title: Clinical cognition and embodiment.
abstract: I first identify two different distinctions: between Cartesian cognition and embodied cognition, and between calculative rationality and intuitive know-how. I then suggest that, in the nursing literature, these two distinctions are run together, to create an opposition between 'Cartesian rationality' and 'embodied know-how'. However, it is vital to keep the two distinctions apart, because 'embodied knowing' is very frequently rational. In separating the idea of embodied cognition from non-rational intuition, I show how 'embodiment' leads to the concepts of distributed cognition and distributed expertise. This has extensive and important implications for how we understand clinical cognition in nursing.
authors.affiliation: Department of Nursing and Midwifery, University of Stirling, UK. jhpl@stir.ac.uk
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Paley
mesh_terms: D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002983:Clinical Competence; D003071:Cognition; D004993:Ethics, Nursing; D006801:Humans; D019545:Intuition; D019359:Knowledge; D008128:Logic; D016294:Models, Nursing; D008960:Models, Psychological; D009726:Nurses / Q000523:psychology; D009736:Nursing Process