Specific features of vnd. Specific features of a person's IDD. §3. Types of higher nervous activity

The mechanisms of formation and dynamics of conditioned reflexes, which ensure individual adaptation to changing environmental conditions, are common in humans and animals. However, man differs sharply in his behavior from animals due to the special mechanisms of nervous activity.

Such features of the higher nervous activity of man as speech, consciousness, abstract thinking developed in connection with labor, thanks to which people were able to consciously influence nature. At the same time, the external environment for a person has a qualitatively new content than for animals, since it is a social environment, a society of people endowed with consciousness and living according to the laws of social development.

The main difference between the higher nervous activity of man and animals is thinking and speech, which appeared as a result of labor social activity.

Thinking is the most complex type of human brain activity in the process of adapting to new conditions and solving new life problems. Thinking processes are reduced to the formation of general ideas and concepts, as well as information and conclusions. In addition to verbal-logical, abstract, there are forms of emotional thinking (evaluation), practical or visual-effective thinking.

Speech is a means of communication between people in the process of work, social, spiritual and personal life. Thanks to the word, generalized concepts and representations, the ability to think logically arise. As an irritant, a word causes a large number of conditioned reflexes in a person. Training, education, development of labor skills and habits are based on them.

Based on the development of speech function in humans. IP Pavlov created the doctrine of the first and second signal systems.

First signal system exists in both humans and animals. This system, whose centers are located in the cerebral cortex, perceives through receptors direct, specific stimuli (signals) of the outside world - objects or phenomena. For a person, they create a material basis for sensations, perceptions, ideas, impressions about the natural environment and the social environment, and this forms the basis of concrete thinking.

But only man has second signal system associated with the function of speech, with words, audible (speech) and visible (writing). A person can be distracted from the features of individual objects and find in them common properties that are generalized in concepts and united by one word or another. For example, the word “birds” generalizes representatives of various genera: swallows, tits, ducks, and many others. Similarly, each word acts as a generalization.

For a person, a word is not only a combination of sounds or an image of letters, but, first of all, a form of displaying material phenomena and objects of the surrounding world in concepts and thoughts. Concepts are formed with the help of words. Signals about specific stimuli are transmitted through the word, and in this case the word serves as a fundamentally new stimulus - a signal of signals.

When summarizing various phenomena, a person discovers regular connections between them - laws. Man's ability to generalize is the essence of abstract thinking, which distinguishes him from the animal.

Thinking is the result of the function of the entire cerebral cortex.

The second signaling system arose as a result of the joint labor activity of people, in which speech became a means of communication between them. On this basis, verbal human thinking arose and developed further.

The human brain is both the center of thinking and the center of speech associated with thinking.

A person is endowed with the ability to learn speech from birth. But if the child is isolated from human society, the ability to learn speech does not develop. The child learns to speak up to 5-6 years. If before this age the child does not master speech, his mental development is delayed.

Human speech functions are associated with many brain structures. The formation of oral speech is associated with the frontal lobes of the left hemisphere, written - with the temporal and parietal lobes.

For animals, the role of conditioned (signal) stimuli is played by objects and phenomena (light, sound, temperature, etc.) of the surrounding world. For a person, the word acquires the meaning of a signal. It is the same real conditioned stimulus as any object or natural phenomenon. A hungry person "drools" not only at the sight of food, but also when talking about it. The word can replace all natural stimuli and evoke the same reactions that these stimuli evoke. The word and speech constitute the second signal system, peculiar only to man. It may be objected that dogs, horses understand words, and birds: starlings, crows, parrots - even talk. But for animals, a word is a complex of sounds, a sound stimulus. For a person, a word is a concept. It is not only a conditioned stimulus that signals everything and can cause any activity, but also a fundamentally new signal. With the help of words, general concepts are formed, verbal human thinking arises.

How does the second signaling system arise? Joint labor activity gives rise to speech as a means of communication between people, as an interpersonal signaling. Labor inevitably gives rise to speech, there is not a single people who would not have verbal speech.

F. Engels wrote that first labor and then speech made us people. The word heard, visible (written speech), tangible (alphabet for the blind), spoken (kinesthetic sensations that occur in the muscles of the tongue, larynx when we speak) becomes the second signal system.

In humans, the vast majority of temporary connections are formed with the help of a second signaling system, with the help of speech. A person, unlike an animal, does not necessarily get acquainted with an object or natural phenomenon. Oral and especially written speech created the conditions for the transfer and storage of knowledge. Language, being a means of communication, becomes an instrument of struggle and development of society, as it consolidates the results of human thinking in words, creates science and thereby ensures the progress of culture. For the development of the second human signaling system, the first 6 years of life are of decisive importance.

For the formation of each skill there is a certain time when it is most easily developed. Learning a foreign language is easier at preschool age.

Animals have a special way of learning at a glance, which is called imprinting, or imprinting. A duckling or a gosling hatched from an egg will recognize as its mother the first moving object it sees and will follow it, whether it is a duck or a goose, a soccer ball or a bird. The strongest impression occurs between 13:00 and 17:00, and after 30:00 it is no longer possible. The following reaction is also very important for ungulates. If it does not arise, then the animal will never be able to join the herd.

