorism and the formation processing model as descriptions of human learning. In the educational research community, the shift in emphasis has found form in postpositivist and qualitative research: "It is not revolutionary to conclude that children and bureaucracies construct their own worlds. An important paradgmatic shift occurs, however, when contemporary researchers treat testimony us evidence, perception us real it^."'^

Qualitative methodologies advocate a more holistic approach to data gathering and rely heavily on interview and case studies, as opposed to the population sampling and "number crunching" techniques of quantitative research. In the rawest sense, constructivism adheres to an epistemology that seats the source of all knowledge creation within the individual. As such, any model that holds that humans merely reflect or discover knowledge are targets of refutation. Instead, constructivism adheres to a belief that individual constructions of knowledge and the environmental variables that mold these constructions should be the true objects of epistemology. For the constructivist, the individual responds to and assimilates the environment in ways peculiar to that individual "The common conviction is that knowledge

17. Von Glasersfeld, "Introduction," xiv.

18. See Patricia A. Alexander, Diane L. Schallert, and V.C. Hare, "Coming to Terms: How Researchers in Learning and Literacy Talk about Knowledge," Review of Educational Research 61, no. 30 (1991 1: 315-43.

19. Robert Stake and Donald Kerr, "Ren6 Magritte, Constructivism, and the Researcher as Interpreter," Educational Theory 45, no. 1 (1995): 59.


cannot simply be transferred ready-made from parent to child or from teacher to student but has to be actively built up by each learner in his or her own mind.”20

The resulting constructions are colored by a whole host of personal variables such as prior knowledge, personal experience, beliefs, and emotional states, to name but a few. The clear implication of such an approach is that certain elements of the constructed knowledge will vary from what may be widely held to constitute the more generalized “truth” of a matter. For instance, an urban dweller who grew up with a leaky roof and poor plumbing might hold a markedly different knowledge construction of water than someone who had grown up by the seaside and been lulled to sleep at night by the song of the surf. Assertions such as these have opened constructivism to charges that their ilk seeks to perpetuate a denial of reality, advocating a subjective rather than objective worldview. According to von Glasersfeld, ”There is not much wrong with that argument, but the fact that we do agree on certain things and that we can communicate does not prove that what we experience has objective reality in itself.”2’

As we have suggested above, for a scholar to claim intellectual allegiance with constructivists is merely a drop in an ever-widening and deepening pool of possible affiliations. The sub-genres of constructivism are quite variegated, though they share many central tenets. In a recent exposition on the tangle of constructivism, D.C. Phillips draws upon thevarious threads of scholarly discourse on the subject in order to arrive at a model from which to orient future dialogue.

Phillips’s model acknowledges constructivism as a “powerful folktale about the origins of human knowledge.”22 As such, we may infer that any handling of constructivism must take into consideration the gravity of its philosophical ques- tioning, for it is clearly an issue that runs much deeper than mere programmatic changes in the way that we teach. Indeed we are engaging the very issue of accounting for how it is that knowledge comes to be. Phillips posits two potential sources of epistemology (as posited by constructivist literature), and organizes his model along these two axes. The first axis addresses the question of whether knowledge is an individual creation, or one born of social interaction. According to Phillips, the sub- genres of radical constructivism and socially shared cognition occupy opposing extremes of this axis. The second axis consists of a range of possible epistemological origins that runs from humans-as-creators to nature-as-instructor. Typologies of knowledge like those astutely forwarded by Phillips are as old as philosophy itself, and can be equated with such notorious debates as those between Plato and Aristotle over the sources of reality, and more recently the dialogue that emanates from language philosophy between realists and deflationists.23

20. Von Glasersfeld, “Introduction,” xiii. 21. Ibid., xv. 22. D.C. Phllips, ”The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: The Many Faces of Constructivism,” Educational Researcher 24, no. 7 (1995): 5. 23. These more recent debates provide yet another template to critique the constructivist project, but lay beyond the purview of this work. See Michael Dummett, Truth and other Enigmas (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978); Paul Honvich, Truth (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990); and Crispin Wright, Truth and Objectivity (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1992).

