Intention

"Intentions", "Intent", "Purpose", and "Purport" redirect here. For "Purpose" or "Purport", see Purpose (disambiguation). For the philosophical concept, see Intentionality. For the racehorse, see Intentionally (horse). For other uses of "Intent", see Intent (disambiguation). For other uses of "Intentions", see Intentions (disambiguation).

Intention is a mental state that represents a commitment to carrying out an action or actions in the future. Intention involves mental activities such as planning and forethought. Intentions could be declared and clearly defined, while in other instances, when undeclared or masked, they could be detected out of context, circumstances that determine, specify, or clarify the meaning of an event or other occurrence.

Definition

Intentions are mental states that involve action plans to which the agent has committed themselves. As action plans, they can guide behavior. The action plan constitutes the content of the intention while the commitment is the agent's attitude towards this content. The term "intention" can be used both for prospective intentions, which are not yet executed, and for the intentions guiding the behavior as it happens, so-called immediate intentions, as discussed below. Intending to study tomorrow is an example of prospective intentions while trying to win a game by scoring a three-point field goal involves an act-related intention.

Folk psychology explains human behavior on the basis of mental states, including beliefs, desires, and intentions. This explanation is based on the idea that desires motivate behavior and beliefs direct the behavior towards the desired goal. This can be understood in terms of causal chains, i.e. that desires cause intentions, intentions cause actions, and actions cause the realization of the desired outcome.

Content and commitment

Intentions, like various other mental states, can be understood as consisting of two components: a content and an attitude towards this content. On this view, the content of an intention is the action plan in question and the attitude involves a commitment to executing this action. Intentions may share the same content with other mental states, like beliefs and desires. But the different mental states are distinguished from each other concerning their attitudes. Admiring the idea of helping the poor, for example, is different from intending to help the poor, even though both states share the same plan as their content. One difference between desires and intentions is that intentions impose more restrictions on their contents. This includes that intentions are directed at possible courses of action, i.e. that they involve something the agent can do or at least thinks they can do. Desires, on the other hand, do not involve this form of restriction. In this sense, it is possible to desire sunny weather for tomorrow but not to intend sunny weather for tomorrow.

A central aspect of intentions concerning the attitude towards their content is that the agent has committed themselves to the plan in question. This is different from merely wanting to do something and thinking that doing it would be good. It is sometimes argued that this commitment consists in an all-out judgment that the intended course of action is good. On this view, intentions evaluate their intended course of action as good all things considered. This aspect stands in contrast to desires, which evaluate their object merely as good in some sense but leave it open whether it is bad in another sense. Someone who is still deliberating whether to perform a certain action, for example, has not yet committed themselves to performing it and therefore lacks the corresponding intention. It has been argued that this form of commitment or being-settled-on is unique to intentions and is not found in other mental states like beliefs or desires. In this sense, intentions may be based on or accompanied by beliefs and desires but are not reducible to them.

Another important aspect of intentions is that they have conditions of satisfaction, like beliefs and desires. This means that intentions are either successful or unsuccessful. An intention that produces the intended action is a successful intention. But if the produced behavior falls short of its goal, the intention is unsuccessful. The the content of the intention determines its conditions of satisfaction. Success is usually not fully up to the agent since various factors outside the agent's control and awareness may influence the success of the attempted action.

Intention and intentionality

The meaning of the term "intention" is different from the term "intentionality" even though the two are closely related. Intentionality is the more general term: it refers to the power of minds to represent or to stand for things, properties, and states of affairs. Intentions are one form of intentionality since their contents represent possible courses of action. But there are other forms of intentionality, like simple beliefs or perceptions, that do not involve intentions. The adjective "intentional" is ambiguous since it can refer either to intentions or to intentionality.

Theories of intention

Theories of intention try to capture the characteristic features of intentions. Some accounts focus more either on prospective or on immediate intentions while others aim at providing a unified account of these different types of intention.

