A nonlinear physics model based on extended synergetics for the flow of infant actions during infant-mother face-to-face communications

Abstract

The temporal ordering or flow of infant actions in the context of infant-mother face-to-face communication is discussed from a nonlinear physics perspective. The actions are considered as spatio-temporal patterns that emerge due to self-organization. The presence of a particular action is described in terms of a finite amplitude of the respective pattern. In line with benchmark models from synergetics and population dynamics, nonlinear amplitude equations that determine the evolution of the infant actions are defined. The model is extended to take selfinhibition and forgetting into account. More precisely, it is shown that the flow of infant actions during infant-mother communication can be explained by assuming that the infant behavior inhibits itself such that after a certain period of time the performed behavior becomes unstable and a transition towards a new behavior occurs. The proposed model is applied to literature data about three minute periods of infant-mother face-to-face communication. Since the model parameters determine the characteristic properties of the flow of infant actions, the conclusion is drawn that changes of the flow characteristics observed on the behavioral level during infant development correspond to changes of parameters on the neurobiological level that happen on the relative slow time scale of infant maturation.

A self organization perspective of non cooperative subject behavior leading to fatal shooting by law enforcement officers

“…The perceptual system may self-inhibit the "do not shoot" percept of the situation. Such self-inhibition of the "active" perception has been documented in several perceptual studies [5,6,8,9,10] and has been assumed to be the mechanism to overcome fixedness [7]. Mathematically speaking, λ21 is assumed to decay as long as the law enforcement officers perceive the situation as a situation in which they should not shoot.…”

“…Using a top-down modeling approach [11], it has been assumed that this approach also holds for selforganizing states whose precise description is more complicated. Human perception, action, and cognition has been addressed and mathematized using the amplitude equation approach [4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11]. For example, grasping a tool with one hand has been considered as a state associated with an amplitude.…”

“…In fact, they do so, if all relevant internal and external parameters are held constant. The fundamental model that describes the evolution of the amplitudes A1 and A2 is given by [4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11]  …”

“…The objective of the present theoretical study is to understand the behavior of individuals confronted by police and the decision-making process of law enforcement officers to shoot down a subject from the perspective of self-organization. To this end, mathematical modeling in terms of amplitude equations will be used as motivated by synergetics [3] (a theory of self-organization and pattern formation founded by Professor Hermann Haken) and generalized variants of synergetics, namely, quasi-attractor theory [4] and extended synergetics [5,6,7,8,9,10].…”

Domains of attraction of walking and running attractors are context dependent: illustration for locomotion on tilted floors

“…Transitions between one-handed and two-handed grasping when the size of the to-be-grasped objects increases have been examined using an order parameter equation [3,9,10]. Applications of order parameter equations in social psychology examined infant-mother face-to-face communication [11] and personal space [12] and applications in clinical psychology have addressed schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and obsessive-compulsive-disorder [13,14,15,16,17,18,19].…”