Behavior

Behavior until the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries was understood almost exclusively as a common term in the field of practical pedagogy, including the social assessment ("good," "bad" behavior) of the moral level of the student in the educational process. Practically, behavior included a characterization of the ideological orientation in relation to its conformity with the requirements of a given pedagogical system. In this regard, behavior included a mandatory characterization of the degree of discipline, self-control, and external self-mastery based on the observance of "generally accepted" social norms. (It goes without saying that the basis for the assessment of behavior was always the norms of morality, ethics, and the dominant class of a given socio-economic formation. Practically, the concept of behavior appeared not only in school pedagogy but also in everyday life generally as a method of socio-ethical characterization of a specific person (again, based on the ethical norms of the dominant class). Understanding of behavior in subjective psychology. In the history of the development of psychology until the second half of the 19th century, the concept of behavior was rarely used and insignificant. Behavior was mainly reduced to a collection of actions (Handeln). In this understanding, behavior is determined by the features of volitional activity on the one hand, and by the features of the entire preceding chain of psychological processes (perception, associative processes, thinking, etc.) on the other. By connecting behavior as a collection of actions with volitional activity, idealistic empirical psychology at the same time contrasted behavior with the psyche as an external form to internal content. Idealistic psychology asserted that consciousness justifies and determines itself, that it is the beginning and end of the entire collection of psychological processes and can only be revealed to itself. Every state of consciousness is directly my state, subjective in form and content, given only to me. To every other person it is known only conditionally, limitedly, through separate random manifestations in external behavior. This position of old idealistic psychology led: 1) to the assertion of self-observation as a psychological form of self-knowledge as the main method of empirical psychology (see Psychology), 2) to the assertion of the unknowability of "foreign psychics," most vividly expressed in the position: "foreign psychics is neither provable nor refutable" (A. I. Vvedensky), and 3) to the understanding of behavior as a limited external, random, and insignificant expression of consciousness and psyche. Actions, words, facial expressions, and gestures appear in this regard only as random, transient, and unreliable designations of the content of psychological processes. Understanding of behavior in mechanistic psychology. The concept of behavior in modern psychology occupies one of the significant places, especially in the directions of so-called "objective psychology" (see Psychology, Behaviorism, Reflexology), where the concept of behavior became the only basic concept. For "objectivists" of all persuasions, the subject of psychology is not the psyche or consciousness, but behavior. The basis for this view is that "phenomena of behavior can be observed just as objects of other natural sciences" (Watson). The transformation of behavior into the subject of mechanistic psychology of "objectivists" led to a radical change in the understanding of behavior. The established understanding of behavior in "objective" psychology considers it as a complex collection of external manifestations of the organism or human personality (identified by "objectivists"), arising from a universal mechanism: stimulus (irritant)-reaction (response to it). According to this formula St-R, St appears as the cause, and R as the result of the process. Stimuli are the effects of the external world or internal-physiological irritations of the organism itself. The reaction of behavior is always a mandatory, temporary or permanent response of the organism, forced to adapt to new conditions of existence, given in the stimulus. The task of behavior is therefore considered by most authors as constant equilibration with the environment, as an adaptive mechanism of the organism. Understanding of behavior in structural psychology. Nothing essentially new in this regard is brought by the viewpoint of structural, "holistic" behavior of the latest psychological directions (for example, gestalt psychology). Criticizing the St-R formula as atomistic, elementary, these trends object to the decomposition of behavior into parts: stimulus "A" never acts only in isolation and directly, but only in conjunction and through stimuli "B," "C," "D," etc., forming together with them a holistic, as if closed at a given moment situation. In accordance with the holistic situation, behavior always functions as a single whole, as a structure, as an active complex of reactions. St-R mutually transform into each other (reversibility of reaction, transforming it into a stimulus for other reactions and changing itself), thereby determining the "flow of activity" of behavior. Intellectual activity is included in these complex structures of "behavior." Such complex (not fitting into the St-R formula) behavior is called intellectual by them. Thus behavior as a whole is considered not as simple, but as a complex dynamic unity of external movements and acts with reflected subjective states in the form of psychological processes. However, here only the distinct mechanism of classical behavioral theories is softened, but by no means are objections to them raised in substance. Understanding of animal behavior. The most important behavioral theories, the object of which are animals, give the following main variants of understanding of animal behavior: 1) Understanding of behavior as the activity of the organism as a whole, as a mobile, balancing and adaptive relationship to the environment. In this, behavior is identified with the activity of the organism in general, the psychological is transformed into the general biological, appearing as the basic law of development of the organism. In American psychology this position is represented by Loeb, Jennings, Watson, Tolman, Weiss, in Russian psychology by Bekhterev with his understanding of zoreflexology as the science of the "correlative activity" of animals with its physical-mechanical laws of development. 