WOODS AND MURPHY Inspecting Constructivist Theories 5 1

To summarize this explication of general constructivist theory, we offer the

1. Like postmodem thought, constructivist accounts of knowledge are a direct response to Enlightenment, modernist philosophy, and the emergence of behaviorism and ”cold” cognitive theory. 2. Constructivist theory proposes that individual constructions of knowledge and the environmental variables that mold these constructions should be the true objects of epistemology. 3. Accordmg to constructivist theory, certain elements of an individual’s constructed knowledge will vary from what may be widely held to constitute the more generalized “truth” of a matter. Having discussed some generalities of the broad field of constructivism, let US

now turn our attention to three intellectual strands that are pervasive in the current literature of educational research. The following classifications reflect our understanding of the boundaries between and similarities among the three sub-genres of constructivism that we have chosen for analysis and comparison with James’s work.

SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIVISM In order to account for the undeniable human propensity for holding similar

general knowledge about certain events, a branch of constructivism known variously as socially shared cognition or social constructivism proposes that interpersonal relations between individuals engaged in learning, as opposed to intrapersonal cognitive creation, is the most viable explanation of knowledge con~truct ion.~~ Models of learning that rely heavily on sociological theories of shared context and the influences that it can bring to bear on phenomena such as conceptual change, mark this strand. Social constructivists often invoke Dewey’s assertion that education should be understood as a means of transferring knowledge from generation to generation with the pragmatic upshot being the perpetuation of the human species. A practical example of this approach in education is the apprenticeship model in which an expert and novice are paired up in an academic setting and engage in the resolution of “real world” problems.25 Advocates of apprenticeship approaches to learning would argue that “our daily lives are filled with instances in which we influence each other’s constructive process by providing information, pointing

following points for continued consideration:

24. Kenneth Tobin, “Social Constructivist Perspectives on the Reform of Science Education,” Australian Science Teachers Iournal36, no. 4 (1990): 29-35 and Lauren B. Resnick, “Shared Cognition: Tninkmg as Social Practice,” in Perspectives on Socially Shared Cognition, ed. Lauren B. Resnick, John M. Levine, and Stephanie D. Teasley (Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association, 1991 J, 1-20.

25. For a mscussion of conceptual change models, see Paul Pintrich, R.W. Marx, and R.A. Boyle, ”Beyond Cold Conceptual Change: The Role of Motivational Beliefs and Classroom Contextual Factors in the Process of Conceptual Change,” Reviewof Educational Research 63, no. 2 (1993): 167-99; for discussion of apprenticeship models of learning, see Barbara Rogoff, Appmnticeship in Thinking (New York: Oxford University Press, 19901, and Allan Collins, John Seeley Brown, and Susan E. Newman, “Cognitive Apprenticeship: Teachmg the Craft of Reading, Writing, and Mathematics,” in Knowing, Learning, and Instruction: ESSQYS m Honor of Robert Glaser, ed. Lauren B. Resnick (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum, 19891,453- 94.


things out to one another, asking questions, and arguing with and elaborating on each other’s ideas.’’26

SITUATED COGNITION

Situated cognition is grounded in the experiential cornerstone of constructivism, but focuses more on the significance of the temporal relation of humankind to the perceptible environment, disparaging the notion that the structure of symbolic intermediaries, such as language, between individual and environment are suitable approximations of cognitive functioning; arguing, rather, that instance is essence. For these theorists, the environment is in Heraclitean flux, and the individual is a cognitive amalgam of the immediate direct experiences, rather than the secondary mental representations created as a result of these experiences. The denial of the concept of symbolic intermediaries as the focus of epistemology referred to by James G. Greeno and Joyce L. Moore as situativity theory epitomizes the denial of the centrality of symbolic processing in favor of a view that more readily acknowledges the vitality and singularity of relations between both the object and social environ- m e n t ~ . ~ ’

D.A. Norman characterizes situated cognition (referred to by Norman as ”situated action”) by suggesting, “these studies focus entirely upon the structures of the world and how they constrain and guide human behavior.”28 The individual accesses the environment through perceptual affordances, decides which of these to attend to based on experience, and constructs knowledge accordingly. Knowledge is situated in the approachable environment for all to attend, but the manner in which each individual accesses the environment is purely subjective. One might imagine a stockbroker who immediately discards sections of the daily newspaper in favor of the financial section, because it speaks more to her cognitive constitution than, say, the classified ads.