Belief-desire theory

The traditionally dominant approach reduces intentions to beliefs and action-desires. An action-desire is a desire to perform an action. On this view, to intend to do sport tomorrow is to have a desire to do sport tomorrow together with a belief that one will do sport tomorrow. Some accounts also hold that this belief is based on the desire: one believes that one will do it because one desires to do it. A similar definition sees intentions as "self-fulfilling expectations that are motivated by a desire for their fulfillment and that represent themselves as such". An important virtue of this approach is its simplicity and its explanatory power. It also manages to account for the fact that there seems to be a close relationship between what one believes, what one desires, and what one intends. But various arguments against this reduction have been presented in the contemporary literature. These often take the form of counterexamples, in which there is both a corresponding belief and a desire without an intention or an intention without one of these components. This is sometimes explained in relation to the idea that intentions involve a form of commitment to or settledness on the intended course of action by the agent. But this aspect is not present in beliefs and desires by themselves. For example, when considering whether to respond to an insult through retaliation, the agent may have both a desire to do so and a belief that they will end up doing this, based on how they acted in the past. But the agent may still lack the corresponding intention since they are not fully decided. It is also possible to have an intention to do something without believing that one actually will do it, for example, because the agent had similar intentions earlier and also failed to act on them back then or because the agent is unsure whether they will succeed. But it has been argued that a weaker relation between intentions and beliefs may be true, e.g. that intentions involve a belief that there is a chance of achieving what one intends.

Another objection focuses on the normative difference between beliefs and intentions. This is relevant for cases where the agent fails to act according to the intended course of action, for example, due to having a weak will. This type of failure is different from the mere epistemic error of incorrectly predicting one's own behavior. But various belief-desire theories are unable to explain this normative difference. Other arguments focus on the dissimilarities between these states. For example, one can desire impossible things but one cannot intend to do what one thinks is impossible. And whereas beliefs can be true or false, this does not apply to intentions.

Evaluation theory

Another prominent approach, due to Donald Davidson, sees intentions as evaluative attitudes. On his view, desires are conditional evaluative attitudes while intentions are unconditional evaluative attitudes. This means that desires see their object as positive in a certain respect while intentions see their object as positive overall or all things considered. So the agent may have a desire to go to the gym because it is healthy whereas their intention to go to the gym is based on the evaluation that it is good all things considered. This theory is closely related to the belief-desire theory explained above since it also includes the idea that beliefs are involved in intentions. Here the belief in question is not a belief that one will do the action but a belief that the action in question is a means towards the positively evaluated end.

This theory has been criticized based on the idea that there is a difference between evaluating a course of action and committing oneself to a course of action. This difference is important for explaining cases of akrasia, i.e. that people do not always do what they believe would be best to do. An example of akrasia is an author who believes it would be best to work on his new book but ends up watching TV instead, despite his unconditional evaluative attitude in favor of working. In this sense, intentions cannot be unconditional evaluative attitudes since it is possible to intend to do one alternative while having an unconditional evaluative attitude towards another alternative.

Strongest-desire theory

Another theory focuses exclusively on the relation between intention and desire. It states that intending to do something consists in desiring it the most. The claim that intentions are accompanied by desires is generally accepted. But there are various arguments against the claim that intentions are nothing but desires. They often focus on cases where people intend to do something different from their predominant desire. For example, the agent may intend to go to the gym even though they have a much stronger desire to go to the pub instead. This may be the case because the agent thinks that going to the gym is better even though this is not in tune with their desires. Another counterexample comes from cases where the agent has not yet formed an intention even though one desire is predominant. A closely related theory understands intentions as dispositions to act and desires as dispositions to form intentions, i.e. as higher-order dispositions to act.

Intending as doing

Most theories of intention see intentions as mental states that are closely related to actions but may occur without the corresponding action in question. Elizabeth Anscombe and her followers provide an alternative account that denies the distinction between intentions and actions. On this view, to intend a goal is already a form of acting towards this goal and therefore not a distinct mental state. This means that when one intends to visit the zoo next Thursday, one is already on the way to doing so. An important strength of this account is that it gives a unified explanation of intentions: it does not need to distinguish between prospective and immediate intentions since all intentions are immediate intentions.

An obvious counterargument to this position is that, in the example of the zoo above, one is not currently doing anything towards realizing this plan. Defenders have rejected this argument by trying to elucidate how even minimal preparatory steps may already be seen as part of the action. Such steps may include, for example, not making any other plans that may interfere with the plan in question, like planning a different appointment at the same time at a different location. Another objection is based on the observation that not all intentions are successful, i.e. that one can intend to do something but fail to do it. For example, one may intend to follow the shortest route home but take a wrong turn and thereby fail to perform the corresponding action. In such cases, it may be argued that the intention was present whereas the action was absent, i.e. the agent intended to take the shortest route but did not take the shortest route. The possibility of the two coming apart would suggest that they are not identical.