2) Understanding of behavior exclusively as the functioning of the nervous system, as a collection of reactions of the nervous system (reflexes) in their motor and secretory expression (see Reflexology, Behaviorism). The prerequisites for this theory were laid by Sechenov in Russia, Loeb and Thorndike in America, but it is most consistently and substantively presented in relation to empirical material by the works of Pavlov's school (partially Bekhterev's) in Russia and Lashley in America. 3) Understanding of behavior as one of the forms of activity of the organism. According to this concept, behavior is a special, unique form of activity of the organism, changing together with the change in the methods of adaptation of the organism and all its morpho-physiological plasticity. The difference between the functions of behavior and the functions of execution lies in the combination of all relations within the organism (physiological dynamics) with its relation to the environment (biological methods of development). Behavior is such a form of development of the organism through which all aspects of its activity participate in adaptation to the environment. The nervous system, especially its higher departments (mainly cortical apparatuses), appears as the main mechanism of behavior. The content of behavior is, however, not neurophysiology, but the entire activity of the animal organism. The biological significance of behavior is determined by its place in the evolutionary process, where one of the regularities is the change in behavior of the animal in adaptive activity without a strictly parallel change in anatomical organization. In this regard, behavior appears in two forms: a) hereditary changes in behavior as a product of hereditary adaptations to very slow changes in the environment, and b) individual changes in behavior of "rational" type animals as a product of adaptation to relatively rapid changes in the environment. This viewpoint is represented mainly in biology (for example, Severtsev). In zoopsychology this has found partial reflection in the biopsychological direction (for example, Wagner). Each of the presented theories theoretically and empirically tried to overcome the idealism, in particular vitalism, prevailing in the psychology of animals and humans. In this sense, the natural-scientific theories of animal behavior represent materialistic teachings. Positive in them was in this connection the comprehensive and multifaceted emphasis on the dependence of behavior on the environment, on the adaptive properties of the organism and its material substrate (anatomical-physiological development). These trends enriched animal psychology with a number of valuable materials and scientific theories that have, within strictly limited limits, the greatest significance for understanding the laws of animal behavior (Loeb's doctrine of tropisms, works of Yerkes, Jennings, Bethe, Tolman, Pavlov's doctrine of conditioned reflexes, works of Bekhterev's school, American behaviorism and its Soviet followers, etc.). Each of these variants of "objective-psychological" (behavioristic, reflexological) understanding of behavior had its correct and valuable sides.

But overall, claiming to become a general psychological theory, each trend in its one-sidedness led to a number of unacceptable positions for us, on^j defining its mechanistic essence. The most important of these unacceptable positions are the following: a) the basis of the development of B. is simple adaptation and equilibration with the environment, regardless of the degree of complexity of the species' organization, b) B. excludes mental processes or dissolves them within itself, c) development is conceived as a purely evolutionary process, etc. Objective-psychological understanding of human B. Objective-psychological theories understand human B. as a complex set of external manifestations of the human organism, above all movements. The social side in B. is essentially reduced by the most consistently mechanistic behaviorists to the configuration of electron-proton interactions (Weiss). The social and psychological conditioning of behavior, motivation of B. as its direction toward a goal, were denied by 'objective' behaviorism. On the contrary, social, public activity and social relations of people are made dependent on the laws of development of individual B. But since B. is a form of activity of the organism, it is concluded from this that social life is governed by the laws of activity of the organism, biological laws, and through these is reduced to the regularities of the animal world. Thus, 'biosocial' behaviorism leads to biologization and psychologization of the material and ideological relations of society and the entire historical process. The 'biosocial' theory of B. is a consistently mechanistic doctrine, definitely hostile to the Marxist-Leninist understanding of B. One of the most important vices of this doctrine is the opposition of the biological essence of man to the social environment (interpreted as a set of external, unchanging conditions). Nothing essentially changed the recognition of the main importance for the development of man not from the 'biological core', but from the external environment ('socio-biological' variant of behaviorism). This recognition led only to the assertion of the unchanging givenness of external conditions as fatal paths of human development, to the understanding of human B. as a mechanically passive product of the environment. Thus, here the essence of human B. was distorted, which, taken in the unity of all the public activity of man, actually appears as a form of active change of environmental conditions. In this sense, it can be said that B. develops not only thanks to, but also in spite of conditions. However, overcoming conditions is possible only when it is based on an understanding of the actual content of these conditions. 