Cortical inhibition (human anatomy)

In nervous activity, two processes interact - excitation and inhibition. IP Pavlov called these two antagonistic, but inextricably linked active processes the true creators of nervous activity.

Excitation participates in the formation of a conditioned reflex and in its implementation. The role of inhibition is more complex and varied. It is the process of inhibition that makes conditioned reflexes a mechanism for subtle, precise, and perfect adaptation to the environment.

According to IP Pavlov, two types of inhibition are characteristic of the cortex: unconditional and conditional. The unconditional does not need to be worked out; occurs immediately. Conditional inhibition is developed in the process of individual experience.

Types of braking according to I.P. Pavlov:

I. Unconditional (external)

External or extinguishing brake

II. Conditional (internal)

1. Fading.

2. Differentiation.

3. Delay.

4. Conditional brake.

Unconditional inhibition. Let's start with the facts. The employee has developed a strong conditioned reflex to light in the dog and wants to show it at the lecture. The experiment fails - there is no reflex. The noise of a crowded audience, new signals completely turn off conditioned reflex activity, a new dominant appears, a new work of the cortex. Such inhibition of conditioned reflexes under the action of

extraneous stimuli is called external inhibition. It is innate and therefore unconditional. It is called a fading brake because if the dog is taken to the audience several times, then new signals, which turned out to be biologically indifferent, fade away and conditioned reflexes are carried out without hindrance. Also, the artist gradually learns to freely stay on stage.

Conditional inhibition. Characteristic of internal conditioned inhibition is that it is just as temporary and conditioned as the conditioned reflex itself; it is developed, acquired in individual life and plays a special role in conditioned reflex activity. All types of internal inhibition are developed in one way - by not reinforcing a conditioned stimulus with an unconditioned one. If the food conditioned stimulus - the bell - is not repeatedly reinforced with food, then the conditioned reaction will disappear, and extinction inhibition will develop. Its biological significance is that in response to signals that are not accompanied by unconditional, that is, vital, stimuli, the animal does not develop useless activity. However, fading is by no means the disappearance of a temporal connection. An extinguished reflex during reinforcement can be quickly restored. This proves that extinction is the result of an active process of inhibition.

Differential inhibition is developed if one signal stimulus, for example, the note "to", is reinforced by an unconditioned stimulus, and the note "G" is not reinforced. After a certain number of applications of the stimulus, the dog will accurately respond to it: "before" will cause a positive conditioned reflex, and "salt" - an inhibitory, negative one. Consequently, differential inhibition provides a subtle analysis of the surrounding world. The red light of a traffic light, the horn of a car, the sight of spoiled food, fly agaric - these are all stimuli to which negative, inhibitory conditioned reflexes have been developed that delay the reaction of the body.

Delayed inhibition exactly coincides the unconditioned reflex with the time of action of the unconditioned stimulus. For example, they turn on the light, and reinforce with food only after 3 minutes. The separation of saliva, after the delayed inhibition has developed, begins by the end of the 3rd minute. The dog "does not drool" is useless. The conditioned stimulus first causes inhibition in the cortex, which is replaced by excitation only before the action of the unconditioned stimulus.

The conditioned brake also contributes to the flexibility and accuracy of conditioned reflexes. Let us explain it on the example of one of the experiments of IP Pavlov. The monkey Raphael was given a basket of fruit high up in the ceiling. To get fruit, he had to build a pyramid of boxes. In some experiments, a gray circle appeared before the appearance of the basket, in which case the basket was empty. After several such combinations of a circle and a basket and futile attempts to get fruit, Raphael, before starting to build a pyramid, carefully looked to see if a circle appeared, which had acquired the meaning of a conditional brake for him. Any stimulus can be turned into a conditioned brake. After that, giving it before any positive stimulus causes inhibition of reflexes. Conditioned inhibition is the basis of negative, inhibitory conditioned reflexes that turn off the body's response to stimuli that have no biological significance.

Outrageous braking. If unconditioned and conditioned inhibition plays a coordinating role, i.e., turns off all reflexes that interfere with the implementation of nervous activity that is necessary at a given moment, then the role of transmarginal inhibition is completely different. Within certain limits, the stronger the irritation, the stronger the excitation caused by it. This law is called the law of power relations. However, if the stimulus is so strong that under its action exhaustion, breakdown and even death of the nerve cell can occur, then protective inhibition comes to the rescue. An excessively strong stimulus causes not excitation in the cortex, but inhibition. This special type of inhibition was discovered by IP Pavlov and called protective.

Dream (human anatomy)

The alternation of sleep and wakefulness is an indispensable condition of life. Sleep deprivation is very difficult for humans and animals. A person develops muscle weakness, increased sensitivity to pain, hallucinations appear, and severe mental disorders develop. A third of a person's life should be spent in a state of sleep!