Self-referentiality theories

Self-referentiality theories assert that one central feature of intentions is that they are self-referential. This means that the intentions do not just represent the intended course of action but also represent themselves as the cause of the action. On this view, the intention to go to the gym represents itself as the cause of going to the gym. One important motivation for accepting a self-referentiality theory is to explain a certain type of case: a case in which the behavior is just like it was intended, but the intention either did not cause the behavior at all or did not cause it in the right way. For example, the agent intends to shoot an intruder, is then startled by a moving shadow, which causes their finger to twitch, thereby shooting the intruder. It is often claimed that in such cases, the behavior in question does not constitute an intentional action, i.e. that the agent did not shoot the intruder intentionally, despite intending to shoot the intruder and shooting the intruder. This paradox can be solved through self-referentiality theories. The behavior in question is not an intentional action because the intention was not properly realized: it was part of the intention to cause the behavior, which did not happen in the right way. It is usually accepted that intentions have to cause the corresponding behavior in the right way for intentional actions to arise. But the claim that this happens on the level of the content of the intention, i.e. that the intention represents itself as causing the behavior, is often contested. Instead, it has been argued that the content of intentions consists only of the corresponding action plan without representing the intention itself and its causal relation to the execution of this plan.

Types of intentions

Some difficulties in understanding intentions are due to various ambiguities and inconsistencies in how the term is used in ordinary language. For this reason, theorists often distinguish various types of intentions in order to avoid misunderstandings and to clearly specify what is being researched.

Prospective and immediate

An important difference among intentions is that between prospective and immediate intentions. Prospective intentions, also called "prior intentions", are forward-looking: they are plans held by the agent to perform some kind of action in the future. They are different from merely desiring to perform this action since the agent has committed themselves to following them when the time comes. In this sense, it is sometimes held that desires evaluate their object only concerning one specific aspect while the commitments in intentions are based on an all-out evaluation. On this view, the intended course of action is not just evaluated as good in one way but good all things considered. In some cases, the intention may point very far into the future, as when a teenager decides they want to become president one day. In other cases, the formation of the prospective intention only slightly precedes the action, as when the agent intends to scratch their back and does so right away. The commitment to the course of action is reversible. So if the agent encounters good reasons later on for not going through with it, the intention may be dropped or reformulated. In this sense, having a prospective intention to perform a specific action does not ensure that this action will actually be performed later on.

Immediate intentions, also known as "intentions-in-action" or "act-related" intentions, are intentions that guide the agent while they are performing the action in question. They are closely related to the sense of agency. The agent's commitment to the course of action in question consists in their active execution of the plan. But not all forms of human behavior are intentional. Raising one's hand may happen intentionally or unintentionally, for example, when a student wants to signal to the teacher that they have a question in contrast to an involuntary bodily reflex. It is often held that a central aspect of immediate intentions is that the agent knows what they are doing and why they are doing it. This means that the action is accompanied by a certain form of knowledge that is absent in mere purposive behavior. This aspect is sometimes used to contrast the behavior of humans and animals. There is no general agreement that all intentional actions are accompanied by this type of knowledge. One reason to doubt this is that even for intentional actions, the agent is not always able to articulate what they are doing and why they are doing it. Some defenders try to explain this by holding that the corresponding knowledge is there, even if it is not conscious.

Proximal and distal

Prospective intentions can be categorized by how far they plan ahead. Proximal intentions involve plans for what one wants to do straightaway whereas distal intentions plan further ahead. The same intention can be both proximal and distal if it is directed both at what to do right now and what to do later. For example, deciding to start watching a movie now in one sitting involves an intention that is both proximal and distal. This distinction is important since many courses of action are too complex to be represented at once in full detail. Instead, usually only proximal intentions involve detailed representations while distal intentions may leave their object vague until it becomes more relevant to the task at hand. But distal intentions still play an important role in guiding the formation of proximal intentions. A simple plan to buy batteries at the close-by electronics store, for example, involves many steps, like putting on shoes, opening one's door, closing and locking it, going to the traffic light, turning left, etc. These steps are not represented in full detail while the agent is putting on their shoes. Central to this process is the agent's ability to monitor the progress in relation to the proximal intention and to adjust the current behavior accordingly. In this way, intention has the capacity to coordinate the agent's behavior over time. While both proximal and distal intentions are relevant for one's sense of agency, it has been argued that distal intentions lead to a stronger sense of agency.

Motivational and oblique

The intentional actions performed by agents usually carry a vast number of major or minor consequences with them. The agent is usually unaware of many of them. In relation to these consequences, the agent is acting unintentionally. Other consequences are anticipated by the agent. Some are motivational in that they constitute the agent's reason for performing the action. A third type involves consequences of which the agent is aware but which play no important role for the agent's motivation. These are the objects of oblique intentions: they involve side effects that the agent puts up with in order to realize their main intention. For example, Ted is unaware that smoking causes bladder cancer, but he is aware that it helps him to deal with stress and that it causes lung cancer. His reason for smoking is to deal with stress. Increasing his risk of lung cancer is a side effect he puts up with. So when smoking, Ted unintentionally increases his risk of bladder cancer, his motivational intention is to deal with stress whereas increasing his risk of lung cancer is obliquely intended. Motivational intentions are the paradigmatic form of intentions and are the main focus of the academic literature on intentions.

