Co-Constructing Subjective Experience

Co-constructing subjective experience:A constructivist approach

Dialogues in Psychology,

16.0, August 13, 1999Revised August 22, 1999 © Mary Hale-Haniff School of Social and Systemic StudiesNova Southeastern University3301 College AvenueFort Lauderdale, FL 33314USAhale-haniff@email.msn.comAna Pasztor School of Computer ScienceFlorida International UniversityUniversity Park, Miami, FL 33199USApasztora@cs.fiu.edu

This paper was presented at the Mind-4conference, Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland, on August 17, 1999.

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to provide an example of contextualizing the study of subjective experience within the

constructivist paradigm

(Denzin & Lincoln, 1994; Lincoln & Guba, 1985) in the hope that this process might beuseful in rethinking the hard problem of consciousness. First we show that the "hard" problem of consciousness(Chalmers, 1995) has been formulated based on the positivist paradigm which, by presupposition, situates the studyof subjective experience outside the limits of what can be known. Then, after contrasting major presuppositions of constructivist and positivist thought systems and therapies, we illustrate the qualitative research approach with casestudy exemplars distilled from the first author's

constructive therapy

practice, where the self of the therapist-researcher is the major research instrument. We also present

new categories

for perceiving subjective experiencewhich may serve as tools for further research. We propose that a qualitative research approach, guided byconstructivist assumptions, might be usefully applied to the study of subjective experience by opening up areas thathave been impossible to reach from within the positivist thought system.

Overview

[01] This paper evolved from a collaboration between a cognitive scientist (Ana Pasztor) and a systemic (family) andcommunication therapist (Mary Hale-Haniff) [note 1]. Ana had been following discussions on the hard and easyproblems of consciousness that were initiated by Chalmers (1995) and was impressed that the field of cognitivescience seemed "stuck" on questions such as whether it is possible for a third person to know a first person'ssubjective experience. Ana was also familiar with Mary's clinical research methods. She noted that Mary was notonly able to "get a handle on" subjective experience, but was able to do so in a manner that affected people deeply,helping them change in ways they found useful. Thus, it appeared to Ana that Mary was doing what many of Ana'scolleagues were wondering whether or not it was possible to do.[02] In exploring the differences in approaches to subjective experience in our respective fields, it became apparentthat cognitive science assumptions and methodologies were based primarily on a positivist paradigm, while Mary'swork in family therapy was based on a constructivist paradigm. Seeing the hard problem of consciousness throughthis lens, it became clear that the positivist paradigm, by virtue of its assumptions that knower and known areseparate and uninfluenced by each other,

a priori

situates the study of subjective experience outside the limits of what can be known. We wondered what the implications might be if cognitive scientists were to step inside analternative thought system and rework questions like the hard problem of consciousness, starting with a new set of assumptions.

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[03] The purpose of this paper is to contextualize the study of subjective experience within the constructivistepistemology, ontology, and methodology. We will view this process through the lens of constructivisttherapy/research, providing an example that may be translated to other fields, most particularly that of cognitivescience. We begin by contrasting positivist and constructivist paradigms according to Lincoln and Guba's (1985) fivedifferentiating axioms. Secondly, we present evidence of the constructivist paradigm currently emerging acrossmany disciplines (Schwartz & Ogilvy, 1979), but seemingly to a lesser extent in the hybrid field of cognitive science.We present Varela's (1996) fourfold classification of research approaches to the study of the hard problem of consciousness, noting that his phenomenological approach most closely approximates our own.[04] We then discuss constructivism as it has evolved in the field of psychotherapy. We give particular attention toLincoln and Guba's (1985) premise that for constructivist inquiry to be meaningful, it is crucial that the paradigm, themodel guiding the inquiry, the inquirer, and the methodologies, be congruent. Therefore, the guiding premises of theconstructivist model must be embodied or lived, not just thought or spoken about. We explore a number of assumptions regarding the use of a constructivist approach and illustrate such an approach with exemplars drawnfrom Mary's psychotherapy practice. In her practice, the therapeutic process is synonymous with that of qualitativeresearch, and the therapist/researcher herself is the primary research instrument. We then present new distinctionsand categories for describing subjective experience in a holistic manner as subsystems of congruence or flow.These categories may serve as a basis for further research.[05] We conclude that questions regarding the hard problem of consciousness might be usefully re-examined in lightof the constructivist-informed methodology. This alternative view might serve as a means to question the efficacy of the positivist presuppositions that have been guiding much of the consciousness research in cognitive science. Weargue that constructivist assumptions and methodologies might open up areas that have been impossible to reachfrom within the positivist thought system, and we offer some case exemplars drawn from the family therapy field aspotential starting points.