The state of sleep differs from wakefulness by lowering muscle tone, all types of sensitivity and turning off consciousness. At the same time, vegetative functions also change: energy metabolism, heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature decrease, breathing slows down.

There are two phases of sleep: non-REM sleep and REM sleep. The phase of "slow" sleep is characterized by the appearance on the EEG of slow waves with a large amplitude - delta waves (see Fig. 121). During "REM" sleep, which occurs periodically after 60 - 80 minutes and lasts about half an hour, fast low-amplitude waves - beta waves, characteristic of the state of wakefulness, are recorded on the EEG. Periods of REM sleep are accompanied by rapid movements of the eyeballs. Awakened at this moment, the person says that he had a dream. These periods are called paradoxical sleep. Depriving a person of "rapid" sleep and dreams leads to memory disorders and mental disorders.

External stimuli: cold, noise, smell - are often included in the content of sleep. With the smell of burning, the sleeper can see in a dream that he is putting out a fire, when his feet cool, he walks barefoot on dewy grass. According to I. M. Sechenov, dreams are unprecedented combinations of experienced impressions.

Under natural conditions, partial sleep can be observed, when individual, so-called sentinel, points of the cortex remain free from inhibition. The mother sleeps with a lot of noise, but the slightest rustle from the side of the child wakes her up. Riders can sleep sitting in the saddle, soldiers sleep on the march.

According to IP Pavlov, sleep is a protective inhibition that prevents overwork and exhaustion of nerve cells.

Sleep that develops under the influence of inhibitory conditioned stimuli was called active sleep by IP Pavlov, in contrast to passive sleep, which occurs as a result of the cessation or restriction of the flow of afferent impulses from receptors to the cortex.

Currently, sleep is understood as the transition of cortical activity to a new mode of operation. For brain cells disconnected from new stimuli, it becomes possible to process information received during wakefulness. This process occurs during REM sleep, which is deeper than non-REM sleep. (During the period of "REM" sleep, it is more difficult to wake the sleeper.) It is believed that the intensive work of the cortex during "REM" sleep is necessary for the analysis, comprehension, ordering and consolidation of information received during wakefulness. There is a processing of existing ideas and their fixation in the long-term memory of the brain.

The structures of the brain that regulate the state of sleep and wakefulness are the diencephalon (thalamus and hypothalamus) and the reticular formation. Turning it off with sleeping pills (for example, barbiturates) causes deep sleep.

The clinic describes cases of prolonged pathological sleep, called lethargic. The patient, observed by IP Pavlov, slept for 22 years. At autopsy, damage to the hypothalamus or midbrain was observed in such patients.

Types and nature of higher nervous activity (human anatomy)

A huge number of dogs passed through the laboratory of IP Pavlov, and the researchers noted that they differed greatly from each other in their behavior and temperament. The method of conditioned reflexes made it possible to establish that this is based on differences in the properties of the main nervous processes - excitation and inhibition, from the interaction of which nervous activity is formed.

As it was found, nervous processes differ in three main indicators: strength, balance and mobility. The main feature that makes it possible to divide animals into two large groups is the strength of nervous processes. It determines the performance of nerve cells. One and the same stimulus can cause a positive conditioned reflex in one dog, and for another it can be superstrong and cause prohibitive inhibition. Depending on the strength of nervous processes, animals are divided into strong and weak.

The strong type of the nervous system is divided into two: balanced and unbalanced. In the latter, the process of excitation is stronger than the process of inhibition. IP Pavlov otherwise called him excitable, unrestrained. In turn, the balanced type of the nervous system occurs in two variants, differing in the degree of mobility of the nervous processes. Mobility is determined by the speed of the restructuring of the behavior of the animal. If a positive conditioned stimulus is no longer reinforced with an unconditioned stimulus (food, electric current), and a negative stimulus begins to be reinforced with an unconditioned one, then an animal with a mobile nervous system quickly reorganizes itself in a new way and reacts correctly. For the motionless, inert type, restructuring is difficult and proceeds slowly.

Scheme of four types of higher nervous activity (according to I.P. Pavlov):

It turned out that the types of the nervous system identified by I.P. Pavlov coincided with the classification of human temperaments given by Hippocrates 2500 years ago. He divided people into choleric (I - easily excitable, aggressive), sanguine (II - lively, mobile, cheerful), phlegmatic (III - calm, sedentary, solid) and melancholic (IV - depressed, with a gloomy mood).

The type of the nervous system is innate, due to heredity, but it is significantly influenced by the environment, which forms an alloy from the type and acquired properties, that is, character. Properties are inherited from parents, and character traits are acquired in individual life.

A weak type is formed during education in a "greenhouse", in the words of IP Pavlov, an environment where there are no strong and unusual stimuli, you do not have to overcome obstacles, do hard work. A certain isolation and protection of the child from environmental influences can form passive-defensive reactions in a strong type. In puppies raised in "prison conditions", the approach of a person caused cowardly behavior, they pressed against the floor or wall, or froze in immobility.

neuroses. Particularly susceptible to the emergence of neuroses - functional disorders of the nervous system - weak and strong, unrestrained types. When presented with unbearably difficult tasks that overstrain the cortical processes of excitation or inhibition, disruptions of nervous activity occur.