These distinctions are relevant for morality and the law. Committing a crime unintentionally, for example, is usually seen as a less serious offense than committing the same crime intentionally. This is often referred to as negligence in contrast to having bad intentions. It is usually held that bad consequences intended obliquely carry more weight on a moral level than unintentional bad consequences. There is no consensus whether obliquely intended behavior constitutes an intentional action, e.g. whether it is correct to state that smokers aware of the dangers intentionally damage their health.

Rational and irrational

Intentions are rationally evaluable: they are either rational or irrational. In this sense, they stand in contrast to arational mental states, like urges or experiences of dizziness, which are outside the domain of rationality. Various criteria for the rationality of intentions have been proposed. Some hold that intentions are based on desires and beliefs and that, therefore, their rationality depends on these desires and beliefs. On this view, desires present certain goals, beliefs present the means needed to achieve these goals and intentions constitute commitments to realize the means towards these goals. In this sense, an intention that is based on irrational states is itself irrational. For example, the intention to heal oneself through the power of crystals is irrational if it is based on an irrational belief concerning the healing power of crystals. But irrationality can also arise if two intentions are not consistent with each other, i.e. if the agent intends both to perform one action and to perform another action while believing that these two actions are incompatible with each other. A closely related form of irrationality applies to the relation between means and ends. This so-called principle of means-end coherence holds that it is irrational to intend to perform one action without intending to perform another action while believing that this latter action is necessary to achieve the former action. For example, it would be irrational to intend to become healthy if the agent believes that exercising is necessary to become healthy but is unwilling to exercise. In such a case, it may still be rational for the agent to desire to become healthy, but intending it is not. This principle is expressed in the proverb "he who wills the end, wills the means". It has also been suggested that additional requirements of rationality concern the consistency between one's beliefs and one's intentions.

Conscious and unconscious

Of special importance to psychology and psychoanalysis is the difference between conscious and unconscious intentions. Unconscious intentions are often used to explain cases where an agent behaves a certain way without being aware of this. This is especially relevant if the behavior is clearly directed at a goal while the agent does not consciously intend to pursue this goal or is not even aware of having this goal. At first, unconscious intentions are usually ascribed to the agent by spectators and may only be avowed by the agent themselves retrospectively. But this form of explanation is not always conclusive, since, at least for some cases, other explanations are available as well. For example, some behavior may be explained as the execution of a blind habit, which may occur with neither consciousness nor intention.

Various prominent examples, due to Sigmund Freud, involve slips of the tongue, like declaring a meeting to be closed when one intends to open it. Freud sees such phenomena not as unintentional errors but ascribes to them a deeper meaning as expressions of unconscious wishes. As a window to the unconscious, interpreting the unconscious intentions behind such phenomena and raising the patient's awareness of them are important aspects of Freudian psychoanalysis. But there is no general agreement as to whether this type of behavior should be seen as intentional behavior. Unconscious intentions are also sometimes used to explain apparently irrational behavior. In this sense, it has been claimed that excessive hand washing seen in some people with the obsessive-compulsive disorder may be motivated by an unconscious intention to wash away one's guilt, even though the person may cite very different reasons when asked.

Critics of the notion of "unconscious intentions" have raised doubts about the empirical evidence cited in favor of unconscious intentions, which is often based on interpretations resting on various controversial assumptions. Another line of argument is directed against the concept of "unconscious intention" itself. On this view, it is incoherent to talk of the mental states in question as unconscious intentions. The reason given for this is that intending something must be accompanied by some form of self-knowledge on the side of the agent about what is intended. This would not be possible if the mental state is unconscious.

Others

Various other distinctions among types of intentions are found in the academic literature. Conditional intentions are intentions to do something just in case a certain condition obtains. Planning to return a book to a friend on the condition that she asks for it is an example of a conditional intention. Having the unconditional intention to return the book, on the other hand, involves planning to return it independent of the friend's behavior. Unconditional intentions are stronger in the sense that the agent is fully committed to the course of action without relying on the presence of a triggering condition.

