The concept of psychological observation. Stolyarenko A.M. Psychology and pedagogy: Proc. manual for universities
MINISTRY OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
Ufa Law Institute
Department of Criminology and Psychology
TEST
IN PSYCHOLOGY
Option No. 12
Completed by: 1st year student of 3.6 years of study
study group No. ____FZO
Record book No.________
Checked: ________________
Option number 12.
1. Observation as professionally significant quality investigator.
The problem of personality is one of central problems society, both in the field of law and in the activities of legal bodies. High results can only be achieved by people, individuals who work in them and have the appropriate psychology. They must be distinguished by a high general culture, needs for intellectual, cultural and moral development, citizenship, hard work, ability to live and work in conditions modern civilization, democracy and universal human values, respecting human rights and freedoms, and the fact that they can correctly use their knowledge, love for Russia, surrounding nature, family, etc. These are the main goals of the entire system of working with legal personnel.
Abilities occupy an important place in the diversity of individual personality traits. They are one of the important internal conditions for successful mastery of a certain specialty, highly productive work and continuous improvement. They are not reduced to knowledge and skills, but represent stable features mental activity meeting the requirements of a particular profession.
A lawyer’s abilities are always an integral set, and not a scattering of certain qualities, the structure of which strictly corresponds to the requirements of legal work. The latter is characterized by two groups of requirements and, accordingly, two groups of abilities: socio-legal and specially legal.
Observation (situational and psychological) refers to special legal abilities - special qualities that are determined by the specifics of legal work, by what distinguishes it from other types of work, and which are important for him, but not obligatory for others.
Observation is a human ability, manifested in the ability to notice significant, characteristic, incl. and subtle properties of objects and phenomena. It presupposes curiosity, inquisitiveness and is acquired through life experience. The development of observation is an important task of forming a cognitive attitude and adequate perception of reality.
The most accessible and most widely applicable way of obtaining psychological information about a person of professional interest to an employee of a legal body is by observing him, observing him from the side, during a conversation, during professional contact. This is feasible with psychological observation- a special psychological action that a legal professional should master.
Psychological observation is a special psychological action that serves the solution of law enforcement problems and is intended to study the psychological characteristics of people with whom a legal professional has to deal. Its significance lies in its wide accessibility and efficiency (the ability to quickly obtain at least some information about a person and his psychology). Everything depends practically on the employee himself, his desire and his professionalism. Psychological observation is carried out using special psychological techniques, meeting its purpose, and specifying their rules. It would be a simplification to attribute his success only to a certain technique of work. Its implementation requires the professional to have a special stable internal attitude towards psychological observation, the presence of certain psychological knowledge, as well as increased psychological sensitivity (sensitivity to external manifestations of human psychology). All these components are interconnected. The very use of psychological observation techniques requires an up-to-date attitude, the desire and desire of a professional to use them. Inverse relationship - the practice of using techniques develops and strengthens attitude and psychological sensitivity, a professional habit arises, appropriate skills and abilities are formed, experience is accumulated, and knowledge is improved.
Psychological observation provides information about a person, but its reliability should not be overestimated. Man as an object of psychological observation is very complex and ambiguous. It contains a lot psychological information: how he entered the room, how he approached, how he sat down, where he put his hands, what phrase he said and why, why he lingered on one question, walked around another, why he lowered his eyes, when his eyelids trembled, who he looked at and at what moment, and much more. All this constitutes the language of external manifestations of human psychology. Its meanings are probabilistic and, nevertheless, a professional should understand them. This language will tell a professional more than a person about himself. There are citizen “artists” who try to mask their real thoughts, attitudes, qualities, states, which, of course, to a certain extent complicates the understanding of the language of external manifestations and the reading of the latter. However, a true professional will confidently distinguish the feigned from the real, the sincere from the deceitful. The fact is that the "artist" lives double inner life: demonstrated, intended for display, and valid "for internal use." Constant transitions from one to another in the process of communication one way or another reveal this bifurcation in numerous signs of inconsistency. Even if a professional fails to formulate a clear psychological portrait person, then, based on the results of psychological observation, he develops dissatisfaction, assumptions, and suspicions, prompting him to carry out additional checks and, ultimately, to establish the truth.
The interest of a law enforcement officer in surveillance is not idle curiosity, it is always specific. This specificity is expressed in interest in drawing up a psychological portrait (which, as noted above, in legal activity is always selective and accentuated) or individual psychological phenomena (for example, sincerity or deceit).
In psychological observation, a lawyer must use certain techniques and adhere to a number of rules.
