Laboratories, Natural Environments, and the Distinction between Proximal and Distal Cues.

Organisms use cues differently as they navigate their environments. One distinction researchers use to characterize differences between cues is the distinction between proximal and distal cues. The standard way of thinking about this distinction involves thinking of distal cues as beyond an experiment apparatus and proximal cues as within that apparatus. I argued that there is a problem with thinking about the distinction this way; there are no proximal or distal cues in natural environments and so the cues are not explanatory of behaviors in those environments. Then, I recommended a new way of thinking about the distinction.