RADICAL CONSTRUCTIVISM

Finally, we consider perhaps the most extreme stripe of constructivism, aptly named radical constructivism. This branch has incurred the most ire of positivist thinkers because it seems to offer an abject denial of a singular reality. Radical constructivists envision knowledge more as a coping mechanism, a navigational tool, than as a vessel of facts, discovered by the individual. In this paradigm, the individual mind is a drifter, making connections that afford some sense of stability in an ever-changing world. The creation of knowledge structures is situated solely in the mind of the individual, and the notion that we can ever accurately communicate these constructions is deemed impossible by radical constructivists. Again, we

~~~~~

26. Resnick, ”Shared Cognition,” 2.

27. James G. Creenoand JoyceL. Moore, “SituativityandSymbols: Response toVeraandSimon,” Cognitive Science 17 (1993): 49-59.

28. D.A. Norman, ”Cognitionin theHeadandin theworld: Anhtroduction to the SpecialIssueon Situated Action,” Cognitive Science 17 (1993): 4.


detect here a notable relation with postmodern staples such as deconstruction and poststructuralism.

While situated cognition concerns itself primarily with questions of individual cognition as it approaches knowledge in the perceptual realm, radical constructivism deals with a much larger epistemological question. What situated cognition and radical constructivism share is a widening of the scope of human consciousness and experience to include the consideration of differing perspectives, but in doing so, both must contend with the slippery slope of relativism. In the case of radical constructivism, knowledge is located only in the mind of the individual under consideration. All of the knowledge that this person possesses is the direct product of personally experienced phenomena, and is constructed in a manner that is absolutely distinct from any other individual’s construction. Radical Constructivism denies the possibility of any overarching truths, instead attributing the proliferation of agreed-upon knowledge to consensual constructions. The domains of science and mathematics, darlings of the positivist and rationalist intellectual communities, have been specifically earmarked by radical constructivists as proving grounds for radical constructi~ism.~~

Like situated cognition, the central argument of the radical constructivist paradigm is the refutation of the model of language in which words are ennobled with the quality of containing knowledge. In this deconstruction of semiotics, the radical constructivist paradigm rails primarily against the conduit model of teaching and learning. As such, radical constructivists place a great deal of weight on the classroom practices of argumentation, contradiction, and negotiation in the construction of understanding, yet allow such practices only inasmuch as they constitute a means to an end. One can certainly hear the echo of the scientific knowledge literature of Kuhn, but there is also a surprising similarity, even among the most radical elements, with Jamesian writings concerning the creation of meaning from chaos.3O

JAMES AND CONSTRUCTIVISM: CONVERGENCE AND DIVERGENCE

For our purposes, it is helpful to regard the work of James as residmg somewhere between the two extremes of realist and antirealist philosophy. Realists might claim James for his postulation of meaning-laden fringes ensconced in the environment. Conversely, James could also be claimed to support antirealist philosophy by virtue of stressing the singular power of the individual to create meaning, locating the creation or discovery of truth in the relation of the individual with the world. Indeed, close examination of James’s explanation of his then-emergent radical empiricism, in which he contrasts empiricism with rationalism, reveals clear harbingers of constructivist theory:

29. For &scussion of constructivism as it relates to science instruction, see Rosalind Driver, Hilary Asoko, John Leach, Eduerdo Mortimer, and Philip Scott, “Constructing Scientific Knowledge in the Classroom,” Educational Researcher 23, no. 7 [ 1994): 5-12. For mscussions of constructivism as it relates tomathematics, in addition to von Glasersfeld, see Paul Cobb, “Where is the Mind? Constructivist and Sociocultural Perspectives on Mathematical Development,” Educational Researcher 23, no. 7 (1994): 13-20.

30. Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure o f Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962).

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Empiricism is known as the opposite of rationalism. Rationalism tends to emphasize universals and to make wholes prior to parts in the order of logic as well as that of being. Empiricism, on the contrary, lays the explanatory stress upon the part, the element, the individual, and treats the whole as a collection and the universal as an abstract.31

If the Jamesian Radical Empiricist approach to knowing is embraced, the individual is seen as an autonomous being immersed in the constant barrage of sensations offered by the environment. Habits of attention are a purely indlvidual manifestation of experiences, and they guide the individual in constructing knowledge in much the same way as radical constructivists envision it. However, James stops short of casting his lot with those who would deny external reality:

[A111 schools (however they otherwise differ) must allow that the elementary qualities of cold, heat, pleasure, pain, red, blue, sound, silence, etc., are original, innate or apriori properties of our subjective nature, even though they should require the touch of experience to waken them into actual consciousness, and should slumber to all eternity, without it?*