The rule of selectivity and purposefulness recommends paying attention to the definition of observation tasks in each specific case, using recommendations for drawing up a psychological portrait, and clarifying which external manifestations, acting as signs of psychological phenomena to be assessed, are subject to observation and recording.
The rule of complexity warns against the inadmissibility of categorical psychological assessments based on a single recording of some signs. It is necessary to double-check the information, strengthening monitoring for their repeated manifestations. In addition, taking into account the integrity of the psyche, one should collect the widest possible range of information that corresponds to the structure of the psychological portrait. This will allow for more reliable assessment of individual manifestations.
A technique for identifying personality traits through observation. By appearance, facial expressions, pantomime, products of activity, words, speech, one can judge a number of qualities of a person. Rules:
· By vocabulary, structure of speech, presentation of thoughts, answers to questions, judge his education, culture, professional affiliation, mental development, resourcefulness, criminality, legal awareness, features of legal psychology, etc.;
· by pronunciation, evaluate his national and regional affiliation, possible place of birth and long-term residence, education;
· based on the rate of speech, intonation, gestures, expressiveness of facial expressions and expressiveness of speech, evaluate his type of temperament, emotional balance, self-control, willpower, self-esteem, culture, system of value priorities. Thus, a person with a choleric temperament is fast, his speech rate is consistently high, his facial expressions are expressive, and his behavior is characterized by impetuosity, impatience, and lack of restraint.
Technique for identifying criminally significant signs in surveillance. For employee law enforcement the significance of such signs is especially great. Rules:
· assessment of signs of criminalization of speech - contamination of speech with words from criminal jargon. Addresses such as “citizen chief”, “commander”, words and expressions characteristic of “thieves’ music” deserve evaluation.
· paying attention to tattoos - most of them carry a semantic load that reveals the wearer’s attitude to the law, law enforcement officers, devotion to the criminal world, status in the criminal environment, talk about plans for the future, character criminal activity, including "prisons", etc.
· observation of gestures, movements, details of clothing, behavioral habits. Characterized by intense gestures, expressive movements of the hand and fingers (in the criminal world, in places of deprivation of liberty, gestures are used for the silent exchange of information and communication), a certain manner of entering a room, gait, communication behavior, squatting against a wall, simulation of illnesses, method storing some things, the peculiarities of waiting (three steps in one direction, three in the other), calling some people and himself by nickname, inability to use a knife and fork in the dining room, the habit of mixing different dishes in one, the presence of expensive rings on the fingers, etc.
Professional observation
The legal profession obliges employees to conduct constant observations of people’s behavior, their appearance, gait, facial expressions, gestures, etc.
Observation is understood as the process of purposeful perception of people, objects, events and phenomena. The main thing in observation is the ability to visually or with the help of hearing notice certain changes in the observed phenomenon, connect them with other phenomena and draw logical conclusions. Observant people are able to notice even minor details and draw important conclusions from them. Observation is inherent in all persons who have a central nervous system. But this does not mean that all people possess these qualities to the same extent. Poor ability to notice phenomena, lack of a plan in observation lead to the fact that people with poorly developed powers of observation will make significant mistakes when solving official problems. Legal work requires people with high level observation.
Psychologists have proven that observation skills develop in the process of specific activities. At the same time, its development is facilitated by special training exercises, as well as training with abstract objects Observation as a personality quality is formed by cultivating certain mental functions of a person’s sensations and perceptions.
A practicing lawyer should strive to notice everything in the observed object (victim, suspect, accused, etc.), phenomenon essential features, that is, to know its essence. The basis of cognition is sensations as a process of reflecting reality. Sensations can be visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, etc. In the development of observation, the most important role visual and auditory sensations play.
The formation of observation skills also depends on the cultivation of attention. In psychology, it is understood as the direction and concentration of the psyche on certain observable objects or phenomena of life. Attention is included as a necessary component in all types of human mental activity. Without attention, deliberate perception, memorization and reproduction of information is impossible.
Observation as a personality quality develops in the conditions of practical activity. To become observant, you must first of all acquire the ability to observe, but this is only one of the stages in the development of this property. To transform a skill into a lasting quality, purposeful, planned and systematic training is needed. It is carried out in Everyday life legal worker, as well as with the help of special exercises.
The lawyer must strive to penetrate into the essence of the observed phenomenon, to notice all the significant signs related to the materials of the case. It is important to organize the observation, setting a definite, specific goal. Only a rationally set goal of observation concentrates our psychological capabilities and forms the necessary qualities.