Excitation overvoltage can be caused by some strong external stimulus. In 1924, during a flood in Leningrad, experimental Pavlovian dogs were rescued on boats, after which their conditioned reflex activity turned out to be impaired. An overstrain of the inhibitory process can occur during the elaboration of subtle differentiations that require the distinction of stimuli that differ little from each other. In this case, the developed conditioned reflexes may disappear or the dependence of the magnitude of the reflex on the strength of the stimulus may be disturbed: a strong reaction occurs to a weak irritation and, conversely, to a strong one, a weak one. Along with this, the behavior of the animal also changes: it either barks for no reason, rushes out of the machine, or is in a state of drowsiness. In this case, the functions of internal organs are disturbed, hypertension occurs, often skin lesions such as eczema.

In humans, mental functions are also impaired under the influence of even very small doses of alcohol (30 - 50 ml). The concentration of attention, the speed and accuracy of perception, the speed of reaction, the sense of responsibility, that is, all the mechanisms of brain activity that are necessary in modern conditions of labor mechanization, suffer.

First and second signal systems. The nature of a person's higher nervous activity must be considered as the result of his relationship with the environment. At the same time, the external environment for a person acquires a qualitatively new content than for an animal. This is a social environment, a society of people endowed with consciousness, living according to the laws of social development.

In humans, as in animals, the conditioned reflex principle of reflecting the external environment is generally preserved. This fundamentally unified basis for the reflection of specific objects, based on the analysis and synthesis of their real properties, is the physiological content of the first signal system.

In the process of socialization of a person associated with labor activity, a second signal system for reflecting reality has developed. Real signals about the outside world for a person are not only the properties, qualities of objective reality, but also their verbal designation. The word has become for a person a signal of primary stimuli acting through the senses (a signal of signals).

In words, specific (for a given subject) and general properties of objects are generalized. Human language is a tool for transforming the material into the ideal, since it, being functionally connected with real objects, replaces them.

In humans, the correlation of the word with objective reality occurs through the ideal images of this reality. The content of the verbal reflection of reality does not coincide with the specific subject content. The word becomes a sign for a person, correlated with the objective reality. Reality acquires its ideal content in the word, becomes an image that more or less fully reflects the objects of the material world.

The qualitative difference between the higher nervous activity of man and that of animals lies in the materialized unity of the first and second signal systems, which ensures the assimilation of the meaning of social influences and the development on their basis of fundamentally new, social forms of behavior. In this unity, two sides are merged, which make up the reflective function of the human brain - physiological and mental.

For a person, the word becomes a tool for reflecting the phenomena of reality, having passed, according to L.S. Vygotsky, three stages. In the beginning, it reflects the attitude towards the things that it means. The word "mother" for a one-year-old child is associated with a very specific object - his mother. Then this concrete-subject connection is used functionally to satisfy elementary needs through adults. Comprehension of connections, relationships for the child himself is the third stage in the formation of speech function. Consequently, self-development, the physiological function itself cannot become a source for comprehension. This is where social experience comes into play. Only through it are comprehended the connections and relationships between the objects of the real world.

Typological features of higher nervous activity. The nature of the higher nervous activity of a person is largely due to the innate properties of the nervous system. Among such properties I.P. Pavlov attributed the strength of nervous processes, their mutual balance and mobility, i.e. the rate of change of inhibition by excitation or excitation by inhibition. In the physiological school of I.P. Pavlov, four types of higher nervous activity were established, which correspond to the four types of temperaments identified in the 4th century. BC. the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates: sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, melancholic.

sanguine - living, mobile type. It is characterized by strong, i.e. resistant to external influences, mobile and balanced processes of excitation and inhibition. Phlegmatic - a strong, calm, sedentary type. The processes of excitation and inhibition in him differ from the first in stagnation and inertness. Choleric - unrestrained. It is distinguished by great strength and mobility of nervous processes, but the processes of excitation in it prevail over inhibition. melancholic - weak type, it is characterized by weak processes of inhibition and excitation, fatigue and exhaustion of the nervous system.

Among literary heroes, Steve Oblonsky from the novel by L.N. is endowed with typical sanguine features. Tolstoy "Anna Karenina". Choleric temperament can be seen in the old prince Bolkonsky from the novel "War and Peace" by L.N. Tolstoy, Fyodor Karamazov from the novel "The Brothers Karamazov" by F.M. Dostoevsky. Typical choleric people were A.V. Suvorov, Peter I. In contrast to the choleric, the phlegmatic is distinguished by extreme inertia, slowness, calmness, and prudence. In its extreme manifestations, this is the hero of the novel by I.S. Turgenev "On the Eve" Uvar Ivanovich Stakhov: "a man obese, to the point of immobility, with sleepy yellow eyes", extremely slow in making the simplest decisions. In another hero of the same novel, Bersenev, we find distinct manifestations of a melancholic temperament.