Another distinction can be drawn between intentions that act as means to other intentions and intentions to do something for its own sake. This is closely related to the difference between intrinsic and instrumental desires. For example, an intention to go to the supermarket may be based on another intention: the intention to eat. Because of this dependence, the agent would not have formed the earlier intention if the latter intention had been absent. In normal cases, the instrumental intention disappears if the intention it is based on does not exist anymore. In the example above, the agent may drop the intention to go to the supermarket if their doctor recommends them to start fasting. But there are special cases in which the instrumental intention persists nonetheless, sometimes referred to as motivational inertia.

The development of an understanding of intention

Understanding intention is thought to be pivotal in understanding social contexts in numerous ways. First, acquiring an understanding of intention is important for development in that it helps children conceptualize how people and animals differ from objects. Much of behavior is caused by intentions, and understanding intentions helps to interpret these behaviors. Second, intentions are integral to an understanding of morality. Children learn to assign praise or blame based on whether actions of others are intentional. Intention is also necessary to understand and predict the plans and future actions of others. Understanding the intentions and motives of others aids in the interpretation of communication, and the achievement of cooperative goals.

Psychological research suggests that understanding intentions of others may be a prerequisite for a higher-level understanding of other people's minds or theory of mind. Theory of mind research attempts to map how children come to understand the mind as a representational device for the world. This research has focused on the development of knowledge that others have beliefs, desires, and intentions that are different from one's own. A basic ability to comprehend other people's intentions based on their actions is critical to the development of theory of mind. Social, cognitive and developmental psychological research has focused on the question: How do young children develop the ability to understand other people's behaviors and intentions?

Intentional acts in infancy and childhood

From an early age, typically-developing children parse human actions in terms of goals, rather than in terms of movements in space, or muscle movements. Meltzoff (1995) conducted a study in which 18-month-olds were shown an unsuccessful act. For instance, children watched an adult accidentally under or over shoot a target, or attempt to perform an action but their hand slipped. The aim of the study was to determine whether the children were able to interpret the intention of the adult, regardless of the actual action performed. Young children have a tendency to imitate other people's actions. The outcome measure was what the child chose to re-enact—the actual event (literal motions), or the adult's goal, which was not accomplished. The results of the study suggested that 18-month-olds are able to infer unseen goals and intentions of others based on their actions. Infants who saw unsuccessful attempts at a target act and infants who saw the target act imitated the act at a higher rate than infants who saw neither the act nor an attempt. Similar paradigms were conducted with children 9 months old and 15 months old. Nine-month-olds did not respond to the unsuccessful attempt demonstrations; however, 15-month-olds acted similarly to the 18-month-olds. This suggests that between 9 months and 15 months of age the ability to infer intentions in other people develops.

The development of understanding intention has also been studied in toddlers. As mentioned previously, an intentional action is based on the belief that the course of action will satisfy a desire. In that case, what was intended can be interpreted as a function of an understanding for what was desired. When outcomes are achieved without the action of the individual directed at the goal, intention is not attributed to the actor; rather, the event is considered an accident. Research by Astington and colleagues (1993) found that 3-year-olds are skilled at matching goals to outcomes to infer intention. If another individual's goals match an outcome, 3-year-olds are able to conclude that the action was done “on purpose.” Conversely, when goals do not match outcomes, the children labeled the individual's actions as accidental. Children may come to distinguish between desire and intention when they learn to view the mind as a medium for representations of the world. Astington argues that initially desire is undifferentiated from intention in that both function as a goal state. Children then develop a more mature command of understanding other's intentions when they are able to represent an action as caused by a prior intention that is separate from desire.

Thus, research suggests that by the age of fifteen months, humans are capable of understanding intentional acts in others. The ability to distinguish between intention and desire develops in early childhood. Gestures and object-directed actions have also been studied in connexion with the development of the understanding of intention. The development of the ability to use gestures and object-directed actions in social situations has been studied from numerous perspectives, including the embodiment perspective and the social-cognitive perspective.

Gestures and object-directed intentions

Gestures are often recognized as a tool indicative of higher social reasoning. In order to engage in or understand a gesture, an individual has to recognize it as an indicator of an object or event separate from the self or the actor. It is thought that pointing, especially declarative pointing (i.e. pointing intended to direct and share intention rather than request an object), reveals the understanding of others as attentional and intentional agents (e.g. Liszkowski, Carpenter, & Tomasello, 2007). This understanding is indicated by object-directed reactions to pointing (rather than focusing on the hand). Pointing is also thought to denote perspective-taking ability and understanding of intention, as the individual must be able to understand that the actor is attending to the object and, perhaps most importantly, that the actor is attempting to communicate information regarding the referent. The development of pointing is thought to reach a critical stage at around 9 to 12 months in normally developing children (e.g. Leung & Rheingold, 1981; Moll & Tomasello, 2007; Schaffer, 2005). Liszkowski, Carpenter and colleagues (2004) found that human children begin to point at around one year of age and do so with a multiple motives, including sharing attention and interest. Earlier pointing may be different in nature and is thought to develop from a learned association between reaching and adult responsiveness to the child's desire for a referent object.