In parallel with targeted observation, it is necessary to develop universal observation. Such observation provides a deeper and more versatile study of the object of observation. It is formed in the process practical work over an object from different points of view, that is, by setting different goals.
The development of observation skills should be based on the principles of purposefulness, planning and systematicity. Compliance with these principles provides a legal worker with observation as a personal quality.
Surveillance plays an important role in the professional activities of internal affairs officers. 33
It allows you to identify the criminal activities of persons of operational interest to the internal affairs bodies, their connections, personal qualities, places of storage and sale of stolen goods, identify facts related to the events under investigation, etc. Skillful organization of the surveillance process, of course in conjunction with other ways of organizing professional activities, greatly contributes to timely warning, rapid detection, full investigation of crimes, and search for hidden criminals.
Under supervision in psychological science refers to deliberate, systematic, purposeful perception undertaken with the aim of studying an object or phenomenon. Purposefulness and organization during observation not only make it possible to perceive the observed object as something whole, but also makes it possible to recognize the individual and the general in it, distinguish the details of the object and establish certain types of its connections with other objects. In other words, an observation is not a simple sum individual elements, isolated from each other, but a combination of sensory and rational knowledge.
Professional observation is a purposeful and specially organized perception by an employee of internal affairs bodies of phenomena and processes that are significant for solving operational and official tasks. The latter include, first of all, manifestations of personality (offenders, persons on preventive registration, convicts, victims, witnesses, etc.), its states, actions, various objects, the study of which is important for revealing and investigation of crimes, the activities of the employee himself, etc.
The psychological nature of professional observation is very multifaceted. Observation is the most advanced form of intentional perception. At the same time, the employee does not perceive everything that catches his eye, but calculates what is most important, necessary, and interesting. This is due to the goals, objectives, plan, which usually form the basis of observation. Observation always relies on the active functioning of the senses. For an internal affairs officer, this is, first of all, vision and hearing. Attention plays a particularly important role in observation, acting as its regulator.
Through attention, as the direction and concentration of consciousness on certain objects, the goals and plan of observation are realized. Observation is always associated with the processing of information and is impossible without the active work of thinking. Finally, observation is also determined by the personality characteristics of the employee himself.
Observation of the activities of employees of internal affairs bodies is characterized by emotional and intellectual intensity. Its terms are determined psychological characteristics employee activities. In this regard, observation, as a method of activity of internal affairs officers, must satisfy the following psychological requirements.
Firstly, the officer needs preliminary knowledge of the personality characteristics of those persons in respect of whom he is conducting surveillance (for example, the nature and direction of their criminal activity, criminal experience, their inclinations, interests, etc.).
Secondly, he must fully and accurately record, by memorization or in another way (if necessary, and with the use of technical means), the specific actions and behavior of the object of observation.
Thirdly, he must compare the recorded facts with previously obtained data about the observed and promptly analyze the results of this comparison in order to anticipate the actions of the object of observation.
The success of observation is ultimately determined by the intellect, which organizes this process according to a certain plan, establishes the necessary sequence of stages of observation and uses its results. According to prof. Ratinova A.R., in order to organize effective surveillance, an internal affairs officer must remember a number of general rules:
Before observation, obtain the most complete understanding of the person, object or phenomenon being studied;
Define a goal, formulate a task, draw up (at least mentally) a plan or observation scheme;
Look for in the observed not only what was supposed to be found, but also the opposite of it; 35
Divide the object of observation and at each moment observe one of the parts, not forgetting about observing the whole;
Keep track of every detail, trying to notice the greatest number of them, to establish the maximum number of properties of an object or features of what is being observed;
Do not trust a single observation, examine an object or phenomenon from different points of view, in different moments and in different situations, changing observation conditions;
Question observable signs that may be false demonstrations, simulations, or staging;
Raise questions “why” and “what does this mean” regarding each element of observation, thinking through, guessing, criticizing and testing your thoughts and conclusions with further observation;
Compare objects of observation, contrast them, look for similarities, differences and connections;
Compare the results of observation with what was previously known about this subject, with data from science and practice;
Clearly formulate the results of observations and record them in the appropriate form - this helps their understanding and memorization;
Involve various specialists in observation, compare and discuss the results of observation with your colleagues;
Remember that the observer can also be the object of observation1.
