The Cognitive Foundations of Teaching

Abstract

The propensity to teach is vital to human cultural evolution and to our ecological dominance of the planet, but its cognitive foundations remain poorly understood. Traditional explanations argue that teaching hinges on particular cognitive pre-requisites, such as Theory of Mind. However, such explanations conflate the function of teaching—promoting learning in others—with how it is achieved, and overlook the role of comparatively simple mechanisms like the heuristics known to underpin teaching in some non-human animals. We propose a novel framework integrating evolutionary and psychological perspectives to understand the diversity of teaching by focusing on the cognitive requirements for flexibility and sensitivity to pupil needs. Synthesizing theory and evidence across disciplines, our framework evaluates the contributions of different mechanisms in determining who and what is taught, and how teaching is achieved. This allows us to understand the cognitive foundations of teaching across different species, in diverse human societies, and neurodiverse populations.