In accordance with the ideas of V.D. Nebylitsyn, one should single out not three, but eight primary and four secondary properties of the nervous system. The primary properties are strength, mobility, dynamism (speed of formation of conditioned reflexes) and lability (speed of occurrence and termination) of nervous processes. These four properties are considered in relation to excitation and inhibition, i.e. one can speak of the strength and dynamism of excitation, as well as the strength and dynamism of inhibition, as two primary properties.

Balance in the manifestation of each of the four primary properties in relation to them is a secondary property. Thus, when characterizing the type of higher nervous activity, 12 different properties of the nervous system should be taken into account. The congenital type of nervous activity is not immutable. Under the influence of external factors, it undergoes significant changes. A phenotype is formed that combines the innate and acquired properties of nervous activity.

Targeted influences on the typological properties of the nervous system contribute to their improvement. The mobility of nervous processes increases under the influence of rapidly changing stimuli, each of which requires a new form of motor response. Long-acting stimuli increase the strength of the nervous process. Special exercises can improve the ability to differentiate stimuli and increase the excitability of nerve centers in adolescents.

The trainability of the typological properties of the nervous system is limited. Therefore, it is necessary not so much to remake the type as to purposefully influence the increase in the existing capabilities of a person in his main activity. In the education of the type of nervous activity in a person, an important role belongs to social factors.

Under the influence of educational measures, the unrestrained genotype outwardly manifests itself as a balanced phenotype. Conscious control over one's own actions makes it possible to restrain impulsive urges associated with the imbalance of nervous processes, with the predominance of the excitation process, or induce activity with the predominance of inhibitory processes.

The nature of the external influences of the educator predetermines the relationship of a person with the environment. However, by relatively easily rearranging the mental side of human activity, the educator is limited in the means of influencing its physiological basis - higher nervous activity and its typological features.

The ratio of higher nervous activity and the psyche. The relationship between physiological processes and mental functions is the subject of a bitter struggle between representatives of various idealistic schools and truly scientific, dialectical-materialist philosophy.

The higher nervous activity of a person provides a real connection between the human body and the external environment. This is a form of reflection of the objective world, in which physiological and mental principles closely interact. A mental, conscious form of reflection of the world is certainly impossible without higher nervous activity. But it cannot be reduced to it. It is a very complex product of neural activity. In other words, the higher nervous activity of a person is the material basis of the mental process, the starting point from which a systematic analysis of higher mental forms of reflection of objective reality can begin.

Reflection of objects and phenomena of the objective world (i.e. both the material world and its ideal attributes - social consciousness) is a multi-stage process that includes both purely physiological reactions (excitation, sensation and sensory perception) and higher mental functions ( thinking, consciousness). The reflection of the objective world by a person also includes a subjective, personal way of cognition and self-knowledge. Physiological and mental processes in the cognitive function appear in a complex unity, which has received a qualitatively new content from the social person.

A natural question arises: why only with a “social person”? Isn't the brain of a person isolated from the human community able to reflect the world in exactly the same way? Apparently no, it can't. Mental ideal processes become functions of an individual through other individuals, they are mediated by social factors. A person cut off from the society of his own kind in early childhood stops in mental development. Such changes occur in the psyche of such people that make it almost impossible for them to return to normal life in a civilized society. There is a known case when two girls Amala and Kamala, released from a wolf's lair, could not adapt to life among people. The youngest of them soon died, and the eldest (she was 8 years old) and after two years of training with a growl grabbed food and ran away on all fours, and after four years she learned ... 6 words! She learned to walk like a human by the age of 13-14, and only by the age of 16 could she communicate with the people around her. The described case is unique in its kind. But it clearly shows the fundamental impossibility outside of human society to acquire human consciousness.

A conscious reflection of reality presupposes that a person has his own, internal attitude towards it. The needs and interests of the organism are reflected in the internal relation. A conscious reflection of the objective world presupposes a personal, rational reflection. How do these internal needs fit into the functional systems of the brain?

The cerebral cortex, under the influence of social environmental factors, has become an organ that forms functional systems, the end result of which is to obtain a useful result, to satisfy certain needs. So, in the formation of speech function or the ability to work, the cerebral cortex plays the role of a higher organ that forms the "speech" or "labor" system.

This new form of reflection of the objective world should be considered not as a result of the self-development of the human brain, but as a means of forming over-organ functional systems, in which the awareness of the objective, real world takes place. Such a supra-organic brain block (structural-functional model) A.R. Luria considers the block of programming, regulation and control over the flow of functions of reflection of reality signals (higher cortical projections of analyzers). It is with them that the formation of motives for mental activity and control over mental processes, their awareness is associated. In other words, the conscious reflection of the world characteristic of a person is associated primarily with his knowledge (in concepts, in objective reality), with subsequent awareness at the level of functional, supra-organ systems of the brain.

The reflection of the objects of the external world is both a process and a result of the reproduction of a cognizable thing in the cognitive apparatus (ie, an objective-subjective process). In this case, the content of the perceived properties of the object is enriched both by personal attitude and previous practical experience. There is a self-growth of information received from outside.

