Grammatical categories and the development of classification preferences: a comparative approach

Abstract

The defining characteristic of the human species is its culture-bearing capacity whereby very similar biological organisms develop and sustain extraordinarily diverse behavioral repertoires. Research on human behavior, then, must necessarily concern itself with the scope and significance of this diversity and the process of its development in childhood. However, contemporary psychological research often assumes instead a homogeneity of repertoire and of underlying psychological function - coupled with a concomitant assimilation of the psychological to the biological - and neglects the process of culture acquisition. Theories and methods developed from such a perspective neither incline their proponents to developmentally oriented comparative research nor provide a set of concepts and tools adequate to undertake it.