For some, such a statement might mark a decidedly Platonic coloring to James’s work, thus allowing us to count him among the realist thinkers, but here again, the picture is much larger. The focus of concern, says James, should be less on these extremes (the object in nature and the knower), and more on the “intermediaries and associations [that] stand between and separate the thought and the thing.”33 This marks a clear resonance with the cognitive modalities offered by social constructivism, situated cognition, and the broader postmodern approach to knowledge and learning. THE CONVERGENCE OF JAMESIAN AND CONSTRUCTIVIST THEORIES

Situated cognition carries with it the distinction of placing the weight of knowledge and the source of knowing in the environment; there is a dichotomy, an inner and outer reality. Like James, the situated cognitivists hold that the environment provides us with affordances (a distinct parallel with Jamesian “fringes”) that allow us entry into the realm of meaning of the object-to-be-known. Furthermore, and maintaining the parallel with James, these affordances are perceptual in nature.

Situated cognition, however, represents more than unbounded knowledge. Rather, it is a rebuttal of the notion that language can hold and store meaning and denies the symbol-system, virtually refuting the traditional conceptualization of human long-term memory as agiant warehouse. James seems to concur on this point, seeing language as a pragmatic tool, a linguistic mortar that can be used to build meaningful structures.

James was concerned with what has been characterized by Jamesian scholars as a tendency toward “addictive verbalism.”34 For James, language is merely a property of truth:

James believed that the correspondence-theory of truth, seemingly obvious, prompts us to ignore the evolving contexts in the world, mood-and-action imbued, in which our lives have meaning -our probing, our bodily responses to our probing, our needs, suspecting, anticipatings valuings,

31. William James, “A World of Pure Experience,” in McDermott, The Writings of WiIhzrn James, 195.

32. James, “Necessary Truths,” 75.

33. James, “Stream of Thought,” 156.

34. Wilshire, “The Breathtaking Intimacy,” 115.


behevings. Obvious and prosaic ”objective truth” -truth about ”what’s out there- bought at a price of an anorexic constriction of existence and meaning is bought too dear. Addictive, no quantity can ever sati~fy.3~

Situated cognition would have educators create environments in which the affordances of learning opportunities are maximized or set in authentic situations. Sadly, an operational definition of “authenticity” is not easily found in the literature on situated cognition, and the various incarnations of the term tend to muddy the water, not to mention the critical role of language, in plumbing the depths of meaning in o w own environment.

As with James, the primary question at issue for situated cognition is one of defining the individual as either a passive being constituted of a specific set of criteria, or the individual as becoming. In the former, the individual is constituted of all of his or her physical properties, and the store of symbolic knowledge is a function of the individual. In the latter, the individual is never static, nor is the environment. Thus, there are no absolutes in this latter case, only an ever-morphing, becoming entity comprised of experiences that grow in a behavioral stimulus- response matrix. Indeed, the seeds of James’s theory of habit formation are firmly grounded in physiological processes:

The most complex habits, as we shall presently see more fully, are, from the same point of view, nothing but concatenated discharges from the nerve-centers due to the presence there of systems of reflex paths, so organized as to wake each other up successively - the impression produced by one muscular contraction serving as a stimulus to provoke the next, until a final impression inhibits the process and closes the chain.36

While some Jamesian scholars may balk at casting James’s theory with that of the behaviorists, it must be remembered that his medical training made a lasting impact on his philosophical thought, an impact that is reflected in his psychological theory manifested in The Principles of Psychology. However, James stops short of oversimplifying and awarding primacy to behaviorism; rather, he uses the theory as a stepping-off point in advancing his own theory of cognitive development set against the shifting realm of experience. For situated cognitivists, such a fluid existence would cause planning to be futile, for conceptions arise only as an afterthought, and reflection suggests new experience rather than approaching a better understanding of the experiences past. In such a world, it would seem that novelty and creativity would be removed from human capacity. For James, though, this tension between being and becoming celebrates the uncertainty of the life course as fertile ground for exploring the possibility of the realization and seizing of possible selves.

Like radical constructivists, James aims to rescue the individual’s percepts and perceptual habits from the scientific community’s dustbin by at least counting perception as a critical variable, if not the critical variable. This makes the individual self an active participant in rendering both the environment and its meanings. As James notes, “we believe that we all know and think about and talk about the same world because we believe our percepts are possessed by us in In contrast

35. Ibid., 116.

36. William James, “Habit,” in The Principles of Psychology, vol. 1 [New York: Dover Publications], 108.

37. William James, The Meaning of Truth (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1997), 85.

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to James, however, it seems that radical constructivists venture too far from the widely acknowledged patterns of basic human behavior by glossing over the implications of eschewing a more or less subjective approach to epistemology. In their desire to eradicate absolutes, they fall prey to their own constructions by implicitly laying claim to absolute relativism, though weakly denying such a stance.