Watching how mental process and a certain form of professional activity of an employee of internal affairs bodies develops in him such an important personality trait as professional observation - a complex personality property, expressed in the ability to notice professionally significant, characteristic, but subtle and at first glance insignificant features of the operational situation, people, objects, phenomena and their changes (which may subsequently be important for the case). The basis of an employee’s professional observation is a stable interest in people, their inner world, psychology, seeing them from the angle of professional tasks, a kind of psychological “orientation” towards them.
What is necessary to ensure a high level of employee observation?
Firstly, the attitude towards the perception of information that is important for the decision professional tasks co-worker. This attitude helps to overcome fatigue, apathy, disgust (for example, when examining a decomposing corpse).
Secondly, a specific concentration of attention precisely on those objects and their properties that can provide the necessary information that is important for solving the problems that the employee faces.
Thirdly, long-term preservation of stable attention, ensuring the employee’s readiness to perceive the necessary initial information at the right time (especially during lengthy searches, inspections of crime scenes and interrogations).
The most important direction in the development of professional observation is the employee’s mastery of the technique of professional observation, which includes techniques and methods for its implementation based on relevant psychological laws.
It is useful to divide training to develop attention into three forms.
General attentiveness. Without giving yourself any preliminary task, you find out what remained noticeable from the impressions you encountered.
Directed mindfulness. The task is given to carefully examine the named object. After which the question is asked about something related to this object, something that could be caught during examination, although the subject of the question was not known in advance.
Targeted observation. The task is given to observe certain details of a certain phenomenon, and only then this phenomenon is shown.
One of the common techniques for developing professional observation is the following: looking closely
at someone around you, you should look away from him and then imagine him in your memory, trying to mentally describe his signs, and then check yourself by looking at this person again. Or the following exercise: look for some time at a house nearby and, turning away, try to mentally describe how many windows, balconies, where the windows are open, where the laundry hangs, where people are in the apartments, etc. It is necessary to take into account that knowing how many windows or balconies there are in a house does not mean being observant: their number is constant. But noticing when individual windows are open or where the light is on is already the result of observation, close attention, the ability to perceive connections and notice dependencies. Another exercise is observing an event. In this case, there is no reference to any street incident that attracts everyone's attention. It can be an ordinary set of actions of one or several people who pursue a specific goal. “Why is this person here?”, “What is he expecting?”, “What will he do now?” - answers to these questions allow you to develop the ability to psychologically observe people, the ability to predict human behavior, which is very important in the activities of an internal affairs officer.
Attention and observation during the exercises develop very successfully. The highest degree of development of observation should be considered the level when it becomes not only a personality trait of an employee, but also a trait of his character, when it manifests itself in all types of his activities. An observant employee is precisely characterized by the fact that he will not miss anything, will notice everything in a timely manner and draw appropriate conclusions.
100 RUR bonus for first order
Select job type Graduate work Course work Abstract Master's thesis Report on practice Article Report Review Test Monograph Problem Solving Business Plan Answers to Questions Creative work Essay Drawing Compositions Translation Presentations Typing Other Increasing the uniqueness of the text PhD thesis Laboratory work Online help
Find out the price
The legal profession obliges employees to conduct constant observations of people’s behavior, their appearance, gait, facial expressions, gestures, etc.
A practicing lawyer must strive to notice all the essential features in the observed object (victim, suspect, accused, etc.), a phenomenon, that is, to know its essence. Cognition is based on sensations as a process of reflecting reality. Sensations can be visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, etc. In the development of observation skills, the most important role is played by visual and auditory sensations.
The formation of observation skills also depends on the cultivation of attention. Without attention, deliberate perception, memorization and reproduction of information is impossible.
Observation as a personality quality develops in the conditions of practical activity. To become observant, you must first acquire the ability to observe, but this is only one of the stages in the development of this property. To transform a skill into a lasting quality, targeted, systematic and systematic training is needed. It is carried out in the daily life of a legal worker, as well as with the help of special exercises.
The lawyer must strive to penetrate into the essence of the observed phenomenon, to notice all the significant signs related to the case materials. It is important to organize observation by setting a specific, specific goal. Only a rationally set goal of observation concentrates our psychological capabilities and forms the necessary qualities.
In parallel with targeted observation, it is necessary to develop universal observation. Such observation skills provide a deeper and more versatile study of the object of observation. It is formed in the process of practical work on the object from different points of view, that is, by setting different goals.
Observation asprofessionally importanthuman quality
3.1. The concept of observation
One of the most complete works devoted to observation, “Education of Observation in Schoolchildren,” which laid the foundations for practical work on its development, was written by B. G. Ananyev back in 1940. But, unfortunately, the development of ways to develop this property of the sensory organization of people before still lags behind such areas of practical psychology as training in communication, sensitivity, memory, etc. At the same time, there is reason to assert that this property is professionally important for a large group of professions.
