Scaling-Up Behavior Settings: An Ecological Approach to Cognitive Institutions

Abstract Barker’s notion of “behavior settings” has been fruitfully used in Gibsonian ecological psychology to highlight the importance of place and to account for how perception–action of affordances is socio-culturally co-constituted. The goal of this paper is to investigate the potential relation between “behavior settings” and the seemingly-related notion of “cognitive institutions” that has more recently been introduced and used in a different context, in the philosophical literature on extended cognition. Focusing on “behavior settings” and “cognitive institutions” as analytical tools we show that, despite their similarities, the two are ultimately different from each other, but that despite these differences, the two are compatible and can work together. Based on this, we offer a proposal for how “cognitive institutions” can be incorporated into the conceptual framework of Gibsonian ecological psychology, enabling a more comprehensive analysis of how cognitive practices are socio-culturally co-constituted at various spatio-temporal scales. Finally, we conclude that this synthesis contributes to the ongoing critical turn in ecological psychology, supporting the analysis of how cognitive practices are shaped by cognitive institutions for better or worse.