Thus, it seems pointing may be more complex than a straightforward indicator of social understanding. Early pointing may not indicate an understanding of intention; rather it may indicate an association between the gesture and interesting objects or events. However, an understanding of intention may develop as the child develops a theory of mind and begins to use pointing to convey meaning about referents in the world.

Embodiment perspective

The embodiment hypothesis holds that cognition arises out of an individual's physical interactions with the environment. In this way, environment and behavior are an integral part of cognition and what psychologists conceive of as ‘mental representations’ are indistinguishable from perception and action (e.g. Smith, 2005). The ontogenetic development of social cognition may be thought of as intertwined with the development pointing actions. According to this perspective, gestures are not just indicators of development but play a key role in how children come to develop advanced social cognition, including understanding of object-directed relations and human intention. In particular, engaging in physical actions oneself may provide insight into the structure of another's actions (eventually leading to a more nuanced understanding of another's mind).

One method of determining developmental relations between actions and an understanding of social nuances behind actions is to assess correlations between infants’ reactions to actions and the frequency with which infants produce actions. Children are generally able to produce actions around the same time they are considered to be capable of understanding the actions in others. For instance, Woodward and Guajardo (2002) found a correlation between children's ability to produce points (either during the experience or based on parental report of pointing at home) and their understanding of object-directed pointing (as evidenced by a preference for looking at a new object rather than a new hand path in a habituation paradigm) by 12 months. In addition, Brune and Woodward (2007) found that infants who produce object-directed points tended to have an understanding of pointing and infants who engaged in shared attention tended to have an understanding of eye gaze. Although the findings are correlational, they support the idea that actions may facilitate cognitive understanding. It is unclear whether self-produced pointing gestures causally influence an understanding of pointing as relational; however, there is experimental evidence which suggests that infants supported in a new action skill will subsequently develop an understanding of that action. For instance, infants allowed to grasp objects with Velcro mittens gained an understanding of object-directed grasping.

Social-cultural perspective

A social-cultural perspective includes the notion that not just actions, but partaking in social interactions and cooperation (both observing and acting) are key to both ontogenetic social development and responsible for larger cultural institutions, symbol systems, and other human social abilities (e.g. Moll & Tomasello, 2007; Tomasello et al., 2005).

This social-cultural perspective is derived from the Vygotskian view that higher cognitive functions originate in relations between individuals. The strict version of this view is that these functions are social actions that have been internalized. Pointing, according to Vygotsky, starts out as an attempt to grab a desired object. Then, a transitional gesture develops in which the individual reaches toward the object when it is desired as a cue to another to retrieve it. This transitional gesture, says Vygotsky, is an important step toward language in that participation in these social interactions are internalized and become an understanding of the psychological functions of others. Thus, pointing is an example of the internalization process that occurs over a long series of developmental events. These gestures help children to gain an understanding of triadic interactions, as the gestures go from being simply about the objects to being specifically directed at people and conveying intention toward others.

Tomasello and colleagues proposed a social-cultural perspective for understanding human affinity for advanced social cognition (e.g. Moll & Tomasello, 2007; Tomasello et al., 2005). This view takes from Vygotsky's theory the idea that social interactions (such as pointing) are not just indicative of higher cognitive functions, such as understanding intention, but play an important role in shaping them. They argue that advanced cognitive abilities are derived from the tendency to cooperate and engage in collaborative activities (e.g. Moll & Tomasello, 2007; Tomasello et al., 2005).

It was originally suspected that such foundational cognitive skills leading to advanced social understanding lie in the human ability to understand another's intention. Humans seem to have an affinity for figuring out what others are perceiving, intending, desiring, believing, etc. For example, the use of symbols requires the ability to understand another's action and attention on an entity in the world. However, understanding intentions is unlikely to be a species-specific ability.

Tomasello and colleagues argue that it is possible to break down the advanced understanding of shared intentionality into two developmental pathways that eventually become intertwined:

1. The ability to understand others as goal-directed and intentional agents and
2. A species-unique tendency to share emotions, events, and activities. Other species, such as great apes, understand the basics of intentionality; however, they do not exhibit behavior that suggests a willingness to engage in shared attention.

