A person who is autonomous

Agents as Causes and the Practical Point of View Even nonautonomous rational agents authorize the motivating power of the desires that move them to act. Korsgaard, Bok This is true, the neo-Kantians point out, even if our decisions are the effect of causal powers over which we have no control. Conclusion These last observations take us back to where we started.

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Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search. Press ESC to cancel. Skip to content Home Philosophy What makes a person autonomous? Ben Davis November 21, What makes a person autonomous?

What is an autonomous relationship? For example, research has suggested that adolescents who autonomously rely on parents tend to be better adjusted than those who are more detached or independent of parents.

It is also clear that cultures differ greatly in values regarding independence, with individualist cultures placing greater value on people acting independently and collectivist cultures more focused on interdependence.

Research suggests, however, that whether a person engages in individualist or collectivist practices, it still matters whether or not they feel autonomous. It appears that people in all cultures feel better when they are acting choicefully, even though what they normatively do may differ.

This is why people around the world often fight for freedoms and the right to pursue what they truly value. Similarly, autonomy is not associated with separateness. Separateness refers to a lack of connection with close others. People can be very autonomously connected with others, as when they love someone and want to be close to that person. Indeed, people are often very autonomous in trying to connect with and take care of people they love.

Another important distinction is between autonomy and free will. Free will, by most interpretations, involves some notion of an undetermined action, or action that is caused by a soul or self that is completely independent of an environment.

Autonomy, in contrast, does not have these implications. Most social scientists believe that all behaviors have an impetus or cause either within the organism or its environment.

But even if all actions are caused in this sense, they can still vary considerably in the degree to which they are volitional or autonomous. Practical applications of research on autonomy can be found everywhere. Insofar as people who are acting autonomously are more persistent, perform better, and are more adjusted, it becomes important to identify factors in the real world that facilitate autonomy. Thus there has been a lot of research on how to support autonomy in domains such as education, sport, work, health care, and psychotherapy.

Across domains, both the structure of incentives and supervision styles have been shown to influence autonomy and the positive outcomes associated with it.