In the theory of functional systems, this self-growth is the result of reverse afferentation, which acquires in the action acceptor not only a signal character, but also significantly supplements the initial idea of ​​the subject of activity. But the acceptor of the results of an action is not just a mechanical adder of the results of an action. Traces of previous nervous excitations acquire a qualitatively new content in it, manifested in the ability to reflect the general properties of heterogeneous objects. In other words, in a real-life functional system, two contradictory tendencies act together - current sensory signals and rational experience that is stored in a person's memory.

When does this conflict arise? At the lower stages of the development of living matter, this contradiction, apparently, does not exist. At least that is the conclusion modern biological science comes to. But this is not the final stage of its development. The inconsistency of the sensual and rational principles in the process of cognition of reality in the form in which it seems understandable to us exists only in man. However, apparently, there are no fundamental biological prohibitions on this form of reflective activity in higher animals (for example, in great apes).

The sensual and rational side of cognition is based on the real property of living matter (irritability, excitability, in other words, sensitivity), which ensures the perception of the signal (i.e. signal for the corresponding reaction) value of environmental stimuli.

At the level of human (socio-human) reflection of objects of the real world, the signal value of environmental stimuli has outgrown the framework of their modal-specific binding to certain systems of analysis. The ability to cognize and use natural objects by themselves, regardless of their biological value for a living being, has arisen. To the formation of sensual images of the reflection of the world, its rational reflection was added. These are the steps of the evolution of the living and the subsequent evolution of Homo sapiens.

Conclusion

Higher nervous activity provides a connection between the body and the external environment.

Reflection of phenomena and objects of the external world is a function of the higher parts of the central nervous system, i.e. cerebral cortex and nearby subcortical nuclei.

A person reflects the external world in the objective (figurative) and in the abstract form.

The highest form of verbal (conceptual) reflection received in the works of I. P. Pavlov the name of the second signal system, in contrast to the First, which reflects the world figuratively, with sensory systems.

The highest form of reflection of the external world, completed in man in mental functions, became possible due to the emergence of a new cortex - highly specialized nervous structures with extensive associative connections.

All types of sensitivity (sensory zones) are represented in the cerebral cortex. Extensive areas of the cortex regulate motor function (somatosensory zones). Associative zones of the cortex provide a more complete analysis of the afferent flow of information entering the cortex.

Ideas about the spatial localization of cortical functions have now been supplemented by information about the physiological asymmetry of the cerebral hemispheres. The left hemisphere is specialized mainly in the abstract-logical reflection of the objects of the outside world. The right hemisphere is the area of ​​sensory, objective reflection.

Congenital features of the functions of the central nervous system - strength, balance, mobility - served as I.P. Pavlov as the basis for distinguishing four types of higher nervous activity, which correspond to the four types of temperaments first described by Hippocrates. Typological features of nervous activity predetermine the qualities of mental activity and, to a certain extent, physical performance.

The regularities of the higher nervous activity of animals from the standpoint of the conditioned reflex theory were disclosed by I.P. Pavlov. Higher nervous activity of a person, unlike animals, consists of both objective, figurative, and abstract ways of reflecting reality.

Mental functions become the property of an individual through other people, they are mediated by social factors. The reduction of mental processes to physiological ones, to higher nervous activity, is just as unlawful as the absolutization of the specificity of the ideal, its transformation into an independent entity. Thinking, consciousness cannot be torn off from its carrier - the brain.

The basis of higher nervous activity is conditioned reflexes that arise during the life of the body, and allow it to expediently respond to external stimuli and thereby adapt to constantly changing environmental conditions. Previously developed conditioned reflexes are able to fade and disappear due to inhibition when the environment changes.
Irritants for the formation of conditioned reflexes in a person are not only environmental factors (heat, cold, light, smell), but also words denoting a particular object, phenomenon. The exceptional ability of a person (unlike animals) to perceive the meaning of a word, the properties of objects, phenomena, human experiences, to think in general, to communicate with each other through speech. Outside of society, a person cannot learn to speak, perceive written and oral speech, study the experience gained over the long years of human existence, and pass it on to descendants.
A feature of the higher nervous activity of a person is the high development of rational activity and its manifestation in the form of thinking. The level of rational activity directly depends on the level of development of the nervous system. Man has the most developed nervous system. A feature of the higher nervous activity of a person is the awareness of many internal processes of his life. Consciousness is a function of the human brain.
The higher nervous activity of man is essentially different from the higher nervous activity of animals. A fundamentally new signal system arises in a person in the process of his social and labor activity and reaches a high level of development.
The first signal system of reality is the system of our direct sensations, perceptions, impressions from specific objects and phenomena of the surrounding world. The word (speech) is the second signal system (signal of signals). It arose and developed on the basis of the first signaling system and is significant only in close relationship with it.
Thanks to the second signal system (the word), a person more quickly than animals forms temporary connections, because the word carries the socially developed meaning of the subject. Temporary human neural connections are more stable and persist without reinforcement for many years.
The second signaling system has two functions - communicative (it provides communication between people) and the function of reflecting objective patterns. The word not only gives a name to the subject, but also contains a generalization.
The second signal system includes the word audible, visible (written) and spoken.
The first signal system is understood as the work of the brain, which causes the transformation of direct stimuli into signals of various types of body activity. The second signaling system refers to the function of the human brain that deals with verbal symbols.