As a way of celebrating the positive aspects of critically consensual community in pedagogical practice, radical constructivist theory attempts to enrich our understanding of the way in which each individual perceives information in the environment; unfortunately, unless the classroom is to become a realm of freelance learning, experience suggests that there must come a time when a teacher intervenes in a nonproductive educational endeavor (regardless of who initiated the endeavor) and says, “Let me tell you what I know.” Indeed, given the learning environments that might characterize any one of the constructivist approaches outlined above, educational traditionalists might be compelled to inquire, ”How long will the teacher allow construction to continue, especially i f s/he recognizes a misconception?” or “For constructivists, what is the role of the teacher, after all?” Perhaps James answers these questions, himself, in his Talks to Teachers when he writes, “Psychology is a science, and teaching is an art; and sciences never generate arts directly out of themselves. An intermediary inventive mind must make the application, by using its ~riginali ty.”~~ Clearly, one of the goals of the intermediary inventive mind is to formulate pedagogical methods and create learning environments that will spark interest and foster students’ motivation to learn and become active, inquiring partners in the educational process. The engine of these practices in Jamesian pedagogy is to emphasize the development of learning habits and pattern recogni- tion, which will ultimately promote the self-development of the student.

Comparing Jamesian theory with socially shared cognition presents us with perhaps the most vivid link between James and constructivists. Like situated cognitivists and radical constructivists, James focused primarily on the individual in relation to the environment. Yet, even in the social constructivist paradigm, evidence of the far-reaching tendrils of Jamesian theory can be found in the fact that inasmuch as the social milieu is a constituent of the immediate physical environment, it may be said to possess certain “fringes” of its own, communication being the most obvious. Interpersonal relations fit neatly within the stream of consciousness because personal encounters are of the same consciousness-arousing matter as episodic encounters, and should be treated as such:

The scheme of relationship and the conclusion being the essential things in thinking, that kind of mind-stuff which is handiest will be the best for the purpose. Now words, uttered or unexpressed, are the handiest mental elements we have. Not only are they very rapidly revivable, but they are revivable as actual sensations more easily than any other item of our e~perience?~

Of notable exception to this parallelism is James’s failure to account for the purely social aspect of cognition to which Lauren Resnick and many like-minded

38. William James, Tulks to Teachers on Psychology: And to Students on Some of Life’s ldeuls (New York: W.W. Norton, 1958), 23-24. 39. hid., 54.


social constructivists adhere. As JohnMcDermott notes: “He neglected. ..the forma- tive power of the social situation, which despite our Promethean protestations, conditions all of our versions of what we are doing including and especially those we contend to be distinctively independent of such i n f l ~ e n c e . ” ~ ~ For James, it is the individual experience that is the best source of explanation (or explication) of knowledge; it is the relation that makes the circuit between thought and object complete: “Take away the terms it [the relation] unites, and it disappears along with them.”41 THE DIVERGENCE OF JAMESIAN AND CONSTRUCTMST THEORIES

Inasmuch as James might have been counted among the proponents of the various forms of constructivism, a case can also be made for his refutation of these theories. For example, in the case of situated cognition, there seems to be little room for any conceptualization of memory as it is held to exist in cognitive theories along the lines of information processing. The symbol systems of the information process- ingparadigm are thevessels in which knowledge is stored in a sign/signifier relation. Situated cognition disallows this relation, instead relying on the qualities of knowable objects in the world as the receptacles of knowledge.

James and the constructivists diverge on this point because when it comes to granting a greater weight to either subject or object, constructivists place the individual construction at the center of an uncertain universe, with the objects of knowledge seeming to constitute little more than window dressing. James grants (at least) equal magnitude to both the object and the relation: “The judgment that my own past thought and my own present thought are of the same object is what makes me take the object out of either and proiect it by a sort of triangulation into an independent position, from which it may appear to both.42 James would have likely argued that both situated cognitivists and radical constructivists are correct in their explanation and critique of language and memory, to a degree; because both camps cautiously acknowledge that the sum of our knowledge comprises the relations that we have with knowable objects, but question the capacity of language to capture the essence of knowledge. James would hold that any explanation of knowledge would necessarily include the way in which we catalogue our understanding via extended symbol systems. This is epistemology, pure and simple, and entails the itemization and creation of a workable meaning from chaos through senses that are both selective and intentional.

