Reflective agency is the capacity of an agent to evaluate, regulate, and modify its own evaluations, goals, beliefs, and actions through conscious reflection.
Where biological agency involves the regulation of interactions with the world, reflective agency involves the regulation of the agent’s own evaluative processes. Reflective agents can examine why they act, question existing goals, compare alternatives, and revise future behaviour in light of reflection.
Reflective agency emerges from increasingly integrated forms of mind and selfhood. It allows significance itself to become the object of evaluation. Agents no longer respond only to what matters; they can reflect upon why it matters and whether it ought to matter.
This capacity provides the foundation for values, responsibility, moral reasoning, cultural learning, and long-term self-directed behaviour.
APS Summary: Reflective agency is the capacity of an agent to evaluate and modify its own evaluations, goals, beliefs, and actions through conscious reflection.