Observation is a mental property based on sensation and perception. Thanks to observation, a person distinguishes signs and objects that have minor differences, notices differences in similar things, sees them with fast movement, with a changed perspective, and has the opportunity to reduce to a minimum the time of perception of a sign, object, process.
As a property of sensory organization, observation is associated with various mental phenomena. First of all, it is mediated by sensations and the conditions of their occurrence. Observation presupposes a well-developed visual analyzer, high absolute and relative sensitivity.
Here it is appropriate to recall the words of the remarkable observer K. Paustovsky, who considered the development of the sensitivity of the visual analyzer to be the most important condition for observation. He wrote:
“A good eye is an acquired taste. Don't be lazy, work on your eyesight. Keep it on track, as they say. Try looking at everything for a month or two with the thought that you absolutely must paint it. On the tram, on the bus, everywhere, look at people this way. And in two or three days you will be convinced that before this you did not see even a hundredth part of what you noticed now on their faces. And in two months you will learn to see, and you will no longer have to force yourself to do this.” (Paustovsky K. Golden Rose: Stories. - Chisinau, 1987. - P. 596).
Thanks to high sensitivity, it becomes possible to finely differentiate and see the unnoticeable.
Already in the development of sensitivity, the influence of personal preferences and attitudes begins to affect. Observation becomes selective. Therefore, you can meet people who have a high level of sensitivity to the perception of nature and the processes occurring in it, but poorly distinguish between the states and processes that arise in their interactions or in the operation of technology.
Personality characteristics manifest themselves to an even greater extent with awareness and understanding of what a person sees and what he observes. The meaningfulness of what is observed depends primarily on the volume of ideas and concepts a person has about the relevant phenomena and processes. It is possible to comprehend what one sees due to its inclusion in already established cognitive structures, which constitute a person’s cognitive experience. This process is also mediated by mental activity, in which not only systematization and classification of what is perceived occurs, but also its translation to the verbal level, and therefore generalization.
N.V. Timofeev-Resovsky, a biologist who valued observation as highly as experiment in his research, emphasized that when observing, you can see something only if you know what you need to look for, what you need to see . Sometimes several people with different professional levels or interests in various areas, looked at the same thing, and when exchanging impressions it turned out that those who did not have the necessary knowledge or did not know what exactly needed to be seen did not see anything.
This means that professional knowledge, as well as the mental processes that ensure its operation, make it possible to realize and understand the observed phenomena. The results of understanding and awareness of what is perceived will be mediated by the characteristics of memory, since it is thanks to it that the completeness of ideas and concepts that make up the structure of a person’s knowledge and his professional experience is ensured.
We can say that understanding what is observed is a certain type of mental task in which the question is resolved: what is it?
does it mean or what does it refer to? As you know, these are problems of systematization or classification. An interesting attempt in this regard was made by J. Hintika and M. Hintika*, who analyzed the observations of Sherlock Holmes as a problem-solving process. In this case, the observation process appears as a search and extraction of information necessary to solve a mental problem. In this case, there is some absolutization of thinking during observation, but nevertheless, the relationship between perception and thinking for understanding and awareness of the observed facts becomes even more obvious.
So, observation, like any mental phenomenon, is an element of a complex system and that is why it has various multi-level connections with various aspects of a person’s mental life. On the one hand, it is determined by the structure and sensitivity of the visual analyzer, on the other hand, by the characteristics of memory and thinking and at the same time is included in the holistic structure of the human psyche through its past experience, orientation, emotional preferences.
In our work we're talking about about the manifestation of observation in relation to people, in addition, there is a type of professions “person-to-person”, where observation is considered as a professionally important quality (E. A. Klimov). Let us try to highlight the specific features of the manifestation of observation in professions of this type.
In psychology, a whole direction has emerged to study the possibility of revealing the psychological essence of a person through his observation and perception. In the works of, for example, B. G. Ananyev, M. Ya. Basov, B. F. Lomov, S. L. Rubinstein, the dialectic of external and internal in the manifestations of the psyche was shown. While maintaining some stable external forms of expression of mental states, their diverse, dynamic characteristics and forms of manifestation were found. Moreover, the diversity of individual manifestations of mental states was also taken into account. Since the object of observation can only be the external manifestations of a person, for the development of observation it has become important to know what mental phenomena these or other observed signs indicate.