The principles and patterns of higher nervous activity discussed above are common to both animals and humans. However, the higher nervous activity of man differs essentially from the higher nervous activity of animals. A fundamentally new signal system arises in a person in the process of his social and labor activity and reaches a high level of development.

The first signal system of reality is the system of our direct sensations, perceptions, impressions from specific objects and phenomena of the surrounding world. The word (speech) is the second signal system (signal of signals). It arose and developed on the basis of the first signaling system and is significant only in close relationship with it.

Thanks to the second signal system (the word), a person more quickly than animals forms temporary connections, because the word carries the socially developed meaning of the subject. Temporary human neural connections are more stable and persist without reinforcement for many years.

The word is a means of cognition of the surrounding reality, a generalized and indirect reflection of its essential properties. With the word "a new principle of nervous activity is introduced - distraction and at the same time generalization of countless signals - a principle that determines an unlimited orientation in the surrounding world and creates the highest adaptation of a person - science."

The action of a word as a conditioned stimulus can have the same force as the immediate primary signal stimulus. Under the influence of the word are not only mental, but also physiological processes (this is the basis of suggestion and self-hypnosis).

The second signaling system has two functions - communicative (it provides communication between people) and the function of reflecting objective patterns. The word not only gives a name to the subject, but also contains a generalization.

The second signal system includes the word audible, visible (written) and spoken.

The typological features of higher nervous activity were considered above. They are common in humans and higher animals (four types). But people have specific typological features associated with the second signaling system. In all people, the second signaling system prevails over the first. The degree of this predominance varies. This gives grounds to divide the higher nervous activity of a person into three types: 1) mental; 2) artistic; 3) medium (mixed).

The mental type includes persons with a significant predominance of the second signal system over the first. They have more developed abstract thinking (mathematicians, philosophers); a direct reflection of reality occurs in them in insufficiently vivid images.

The artistic type includes people with a lesser predominance of the second signaling system over the first. They are characterized by liveliness, brightness of specific images (artists, writers, actors, designers, inventors, etc.).

The average, or mixed, type of people occupies an intermediate position between the first two.

The excessive predominance of the second signal system, bordering on its separation from the first signal system, is an undesirable quality of a person.

“You need to remember,” said I.P. Pavlov, “that the second signal system matters through the first signal system and in connection with the latter, and if it breaks away from the first signal system, then you turn out to be an empty talker, a talker and you will not find a place for yourself in life."

People with an excessive predominance of the first signal system, as a rule, have a less developed tendency to abstract, theorize.

Modern studies of higher nervous activity are characterized by the development of an integral approach to the study of the integral functioning of the brain.

Motivation and regulation of behavior.

Mental processes and states.

Motivation of activity and behavior.

The concept of activity and behavior

Activity is a purposeful interaction of a person with the environment, carried out on the basis of its knowledge and aimed at its transformation to meet human needs.

Activity is determined by internal (mental) and external conditions, carried out in the form of various methods (systems of techniques and operations), with the help of certain means.

In the ontogenetic development of a person, three leading types of activity are usually distinguished: play, learning, work. But this is only the most general classification of activities. It excludes such an important form of human life as the activity of including a person in the system of social ties, the formation of socially adapted behavior.

Behavior is a socially significant system of human actions.

Separate behavioral actions are called an act if they correspond to generally accepted norms of behavior, and a misdemeanor if they do not correspond to these norms. Socially dangerous, criminally punishable, guilty behavior committed under the control of the will and consciousness of a person is called a crime.

One of the main prerequisites for criminal behavior is the negative qualities of a person: selfishness, individualism, disregard for the rights and interests of other citizens, money-grubbing, careerism, revenge, cruelty, the desire to stand out in a reference group that attracts a given person. These qualities are not innate, but are formed depending on the conditions of a person's mental development. The formation of a person is the formation of his needs and ways to satisfy them.

Needs, motivational states and motives of activity

A prerequisite for human behavior, the source of his activity is the need.

Needing certain conditions, a person seeks to eliminate the deficit that has arisen.

The conditions necessary for the life and development of a person are divided into the following groups: a) the conditions necessary for the life and development of a person as a natural organism (hence the natural or organic needs); b) the conditions necessary for the life and development of a person as an individual, as a representative of the human race (conditions for communication, knowledge and work); c) the conditions necessary for the life and development of a given person as a person, to satisfy a wide system of his individualized needs.

Need - the need to equalize deviations from the parameters of life that are optimal for a person as a biological being, individual and personality.

