Two influential theoretical positions have permeated cognitive science:
(i) that the mind/brain is a general-purpose problem solver (Newell and Simon 1972; Piaget 1971);
(ii) that the mind/brain is made up of special-purpose modules (Chomsky 1980; Fodor 1983; Gardner 1985).
 
The concept of modular organization dates back to KANT (1781/1953) and to faculty theory (Gall, see Hollander 1920).
But it was the publication of Fodor's Modularity of Mind (1983) which set the stage for recent modularity theorizing and which provided a precise set of criteria about what constitutes a module.

Fodor holds that the mind is made up of genetically specified, independently functioning modules. Information from the external environment passes first through a system of sensory transducers which transform the data into formats that each special-purpose module can process. Each module, in turn, outputs data in a common format suitable for central, domain-general processing. The modules are deemed to be hardwired (not assembled from more primitive processes), of fixed neural architecture (specified genetically), domain specific (a module computes in a bottom-up fashion a constrained class of specific inputs, focusing on entities which are relevant to its particular processing capacities only), fast, autonomous, mandatory (a module's processing is set in motion whenever relevant data present themselves), automatic, stimulus driven, and insensitive to central cognitive goals. A further characteristic of modules is that they are informationally encapsulated. In other words, other parts of the mind can neither influence nor have access to the internal workings of a module, only to its outputs. Modules only have access to information from stages of processing at lower levels, not from top-down processes. Take, for example, the Muller-Lyer illusion where, even if a subject explicitly knows that two lines are of equal length, the perceptual system cannot see them as equal. Explicit knowledge about equal line length, available in what Fodor calls the "central system," cannot infiltrate the perceptual system's automatic, mandatory computation of relative lengths.

For Fodor, it is the co-occurrence of all the properties discussed above that defines a module. Alone, particular properties do not necessarily entail modularity. For instance, automatic, rapid processing can also take place outside input systems such as in skill learning (Anderson 1980). Task-specific EXPERTISE should not be confounded with the Fodorian concept of a module. Rather, each module is like a special-purpose computer with a proprietary data base. A Fodorian module can only process certain types of data, and automatically ignores other, potentially competing input. This enhances automaticity and speed of computation by ensuring that the organism is insensitive to many potential classes of information from other input systems and to top-down expectations from central processing. In other words, Fodor divides the mind/brain into two very different parts: innately specified modules and the non-modular central processes responsible for deductive reasoning and the like.

Fodor's modularity theory had a strong impact on researchers in cognitive development. Until the 1980s BEHAVIORISM and Piaget's constructivism had been dominant forces in development. Both these theories maintain that the infant and child learn about all domains -- SYNTAX, SEMANTICS, number, space, THEORY OF MIND, physics and so forth -- via a single set of domain-general mechanisms (the actual types of mechanism invoked are very different in the two theories). By contrast, with Chomskyan linguistics and Fodorian modularity, a sizeable number of developmentalists opted for an innately specified, modular view of the infant mind. Not only did Chomskyan psycholinguists argue for the innately specified modularity of syntax (e.g., Smith and Tsimpli 1995; chapters in Garfield 1987; but see Marslen-Wilson and Tyler 1987 for a different view), but developmentalists also supported a modular view of semantics (Pinker 1994), of theory of mind (Anderson 1992; Baron-Cohen 1995; Leslie 1988), of certain aspects of the infant's knowledge of physics (Spelke et al. 1992; but see Baillargeon 1994 for a different view), and of number in the form of a set of special-purpose, number-relevant principles (Gelman and Gallistel 1978).

Data from normal adults whose brains become damaged due to stroke or accident seem to support the modular view (Butterworth, Cipolotti, and Warrington 1996; Caramazza, Berndt and Basili 1983). Indeed, brain-damaged adults often display dissociations in which, say, face processing is impaired while other aspects of visuo-spatial processing are spared, or where semantics is spared in the face of impaired syntax, and so forth. However, several authors have now challenged these seemingly clearcut dissociations, demonstrating for instance that supposedly damaged syntax can turn out to be intact if one uses on-line tasks tapping automatic processes rather than off-line, metalinguistic tasks (e.g., Tyler 1992), and that a single underlying deficit can give rise to behavioral dissociations (Farah and McClelland 1991; Plaut 1995). This suggests that such data may not be appropriate for trying to bolster the modularity thesis.