'It is people, but only insofar as they correctly understand the conditions which they find ready-made, and only insofar as they understand how to change these conditions, that make history' (Stalin). It is this active role of consciousness, psyche and human B. in changing environmental conditions that was ignored by behaviorists of all persuasions. Ignoring the socially-labor essence of man, this theory replaced the historical unity of human B. and animal B. with simple identity. In Soviet conditions, behavioral theories tried to appear, masking themselves as Marxism, which essentially led to a mechanistic distortion of the Marxist-Leninist theory in psychology, to the introduction into Soviet science of a reactionary theory justifying capitalist 'civilization' from 'biological' positions. The historical-class essence of human B. The real definition of human B. begins with establishing the social essence of the human personality, with revealing its historical-class content (see Personality). Human B. must first be considered in this social-historical plan, but only in its specific, unique psychological form. B. is not a social relation in itself, social activity in itself, but B. is defined precisely by them, expressing in itself the social content of personal activity. Whatever form of B. we may analyze (actions, speech, facial expressions, gestures, work movements), in its basic content everywhere it is typical for it to have social activity. In this process of communication, the personality necessarily reveals its goals, intentions and needs, discovers its true thoughts, establishes ^-social measures of its individual possibilities. From this it follows that B. is necessarily the main means of objectifying the subjective life of the personality, her psych, processes and consciousness. Thus behavior can be defined as the individual form of communication, which is the main means of objectifying the psyche and consciousness of man. The development of B. in the history of socio-economic formations. Historically formed in the development of human society, human B. with the change of socio-economic formations and forms of class struggle changes not only in content but also in form. This same basic content of B. determines its internal contradiction. Determination and motivation of B. Analyzing behavior in this plan, it is first necessary to distinguish between the determination and motivation of B. (for a number of psychological directions it is characteristic to identify these concepts). Determination of B.-these are the causal conditions for the emergence, change and overcoming of processes of B. Motivation-this is the internal direction, intentionality. They are not identical. The determination of B. (social in its basis) necessarily includes the motivation of B. as one of the mediating causal links in the formation of B. The social character of the conditioning of B., ultimately determining also its mechanisms, is the basis of B., its determination. This also includes neurophysiol. mechanisms of B. in relation to elementary acts of B. All this are the real causes, driving forces of B. on the basis of social regularity. The cause of B. may also be subjective motives, but only in the case if in the subjective intention, need, this direction as a whole the real causes are correctly reflected. On the other hand, there is not a single undetermined moment of B., but in psychology there are many unmotivated actions in the absence of consciousness control over B. There are also actions that are not justified rationally and appear to the immediate impression as⁴ causeless and purposeless act. Such actions are called unmotivated. In connection with the general line of B. a certain stability of characteristic features of B. arises. In psychology the concept of stability of B. is closely connected with the typology of B., which establishes the variability of behavior within the limits of a certain character, temperament, type. Behavior of the child. In the doctrine of the B. of the child, the same idealistic and mechanistic trends are reflected as in the general theory of B. At the same time, idealistic psychology, which posited the essence of man in his consciousness and denied the possibility of objective study of the latter, turned out to be powerless to reveal the regularity of the B. of the child. 'Objective-psychological directions', one of the most vivid exponents of which is genetic reflexology (see), reduced their work either to pure description or to the study of the development of general states of the child's organism, his neurophysiol. mechanisms and 'other physiological functions. The uniqueness of the forms of B. of the child in different age periods is connected with the uniqueness of the forms of the social environment, in which the child develops as an active member of this environment. The question here is that at different ages 'the decisive role in the life of the child is played first by one, then by other sides of social relations. Thus, in infancy and preschool age, the family has the greatest influence on the child (along with which in the USSR kindergartens, centers, children's homes are acquiring increasing importance). In school age, the school with its organized pedagogical process, with the work of the pioneer organization developing in it, comes to the fore. In adolescence, the child, along with school, is included in the life of production, and finally in youth age the immediate production environment takes first place, and the young person is actively included in social construction, in the work of the Komsomol organization, etc. Thus, socio-production relations appear in the process of development of the child in refraction through the family, children's institutions, school and only in youth age appear mainly in the same form as for the adult.-With the uniqueness of the forms of influence of the social environment on the child in different age periods is also connected the uniqueness of the forms of active participation of the child in the development of this environment and the uniqueness of the forms of B. of the child. Thus, in infancy, on the basis of emerging social connections and development of the mechanisms of the motor apparatus and speech, there is a transition from spontaneous activity to a c t i v e l y-d i r e c t e d B. This B. unfolds, mainly already in preschool age, in organized play B., which together with the initial forms of labor activity leads to the effective enrichment of the child's experience. In school age, on the basis of the organized pedagogical process, there is a systematic development of the organized-cognitive activity of the child in the form of educational labor.