This claim may be further investigated by examining the functional origins of pointing. It is possible that the pointing exhibited by other species is different in purpose and origin from the pointing said to be indicative of a developing psychological understanding. The former, referred to as imperative pointing, was originally described by Vygotsky (1978) as pointing which begins in an attempt to reach for a desired object. When another retrieves the desired object, the individual learns to associate the gesture (typically hand and all fingers extended outward) with a communicated intention to acquire the desired object. However, research suggests not all points develop in this way. A study by Bates, Camaioni and Volterra (1975) distinguished between imperative and declarative gestures. Imperative gestures were described as those directed at an adult in order to obtain an object, while declarative gestures were those simply intended to obtain adult attention. Both types of gestures are social in nature; however, declarative pointing is thought to be linked to more advanced social understanding. Declarative gestures may involve more complex social and cooperative skills, linked to the development of communication skills (e.g. Liszkowski et al., 2005). For instance, Camaioni and colleagues found that declarative pointing was related to an understanding of adult's intentions, while imperative gestures were not related.

According to a social-cultural perspective, it is not the actions of pointing themselves, but the tendency to engage in cooperative actions (as indicated by elements such as shared intentionality and declarative pointing) that determines the advanced social-cognitive status of normally developing humans. These cooperative actions reveal an understanding of intention and may be for the sole purpose of interacting or cooperating rather than achieving an end. It may be that declarative pointing (typically exhibited by normally developing children but not children with autism), rather than imperative pointing, is indicative of the tendency to engage in the cooperative interactions believed to be important for developing advanced social-cognitive understanding. This fits in with Tomasello and colleagues’ conception that triadic social interactions in which child and adult engage in cooperative actions with shared intention are not only indicative of advanced social-cognitive ability but critical to the development of it. During these interactions, children gradually begin to conceptualize both first- and third-person perspectives, gaining a “bird’s eye view” of social interactions. Both the embodiment and social cultural perspectives share the principle that gestures are not just indicators of development, but play an important role in how children come to understand object-directed relations and human intention.

Gaze and attentional acts

Research suggests that faces are pivotal in offering social cues necessary for children's cognitive, language, and social development. These cues may offer information on another's emotional state, focus of attention, and potential intentions (For a discussion see Mosconi, Mack, McCarthy, & Pelphrey, 2005).

Intention may be ascribed to an individual based on where in space that individual is attending. Intention is understood not only through actions and the manipulation of objects, but by tracking eye movements. Research in this area is focused on how humans develop the understanding that eye gaze indicates that the observer may be psychologically connected to the referent.

Even as infants, humans are able to follow the gaze of others. Further research has aimed to test whether infants are simply inclined to look in the direction of head movements, without any real understanding of another individual's psychological state. Brooks (1999) found that children do not direct attention simply toward the visual hemisphere of novel head movements; rather, children as young as 15 months attend to object-directed eye gaze, suggesting that children are attending to referents to which others attend, and are not simply gazing in a similar direction. These results support the idea that infants understand eye gaze as an indicator of another individual's psychological state, which is a basic component of understanding that others may have intentions separate from one's own.

Biological motion and inferring intention

Neuroimaging research suggests that biological motion is processed differently from other types of motion. Biological motion is processed as a category in which individuals are able to infer intention. An evolutionary perspective of this phenomenon is that humans survived on the basis of being able to predict the internal mental states and potential future actions of others. Research on biological motion has found cells in the primate superior temporal polysensory area (STP) that respond specifically to biological motion. In addition, there are brain regions, including the superior temporal sulcus, that respond to biological but not non-biological motion. These findings suggest that humans may have a biologically-based affinity for spotting and interpreting purposeful, biological motions.

In one experiment, 18-month-olds observed either a human or a mechanical arm attempting to perform actions, but failing to achieve a goal. The children imitated the action to complete the intended goal when the arm was human, but not when it was mechanical. This suggests that from a young age, humans are able to infer intention specifically as a biological mechanism between motions and goals.

Humans have a tendency to infer intention from motion, even in the absence of other distinguishing features (e.g. body shape, emotional expression). This was demonstrated in a study by Heider and Simmel; they had observers view videos of moving triangles, and found that participants tended to attribute intentions and even personality traits to the shapes based on their movements. The movement had to be animate, meaning self-propelled and non-linear.

Johansson devised a way to study biological motion without interference from other characteristics of humans such as body shape, or emotional expression. He attached dots of light to actors' joints and recorded the movements in a dark environment, so that only the dots of light were visible. The Johansson figures, as they came to be known, have been used to demonstrate that individuals attribute mental states, such as desires and intentions to movements, that are otherwise disconnected from context.