Evidence from idiot-savants (Smith and Tsimpli 1995) and from certain developmental disorders (e.g., Baron-Cohen 1995; Leslie 1988; Pinker 1994) has also been used to lend support to the modularity view. There are for instance developmental disorders in which theory of mind is impaired in otherwise high functioning people with AUTISM (Frith 1989), or face processing is spared together with seriously impaired visuo-spatial cognition as in the case of people with Williams syndrome (Bellugi, Wang and Jernigan 1994). These data have led some theorists to claim that such modules must be innately specified because they are left intact or impaired in genetic disorders of development. However, even though some genetic disorders are at first blush suggestive of modularity of mind, this has also been recently challenged. In almost every case of islets of so-called intact modular functioning, serious impairments within the "intact" domain have subsequently been identified (e.g., Karmiloff-Smith 1997; Karmiloff-Smith et al. 1997), and in cases of purported singular modular deficits, more general impairments have frequently been brought to light (e.g., Bishop 1997; Frith 1989; Pennington and Welsh 1995). In other words, abnormal development does not point to isolated, prespecified modules divorced from the rest of the cognitive, motor and emotional systems. Genetic impairments affect various aspects of the developmental process, in some domains very subtly and in others more seriously.

In normal development, too, new research is also pointing to gradual specialization rather than prespecification. Take the case of syntax, a particularly popular domain for claimants of modularity. Brain imaging studies of infants, toddlers and children across the first years of life have shown a changing pattern of HEMISPHERIC SPECIALIZATION (Mills, Coffey-Corina and Neville 1993, in press). Initially the infant processes syntax in various parts of the brain across both hemispheres. It is only with time that parts of the left hemisphere become increasingly specialized. It is highly likely that this will be shown to obtain for other aspects of language, and for number, face processing and the like, once further infant imaging studies have been completed. The human cortex takes time to structure itself as a function of complex interactions at multiple levels: differential timing of the development of parts of cortex, the predispositions each has for different types of computation, and the structure of the inputs it receives (for detailed discussion, see for example Elman et al. 1996; Johnson 1997; Quartz and Sejnowsky in press). While there may be prespecification at the cellular level, this does not seem to hold for synaptogenesis at the cortical level. Specialized circuitry, i.e., the rich network of connections between cells, appears to develop as a function of experience, which questions the notion of prespecified modules.

Although the fully developed adult brain may include a number of modular-like structures, the assertion that these must be innately specified does not therefore necessarily follow. Given the lengthy period of human post-natal brain development, and what we know about the necessary and complex interaction of the genome with environmental influences (e.g., Elman et al. 1996; Johnson, 1997; Quartz and Sejnowsky in press; Rose 1997), modules could be the product in adulthood of a gradual developmental process (Karmiloff-Smith 1992) rather than being fully prespecified, as Fodorians maintain. This is not a return to a general-purpose, equipotential view of the infant brain. On the contrary, an alternative to representational nativism or the innate knowledge position on which modularity theory is based has been proposed by several theorists who have formulated hypotheses about what might be innately specified, in terms of computational and timing constraints, whilst leaving a lot of room for epigenetic processes (Elman et al. 1996; Quartz and Sejnowsky in press).

While challenging the concept of prespecified modules, it has also become increasingly clear that the general-purpose view of the brain is inadequate. The human mind/brain is not a single, domain-general processing system, either in infancy or in adulthood. Nor is the alternative a return to simple Behaviorism. The genome and socio-physical environment both place constraints on development. A different way to conceive of modularity might therefore be to adopt a truly developmental perspective and acknowledge that the structure of minds could emerge from dynamically developing brains, whether normal or abnormal, in interaction with the environment. The long period of human postnatal cortical development, together with the considerable plasticity it displays, suggest that progressive modularization may arise simply as a consequence of the developmental process. There is no need to invoke innate knowledge or representations to account for resulting specialization. Rather, variations in developmental timing and the brain's capacity to carry out subtly different kinds of computation could suffice, together with differential structures in the environmental input, to structure the brain (Elman et al. 1996; Karmiloff-Smith 1992, 1995; Quartz and Sejnowsky in press; Rose 1997). Of course, nativists also recognize that environmental input is essential to trigger developmental processes, but it plays a triggering and very secondary role to the genome in such theories. However, in the alternative framework pointed to above, information inherent in the environment would play a much more crucial role in the dynamics of development and in the gradual formation of modular-like structures.
 
 

-- Annette Karmiloff-Smith
 

 

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