Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Table of Contents - 2005 - Volume 28, Issue 05  


Open Peer Commentary

Do infants understand that external goals are internally represented?

Josef Perner a1 and Martin Doherty a2
a1 Department of Psychology and Centre of Neurocognitive Research, University of Salzburg, A-5020 Salzburg, Austria josef.perner@sbg.ac.at http://www.sbg.ac.at/psy/people/perner/index.htm
a2 Department of Psychology, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4BR, Scotland m.j.doherty@stir.ac.uk

Abstract

Evidence for infants' sensitivity to behavior being goal oriented leaves it open as to whether they see such behavior as being designed to lead to an external goal or whether they see it, in addition, as being directed by an internal representation of the goal. We point out the difficulty of finding possible criteria for how infants or children view this matter.