Simulation theory

The simulation hypothesis holds that in order to understand intention in others, individuals must observe an action, and then infer the actor's intentions by estimating what their own actions and intentions might be in the situation. Individuals connect their own actions to internal mental states through the experience of sensory information when movements are carried out; this sensory information is stored and connected to one's own intentions. Since internal mental states, such as intention, cannot be understood directly through observing movements, it is hypothesized that these internal states are inferred based on one's own stored representations of those movements.

This theory is supported by research on mirror neurons, or neural regions, including the premotor cortex, and parietal cortex, that activate both when individuals are engaging in an action, and when they are observing the actions of others. This suggests individuals may be simulating the motor movements via internal representations of their own motor movements. Thus, research indicates that humans are hard-wired to notice biological motion, infer intention, and use previous mental representations to predict future actions of others.

Intentions and behaviors

Although human behavior is extremely complex and still remains unpredictable, psychologists are trying to understand the influential factors in the process of forming intentions and performing actions. The theories of Reasoned Action and Planned Behavior are comprehensive theories that specify a limited number of psychological variables that can influence behavior, namely (a) intention; (b) attitude toward the behavior; (c) subjective norm; (d) perceived behavioral control; and (e) behavioral, normative and control beliefs. In the theory of reasoned action, intention is influenced by people's attitude toward performing the behavior and the subjective norm. However, the level of perceived control is believed to be influential on people's behavioral intention along with their attitude and subjective norms, according to the theory of planned behavior. Not surprisingly, in most studies, intention is driven by attitudes to a greater extent than by subjective norms.

The predictive validity of the theory of Reasoned Action has been examined in numerous studies that have previously served as literature for at least three quantitative reviews. Ajzen and Fishbein (1973) reviewed 10 studies and reported a .63 average correlation for the prediction of behavior from intentions and a mean multiple correlation of .76 for the equation predicting intentions from both attitudes and norms. With similar objectives but larger samples, Sheppard et al.'s and van den Putte's meta-analyses estimated correlations of .53 and .62 for the prediction of behavior and multiple correlations of .66 and .68, respectively, for the prediction of intentions. All these studies have reflected the strong correlation that exists between people's attitudes, social norms and their intentions, as well as between their intention and the prediction of their behaviors. However, these correlations do not remain unchanged across all the conditions in people's life. Although people are likely to develop intentions to perform the action in question if they have a favorable attitude and perceive the behavior as controllable, then people's perception of control would be irrelevant to intentions when people have negative attitudes and perceive normative pressure not to perform certain actions. Research has also shown that people are more likely to perform an action if they have previously formed the corresponding intentions. Their intentions to perform the action appear to derive from attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control. To state an example: The reason one may be motivated to consume alcohol after work is determined by several factors: (1) Intention. The idea that drinking can help an individual relieve stress and enjoy one's time, for example, can greatly infleunce the attitude towards post-work drinking. (2) Subjective norms in one's surroundings. This factor is mainly cultural, so how much a society values and rewards drinking, but also strongly influenced by one's immediate social circle's values about this specific issue. (3) Perceived behavioural control towards the intended behaviour, specifically regarding the amounts of alcohol consumed. (4) Trends in behaviour. The longer the behaviour has been influenced by the previous factors, the more likely the behaviour is prone to be repeated as the original intention becomes reinforced.

How people think about and verbally communicate their own intentions also impacts these intentions. For example, asking a question about prior behaviors using the imperfective aspect of language seems to be able to bring out stronger intentions to perform such a behavior in the future. According to the World Atlas of Language Structures, "Imperfective Aspects" refers to a specific form of language structure used for reference to the present and the future but also for ongoing and habitual events in the past. For example, ‘He writes/is writing/wrote/was writing/will write letters.’ People are more likely to interpret the event as ongoing, and likely to resume the action in the future when it has been described with the imperfective verb aspect. Similarly, using present tense to describe an action as ongoing may strengthen intentions to perform the same action in the future. Previous research has showed that both information on past behavior and their attitude towards such behavior play crucial roles in predicting people's future behavioral tendency. Recent research done by Carrera and others concluded that verb tense may not have direct influence on intentions, however it could still affect the type of information used as a basis of behavioral intentions. When participants described a past episode using the present tense, they consistently used the more concrete past behavior as a basis for their intentions. In contrast, when participants described a past episode using the past tense, they consistently used the more abstract attitude as a basis for their intentions.

See also

• Collective intentionality
• Entention
• Intention (criminal law)
• Intentional stance
• Intentionality
• Intentions (disambiguation)
• Motivation
• Scienter
• Telos (philosophy)

External links

• Media related to Intention at Wikimedia Commons
• Online works of Immanuel Kant on Gutenberg