So, the first specific feature of observation in professions of the “person-to-person” type is that it is necessary to see in the external behavior or in the very appearance of a person his internal, mental states or properties.
* Khintika J., Khintika M. Sherlock Holmes against modern logic: Towards a theory of information retrieval using questions // Languages and modeling of social interaction. - M.: Progress, 1987. - P. 265-281.
The second feature of observation in this area is the need to differentiate the signs through which a person expresses himself externally. It is necessary to develop both absolute and relative sensitivity to these signs, since they reveal the dynamic characteristics of a person, formed in the process of his ontogenesis, on the one hand, and manifested in his / real life - on the other. The dynamics of ontogenetic change can be expressed through a physiognomic mask, posture, and gait; mental phenomena occurring in the present time are expressed through facial expressions, gestures, and postures.
Writers and poets are excellent observers. Their powers of observation never cease to amaze and delight. Many vivid pictures of human images were given by them on the basis of observation and vision of subtle changes in people's behavior. Let us remember the sketch by S. Zweig:
“Involuntarily, I raised my eyes and saw right in front of me - I even felt scared - two hands, the likes of which I had never seen before: they grabbed each other like enraged animals, and in a frantic fight they began to squeeze and squeeze each other so that their fingers they made a dry cracking noise, as if cracking a nut... I was frightened by their excitement, their insanely passionate expression, this convulsive clutch and combat. I immediately felt that a man filled with passion had driven this passion into his fingertips so as not to be blown up by it himself.” (Zweig S. Twenty-four hours from a woman's life: Novellas. - Minsk, 1987.-S. 190).
The third feature of observation, manifested in the “person-to-person” sphere, is associated with interest specifically in a person as an object of perception and observation. On the basis of this interest, selectivity of perception is formed, and the experience of observing a person and seeing his mental states is quickly created. Orientation, as a rule, is associated with professional interest, which determines the structure of professional knowledge. These observations are included in it and at the same time, based on the characteristics of professional knowledge, can be understood and interpreted.
Any observation is included in the context of the content of a particular professional activity. For the teacher’s observations, it becomes important to know the age-related characteristics of the manifestation and experience of feelings, age-related characteristics of the relationship between emotions and cognitive activity, the manifestation of children’s emotions in relationships with peers, parents, etc. For a doctor or nurse, knowledge about the external signs of a person who has this or that other disease, about the characteristics of people’s behavior when
various diseases, about age-related characteristics manifested by the patient in relation to himself and the illness that has befallen him, etc. The context of observations carried out by an investigator or inspector for juvenile affairs is completely different. His observations include knowledge about the relationship between the type of personality and the type of offense, the type of violations and the type of family and relationships in it, changes in the social environment in the neighborhood, etc.
Professional knowledge constitutes the basis that not only influences the purposefulness of perception and contributes to the development of differentiation of perceived signs, but directly affects the understanding of observed objects and processes.
All of the listed features of observation can be classified as perceptual and conceptual.
The fourth feature of observation, specific to professions of the “person-to-person” type, is determined by the fact that the content of activity in these professions involves the interaction of people. This means that it is necessary to observe, as a rule, not an isolated person, but people in communication, in relationships with each other. We can say that observation in this case presupposes not only the perceptual and conceptual qualities of the observer, but also empathy.
Empathy is characterized by the ability to reflect the inner world of another person. Such reflection promotes understanding of the thoughts and feelings of the other, and also creates “emotional involvement.” The emergence of empathy presupposes developed powers of observation and its connection with thinking and feeling. The ability to take the point of view of another person, imitate his states, understand what is not expressed out loud, identify with his emotional state, anticipate the development of behavior and mental states - this is the specific content of empathy that manifests itself in the processes of interaction between people. Observation here is facilitated by a certain personality structure, in which such emotional properties as impressionability and emotional responsiveness are developed.
The development of the relationship between the perceptual, conceptual and empathetic components of observation contributes to its improvement, the emergence of the ability not only to see and feel another, but also to anticipate his behavior.
This level of observation was perfectly described by O. de Balzac.
“My powers of observation took on the side of instinct: without neglecting the physical appearance, it unraveled the soul - or rather, it
she accurately captured a person’s appearance, which immediately penetrated into his inner world; it allowed me to live the life of the one to whom it was addressed, for it endowed me with the ability to identify myself with him.” (Mo-rua A. Prometheus, or the Life of Balzac. - M., 1968. - P. 72).
Thus, observation, manifested in professions of the “person-to-person” type, is associated with the characteristics of the subject and object of observation.