Finally, through the adolescent and youthful years, with active involvement in the labor of adults, with the formation of class consciousness and labor specialization, the child arrives at the forms of labor and everyday Behavior of adults. Pathology of Behavior. For the neuropsychiatric clinic, which studied the pathology of Behavior, changes in Behavior were of interest primarily as symptoms of specific nosological units, while the analysis of this or that individual symptom as an act of Behavior was pushed to the background. It should also be taken into account that dissatisfaction with the subjective-psychological approach and objectivist tendencies appear in psychiatry significantly earlier than in general psychology. (Here, in particular, the neurological approach is put forward, which has yielded a number of most valuable works in the field of the doctrine of the localization of pathological changes in the nervous system in various nervous and mental diseases.) However, along with the neurological explanation of this or that pathological disorder, psychological-clinical explanations and classifications are also preserved. Thus, in the chapters of psychiatry devoted to pathological changes in Behavior, an eclectic approach predominates. First of all, it is noteworthy that in classical psychiatry, pathological changes in Behavior are interpreted in accordance with the views of idealistic psychology as the pathology of will and actions (Pathologie des Wollen und Handeln). In accordance with the same approach, the classification of pathological changes in Behavior is also carried out. Despite the fact that a number of Behavior disorders have been thoroughly studied from the neurological side (e.g., the entire group of so-called psychomotor symptoms, Behavior disorders associated with disease of the frontal lobe of the brain), the traditional categories of old idealistic psychology are laid at the foundation of this classification. Such a classification, besides all the vices of psychological atomism, also suffers from considerable inadequacy from the point of view of its practical applicability to psychiatric symptomatology. In practice, psychiatry made much greater use of such clinical symptoms and syndromes, which, being well-studied, usually did not fit into the framework of this classification (e.g., the frontal lobe syndrome, catatonic syndrome, etc.). This situation was not changed by the 'behavioral' trend in psychology, which was also reflected in psychiatry. Here, however, 'behaviorism' was reduced in essence merely to purely terminological changes, to the translation of psychological terminology into the language of neurophysiology (in such a plan was basically conceived Bekhterev's 'pathological reflexology'; see Reflexology). Some authors limited themselves only to replacing the general name of the discipline (e.g., Osipov, who proposed to rename psychiatry 'tropopathology'), preserving in full inviolability all the empirical part and its psychological interpretation. The introduction of objective methodologies into psychiatric clinic, in particular neurophysiological and reflexological methodologies (Bekhterev and his school, and in recent years Pavlov with his school), had incomparably greater significance than behavioral theory. Experimental studies conducted on mentally ill patients of various forms of disease have provided much material characterizing changes in their neurophysiological mechanisms. However, attempts to base the explanation of the change in Behavior of patients on these studies, due to their grossly mechanistic nature, were doomed to failure. Structural behaviorism attempted to introduce an evolutionary-genetic approach into the doctrine of the pathology of Behavior. Such is, for example, the doctrine of the disintegration of personality and the decay of Behavior, on the destruction of higher, genetically later forms of Behavior in certain diseases and the return to more archaic ones. However, in all these theories, a formally historical approach is manifested, which slips either into crude biologism or into the psychology of cultural development, connected with idealistic views on history. Thus, at the present time, in the field of pathology of Behavior, there is a huge amount of empirical material accumulated along the lines of clinical symptomatology and casuistry and along the lines of neurological and neurophysiological research, but along with this richest factual material, an incredible theoretical disarray, most often an eclectic intertwining of idealistic and mechanistic theories. The immediate task of psychopathology is the thorough reworking of all this material on the basis of Marxist-Leninist methodology. In this reworking, the class-historical understanding of Behavior must play a huge role, and from this point of view all clinical observations and neurophysiological research must be utilized. Undoubtedly, the class-historical analysis will make it possible to uncover the social roots of a number of pathological changes in Behavior. This analysis, without exhausting the causal explanation of this or that symptom as a pathological condition, nevertheless makes it possible to approach the study of the pathogenesis of specific pathological changes in Behavior from a completely new scientific standpoint.