Understanding affordances: history and contemporary development of Gibson’s central concept
Understanding affordances: history and contemporary development of Gibson’s central concept

Summary/Abstract: Gibson developed the affordance concept to complement his theory of direct perception that stands in sharp contrast with the prevalent inferent ial theories of perception. A comparison of the two approaches shows that the dist inct ion between them also has an ontological aspect. We trace the history and newer formalizat ions of the notion of affordance and discuss some compet ing opinions on its scope. Next, empirical work on the affordance concept is reviewed in brief and the relevance of dynamical systems theory to affordance research is demonstrated. Finally, the striking but often neglected convergence of the ideas of Gibson and those of certain Cont inental philosophers is discussed.

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