The concept of "behavior" in psychology, epistemology, and economics. Starting from G.H. Mead

Titolo Rivista PARADIGMI
Autori/Curatori Guido Baggio
Anno di pubblicazione 2017 Fascicolo 2016/3 Lingua Inglese
Numero pagine 15 P. 119-133 Dimensione file 175 KB
DOI 10.3280/PARA2016-003008
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Mead referred to behaviorism as the science that describes human activity in terms of conduct, highlighting its importance for understanding human psychological processes. However, Mead also specified that the observation of behavior is just one of the methods of psychology. The active involvement of the individual in the social act points out the role that consciousness plays in the individual’s experience of signifying and evaluating "the world that is there". Thus Mead’s social behavioral psychology is related to his behavioral theory of meaning according to which the social character of "meaning" is expressed in the functional identity of individuals’ responses to the same sensible stimulus. Mead’s social psychology and theory of meaning also offers some useful elements to overcome critical observations that Sen has mobilized to Samuelson’s and Little’s theory of consumer behavior in economics, as well as integrating Davidson’s linguistic approach to Decision Theory. Comparison with Sen’s and Davidson’s proposals would in fact offer the occasion to argue in favor of a pragmatist theoretical approach to Decision Theory related to the communicative dimension.

Mead evidenzia l’importanza del comportamentismo di Watson per la comprensione dei processi psichici dell’essere umano. Specifica anche, però, che l’osservazione del comportamento è uno dei metodi della psicologia, non l’unico. Il coinvolgimento attivo dell’individuo nell’atto evidenzia il ruolo che la coscienza, intesa come comportamento mentale, riveste nell’esperienza di significazione del "mondo che è lì" da parte degli individui. La prospettiva meadiana chiama così in causa anche una concezione comportamentale del significato. Il significato ha natura sociale e si esprime nell’identità funzionale delle risposte comportamentali degli individui a uno stesso stimolo. Tale approccio permette un confronto con le osservazioni critiche mosse da Sen alla teoria del comportamento del consumatore attraverso la preferenza rivelata di Samuelson e Little e con la proposta di Davidson di una teoria della decisione che ponga attenzione alla dimensione interpretativa delle probabilità e desiderabilità dei soggetti. Secondo l’Autore, un confronto con le proposte di Sen e Davison permette di porre in luce il potenziale di un approccio pragmatista alla teoria della decisione connessa alla dimensione linguistico-comunicativa

Keywords:Comportamentismo, Pragmatismo, Comportamento economico, Mead, Sen, Davidson.

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Guido Baggio, The concept of "behavior" in psychology, epistemology, and economics. Starting from G.H. Mead in "PARADIGMI" 3/2016, pp 119-133, DOI: 10.3280/PARA2016-003008