An identical situation can be experienced differently by different people. We will call these different ways of experiencing a situation experiential attitudes. This work aims to develop a model that distinguishes between different experiential attitudes that exist on a spectrum with the following two extremes - content focused and relationship focused. Somebody is content focused, for example in a communicative situation, if they focus is primarily what is being discussed. On the other hand, a relationship focused attitude is revealed when someone is focused primarily on who they are communicating with. This distinction was adopted from Watzlawick's two levels of communication. We propose to use the aforementioned distinction as an umbrella term that can bridge the gap between seemingly unconnected theories from various areas of cognitive science and psychology, including Dunbar’s theory of the evolution of language, Baron-Cohen’s E-S theory and Piaget’s theory of cognitive development. We approach our research using a questionnaire that examines people’s intuitions about experiential attitudes and a phenomenological interview in which we examine experiential attitudes in important moments from co-researcher’s daily lives. Our findings indicate that the concept of experiential attitudes is a valid way of bridging the gap between the various theories listed above. Additionally, the concept of a spectrum of attitudes with content focused on one extreme and relationship focused on the other looks valid as well.
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