The Hard Problem of Consciousness in Cognitive Science

[06] An exponentially growing number of recent publications have been concerned with the scientific study of consciousness. Chalmers' (1995) seminal paper launched a new direction in cognitive science research, giving riseto an avalanche of publications on the hard problems of consciousness. He introduced the hard and easy problemsas follows: "The easy problems of consciousness are those that seem directly susceptible to the standard methodsof cognitive science, whereby a phenomenon is explained in terms of computational or neural mechanisms. Thehard problems are those that seem to resist those methods" (p. 200).[07] Varela (1996) classified proposed solutions to the hard problem of consciousness into four categories. The first,

neuro-reductionism

(Churchland & Sejnowski, 1992; Crick, 1994) "seeks to solve the hard problem by eliminatingthe role of experience in favor of some form of neurobiological account which will do the job of generating it" (Varela,1996, p. 333). The second approach, labeled

functionalist

(Baars,1988; Calvin, 1990; Dennett, 1991; Edelman,1989; Jackendoff, 1987), "relies almost entirely on a third-person or externalist approach to obtain data and validatethe theory. Its popularity rests on the acceptance of the reality of experience and mental life while keeping themethods and ideas within the known framework of empirical science" (Varela, 1996, p. 333). The third approach,

mysterianism

(Nagel,1986; McGinn, 1991) concludes that, based on intrinsic limitations of the means through whichour knowledge of the mental is acquired, the hard problem is unsolvable.[08] The final approach,

phenomenology,

gives an explicit and central role to first-person accounts and to theirreducible nature of experience (Chalmers, 1996; Flanagan, 1992; Globus, 1995; Johnson, 1987; Lakoff, 1999;Searle, 1992; Varela, 1996). Within this approach, a great diversity of proposed methodologies can be found.Phenomenology is Varela's methodology of choice for approaching the hard problem of consciousness, as it iscongruent with his view that "any science of cognition and mind, must, sooner or later, come to grips with the basiccondition that we have no idea what the mental or the cognitive could possibly be apart from our own experience of it" (Varela, 1996, p. 333).[09] Our inquiry presented in this paper goes beyond methodological and pragmatic concerns, challenging the

positivist world view

or

paradigm

from which the hard problem of consciousness is formulated. Our research isguided by a

constructivist

[note 2] paradigm (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994; Lincoln & Guba, 1985).

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Contrasting Positivist and Constructivist Paradigms

[10] The term "paradigm" refers to a systematic set of assumptions or beliefs about fundamental aspects of reality."Paradigms represent what we

think

about the world (but cannot prove). Our actions in the world, including theactions we take as inquirers, cannot occur without reference to those paradigms: 'As we think, so do we act.'"(Lincoln & Guba, 1985, p. 15). In this section we will compare the positivist (rationalist) and constructivist(naturalistic) paradigms by examining the shift from positivism to naturalism through Schwartz and Ogilvy's (1979,p. 15) seven characteristics of emerging paradigms, and by contrasting Lincoln and Guba's (1985, p. 37) five basicpresuppositions (axioms) of both the positivist and naturalistic paradigms. Lincoln and Guba (1985, p. 56) note thatthese seven basic characteristics of the alternative emerging paradigm, "have a synergistic relationship to oneanother -- none could stand alone."

Schwartz and Ogilvy's Seven Characteristics

[11] In a 1979 monograph, Schwartz and Ogilvy [note 3] provided an analysis of the concepts that were, at the time,emerging in a variety of disciplines and research areas, such as physics, chemistry, brain theory, ecology, evolution,mathematics, philosophy, politics, psychology, linguistics, religion, consciousness, and the arts. From their analysis,Schwartz and Ogilvy synthesized seven major characteristics of an alternative naturalistic paradigm, that stand indramatic contrast to those of the still-dominant positivist paradigm (Lincoln & Guba, 1985):

1.

Movement from simple to complex realities:

It is no longer possible to view systems as merely the sum of their parts; as systems become more and more complex, they develop unique properties that cannot beaccounted for or predicted from the properties of parts.

2.

Movement from hierarchic to heterarchic concepts of order:

Emergent thinkers have come to believe that if there are orders, many of them exist side by side.

3.

Movement from mechanical to holographic images:

The earlier predominant mechanistic metaphors are toosimple to complement related concepts of complexity and heterarchy. Instead, holographic images areemerging:With the holographic metaphor come several important attributes. We find that the image in the hologram iscreated by a

dynamic

process of interaction and differentiation. We find that the information is

distributed

throughout -- that at each point information about the whole is contained in the part. In this sense,everything is interconnected like a vast network of interference patterns, having been generated by thesame dynamic process and containing the whole in the part (Schwartz & Ogilvy, 1979, pp. 13-14).

4.

Movement from determinacy to indeterminacy:

Heisenberg's Indeterminacy Principle demonstrated that, atsubatomic levels, the future state of a particle is not predictable, and the act of experimentation to find itsstate will itself determine the observed state.

5.

From linear toward mutual causality :

The concept of feedback is extended by the concept of feedforward,which blurs the distinction between cause and effect, introducing the notion of mutual causality.

6.

From assembly to morphogenesis:

Morphogenetic change occurs suddenly and dramatically, operating insuch a way that lower forms create higher order forms.

7.

From objective to perspectival views:

Objectivity is an illusion, but subjectivity in the usual sense is not theonly alternative:We suggest that perspective is a more useful concept. Perspective connotes a view at a distance from a particular focus. Where we look from affects what we see. This means that any one focus of observation gives only a partialresult; no single discipline ever gives us a complete picture. A whole picture is an image created morphogeneticallyfrom multiple perspectives (Schwartz & Ogilvy, 1979, p. 15).

Lincoln and Guba's Five Axioms

AxiomsPositivist ParadigmNaturalistic ParadigmThe nature of reality

Reality is single, tangible, andfragmentableRealities are multiple, constructed, and holistic.

The relationship of knower and known

Knower and known are independent, adualism.Knower and known are interactive, inseparable.

The possibility of

Time-and context-free generalizations Only time- and context-bound working hypotheses

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