It is not, therefore, in concert with James’s theory to suggest that the language- based construction and transmission of knowledge is an inadequate way of explain- ing human understanding (as situated cognitivists do], that it does not provide a true representation of knowledge [as radical constructivists do), or that it is discountable in the construction of memory. Though he would agree with constructivists that we each “dichotomize the Kosmos in a different place,” James might be reluctant to go

40. John J. McDermott, Streams of Experience: Reflections on the History and Philosophy of American Culture (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986). 56.

41. James, “Stream of Thought,” 41. James’ footnote, the quote is attributed to Spenser. 42. Ibid., 60.

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so far as to say that learning can be merely facilitated, for to facilitate simply suggests a sort of detached overseeing of progress. James would likely be more apt to advocate a deeply involved pedagogy in which all members play critical roles in the discovery of pragmatic truths and engage equally in spirited debate over the “cash value” of the resulting knowledge. Such an approach seems to be in concert with the principles of radxal constructivism, indeed James might have applauded the radical constructivists’ devaluation of a normalized, pervasive truth in favor of an acknowledgement that truth is but an expedient in the quest for knowledge.

As we have stated, for James, there is little promise of absolutes or certainties in our relation with the external world. All that we can be sure of is our own experiences, and our felt relations between the object and ourselves. Like the constructivists, the Jamesian relation that we have is specifically our own, and even to have an understanding of another individual’s construction is a personal construction twice removed from the fact. This does not deny the objective world, but merely puts a subjective spin on anything that is to be called “knowledge.” For James, the objects themselves are mere vantage points from which we catch reflections of ourselves and cull meaningful experience.43

THE UPSHOT FOR EDUCATION: CONCLUDING THOUGHTS We have attempted to delineate the apparent, though unclaimed, intellectual

relations between William James’s philosophical and psychological writings and the constructivist sub-genres of social cognition, situated cognition, and radical constructivism. It is our hope that we have provided insights into the complexities of Jamesian theory as well as an accurate synopsis of these contemporary theories without being too pedantic in the process. Certainly, these characterizations should be qualified with the caveat that they are offered up as we understand them. As mentionedabove, we must admit that the omission of James from the constructivist literature may well be a factor of scholarly license. Perhaps these authors hold to the belief that those in the field who would attempt to grapple with the tenets constructivism puts forth would already be well-equipped with an implicit understanding of Jamesian psychology. Perhaps this is so, but we would hold that despite this presupposition, the omission of a thinker who so profoundly parallels the work at hand constitutes a disservice to novice researchers and practitioners, and may threaten the integrity of a truly promising area of educational research and theory- building.

In a similar vein, our previous forays into the understanding of this somewhat alarming trend have yielded some rich but disturbing profiles of how researchers and practitioners in the field conceptualize the foundations of education.441nterestingly, when we present the somewhat disappointing results of our research, which reflect an alarming dearth of knowledge among practicing professionals, to the very

43. McDermott, Streams of Experience. 44. Patricia A. Alexander, P. Karen Murphy, and Bradford S. Woods, “Unearthing Academic Roots: Educators’ Perceptions of the Interrelationship of Philosophy, Psychology, and Education,” The Educa- tional Forum 61, no. [ 1997): 172-86.


intellectual body from which they are drawn, we are confronted with a spectrum of responses that run from personal attacks to simmering denial to vehement assent, and in rare cases, applause. This variety of response further compels our inquiry into the heart of the matter, where even deeper questions surface.

The forward-looking scholar will surely recognize the importance of adhering to well-worn paths (implicit or not) when navigating the complex terrain of research in education. On the other hand, in no way should this gravitation toward trodden paths be restrictive. In fact, the accomplished scholar should recognize the pitfalls of becoming entrenchedin a research program based on the quietude of habit. We would encourage scholars to endeavor to indulge the latest tools of navigation and blaze new trails.47 For our part, we hope to have illustrated that the paths of various strands of constructivism have, in fact, already been blazed in the early psychological writings of James, and that explicit acknowledgment of this fact coupled with further excavation of the possible links between James and constructivism can contribute to a more informed discussion of where this approach to epistemology might take us, both as researchers and as educators.

47. P. KarenMurphyandBradfordS. Woods, “Situating Knowledgein LearningandInstruction: Unanswered Questions and Future Directions,” Educational Psychologist 31 (1996): 141-45.

THE AUTHORS WOULD LIKE TO ACKNOWLEDGE the teachings of Patricia A. Alexander and John McDermott and the immeasurable role that they have played in the realization of this project. An earlier draft of this essay was presented as a paper at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, Illinois, 25 March 1997.

thickening the discussion: inspecting constructivist theories of knowledge through a jamesian lens

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