The multiple, interacting levels of cognitive systems (MILCS) perspective on group cognition
Abstract
We lay out a multiple, interacting levels of cognitive systems (MILCS) framework to account for the cognitive capacities of individuals and the groups to which they belong. The goal of MILCS is to explain the kinds of cognitive processes typically studied by cognitive scientists, such as perception, attention, memory, categorization, decision-making, problem solving, judgment, and flexible behavior. Two such systems are considered in some detail—lateral inhibition within a network for selecting the most attractive option from a candidate set and a diffusion process for accumulating evidence to reach a rapid and accurate decision. These system descriptions are aptly applied at multiple levels, including within and across people. These systems provide accounts that unify cognitive processes across multiple levels, can be expressed in a common vocabulary provided by network science, are inductively powerful yet appropriately constrained, and are applicable to a large number of superficially diverse cognitive systems. Given group identification processes, cognitively resourceful people will frequently form groups that effectively employ cognitive systems at higher levels than the individual. The impressive cognitive capacities of individual people do not eliminate the need to talk about group cognition. Instead, smart people can provide the interacting parts for smart groups
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There are agents at multiple levels of organisation within a system.
“This gives us the possibility of explaining how it can be that there are agents at multiple levels of organisation within a system which solves puzzles raised by colonies of single celled organisms such as slime moulds”
From Traces of thinking: a stigmergic approach to 4E cognition (2025) · cites this paper as Goldstone & Theiner, 2017
Other theorists have not shied away from multiple levels of agency: Hutchins explores agents consisting of agents in distributed cognitive systems, Goldstone and Theiner offer a computational systems account of group cognition in such terms, and Godfrey-Smith explores the transition between single and multicelled organisms in terms of agency and subjectivity.
“Hutchins explores the dynamics of agents consisting of agents in distributed cognitive systems (Hutchins, 1995a) Goldstone and Theiner (2017 ) offer a computational systems account of group cognition in such terms, and Peter Godfrey-Smith (2016) explores the transition between single and multicelled organisms in terms of agency and subjectivity.”
From Traces of thinking: a stigmergic approach to 4E cognition (2025) · cites this paper as Goldstone and Theiner (2017)
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The Spread of Beliefs in Partially Modularized Communities
Goldstone, R. L., Dubova, M., Aiyappa, R., & Edinger, A. (2023) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/17456916231198238 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
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CENTRALIZED, PARRALLEL, AND DISTRIBUTED INFORMATION PROCESSING DURING COLLECTIVE SENSEMAKING
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Least Effort and Alignment in Task-Oriented CommunicationPreprint
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Least Effort and Alignment in Task‐Oriented Communication
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Agency Scaffolding: From Anthropocentric to Relational Action. A Critical Review
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Multi-Agent Systems have Some More to Learn from Human Multi-Agent SystemsPreprint
Riordan, B., Bosch, P., Salarian, A., Saeks, M., & Pandey, V. (2026) · SSRN Electronic Journal · doi:10.2139/ssrn.6736398
- Authors
- Goldstone, R. L., & Theiner, G.
- Affiliations
- Indiana University Bloomington (US)
- Villanova University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Goldstone, Robert L.
- Venue
- Philosophical Psychology
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2017-04-03
- Volume
- 30
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 338-372
- ISSN
- 0951-5089 (ISSN-L)
- 1465-394X
- OpenAlex
- W2604126156
- Cited by
- 31
- References
- 114
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 1 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 3
- FWCI
- 2.04
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Update notices
- correction (2017-08-28)
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Philosophical Psychology (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Embodied and Extended Cognition
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Cognitive Science and Education Research
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Philosophy and Theoretical Science
- Keywords
- group cognition, lateral inhibition, diffusion models, decision-making, group identification, cognitive networks, behavioral flexibility, categorization
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