To understand themselves as playing a social role, individuals must understand themselves to be contributing to a cooperative endeavor. Psychologically, the form of cooperation required is a specific type that only humans may possess, namely, one in which individuals form a joint or collective agency to pursue a common end. This begins ontogenetically not with the societal level but rather with more local collaboration between individuals. Participating in collaborative endeavors of this type leads young children, cognitively, to think in terms of different perspectives on a joint focus of attention ‐ including ultimately an objective perspective ‐ and to organize their experience in terms of a relational‐thematic‐narrative dimension. Socially, such participation leads young children to an understanding of self‐other equivalence with mutual respect among collaborative partners and, ultimately, to a normative (i.e. moral) stance toward “we” in the community within which one is forming a moral role or identity. The dual‐level structure of shared endeavors/realities with individual roles/perspectives is responsible for many aspects of the human species' most distinctive psychology.

中文翻译：

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角色在人类独特的认知和社交中的作用

要了解自己在扮演社会角色，个人必须了解自己为合作努力做出的贡献。从心理上讲，所需的合作形式是只有人类才能拥有的一种特殊类型，即由个人组成联合或集体机构以追求共同目标的形式。从本体上讲，这不是从社会层面开始的，而是从个人之间更多的本地合作开始的。参加这种类型的协作活动，会使幼儿在认知上以不同的观点思考共同关注的焦点，包括最终成为客观的观点，并以关系，主题，叙事维度来组织他们的经验。社交上，这种参与使幼儿了解合作伙伴之间相互尊重并相互尊重自己，并最终形成一种规范的（即道德的）立场，以在社区中形成道德角色或身份的“我们”。具有个体角色/观点的共同努力/现实的双重结构负责人类最独特心理学的许多方面。