Needs determine the orientation of the psyche of a given person, its increased excitability to certain aspects of reality.
Needs are divided into natural and cultural. Cultural needs are divided into material, material and spiritual (books, art objects, etc.) and spiritual. Human needs are socially determined. Depending on the range of social requirements these needs are associated with, their different levels differ.

Human needs are hierarchized, i.e. organized in a specific subordinate scheme. The hierarchy of individual needs is the main distinguishing feature of the personality - its orientation. But despite the significant variety of individual needs of the individual, it is possible to isolate the basic scheme of personal needs.

All levels of needs are interconnected, the regulation of human behavior simultaneously interacts with all levels - the so-called “through regulation” occurs, associated with the interaction of these levels. Deprivation of one of the needs leads to deformation of personal behavior in general. For example, the inability to satisfy the need for security leads to an increase in the level of anxiety of the individual, to the curtailment of its possibilities for self-realization; difficulty in satisfying physiological needs leads to a decrease in cognitive needs, etc.

The hierarchy of personal needs is modified with the development of the personality, its highest levels “ripen” only by the time the individual reaches psychological maturity. But once the higher levels of needs are formed, especially the needs for self-realization, self-improvement, they begin to play a system-forming role in the system of needs. Autonomization of its individual levels leads to a narrowing of the interests of the individual, and in some cases to asocial ways of their implementation.

A socialized person has a need for self-esteem, for understanding himself, the meaning of his existence. This is of great importance for its adaptation to the environment.

Hierarchy of human needs

The need for self-realization

Cognitive needs Need for recognition, respect

The need for affection

The Need for Security

Physiological Needs

For normal social functioning, it is necessary to include a person in activities in which he would find the meaning of his existence. From this follows the need for labor, creative labor, in which the basic abilities of a person would be revealed. The absence of this fundamental human need is the main indicator of the social deformation of the individual.

The organic needs of a person arise without their special formation, while all social needs arise only in the process of their special formation, education.

The needs of people depend on the historically established level of production and consumption, on the conditions of human life, on the traditions and dominant tastes in a given social group.

Needs are fixed in the process of their satisfaction. Satisfied need first disappears, but then arises with greater intensity. Weak needs in the process of their repeated satisfaction become more persistent.

More and more new needs arising as a result of activity are the main stimulus for both the development of the individual and the historical progress of society as a whole.

A need becomes the basis of a behavioral act only if the necessary means and conditions (object of activity, tool of activity, knowledge and methods of action) are available or can be created to satisfy it. The more diverse the means of satisfying a given need, the more firmly they are fixed.

A need, from a neurophysiological point of view, is the formation of a dominant, a stable excitation of certain brain mechanisms that are associated with the regulation of necessary behavioral acts.

The emerging need causes motivational excitation of the corresponding nerve centers, prompting the body to a certain type of activity. At the same time, all the necessary memory mechanisms are revived, data on the presence of external conditions are processed, and on the basis of this, a purposeful action is formed.

So, the actualized need causes a certain neurophysiological state - motivation.

Motivation is a need-conditioned excitation of certain nervous structures (functional systems) that cause directed activity of the body.

The admission to the cerebral cortex of certain sensory excitations, their strengthening or weakening depends on the motivational state. The effectiveness of an external stimulus depends not only on its objective qualities, but also on the motivational state of the organism (a well-fed organism does not respond to the most attractive food). External stimuli become stimuli, that is, signals for action, only when the organism is in an appropriate motivational state.

Thus, the motivational states caused by the need are characterized by the fact that the brain models the parameters of the objects that are necessary to satisfy the need, and the schemes of activity for mastering the required object. These schemes - programs of behavior - can be either innate, instinctive, or based on individual experience, or newly created from elements of experience.

The implementation of activities is monitored by comparing the achieved intermediate and final results with what was pre-programmed. Satisfying a need relieves motivational stress and, by evoking a positive emotion, “affirms” this type of activity (including it in the fund of useful actions). The dissatisfaction of the need causes a negative emotion, an increase in motivational tension and, at the same time, search activity. Thus, motivation is an individualized mechanism for correlating external and internal factors that determines the behavior of a given individual.

In the animal world, modes of behavior are determined by the reflex correlation of the external environment with actual, vital organic needs. Thus, hunger causes certain actions depending on the external situation.

In human life, the external environment itself can actualize various needs. So, in a criminally dangerous situation, one person is guided only by the organic need for self-preservation, another is dominated by the need to fulfill civic duty, the need to help other people, the third - to show prowess in a fight, to distinguish themselves, etc.

All forms and methods of a person's conscious behavior are determined by his relationship to various aspects of reality. The motivational states of a person differ significantly from the motivational states of animals in that they are regulated by a second signaling system, the word. Motivational states of a person include attitudes, interests, desires, aspirations and drives.

Types of motivational states: attitudes,
interests, desires, aspirations, inclinations

Attitude is a stereotyped readiness to act in a certain way in an appropriate situation. This readiness for stereotypical behavior arises on the basis of past experience. Attitudes are the unconscious basis of behavioral acts in which neither the purpose of the action nor the need for which it is performed is realized.

There are the following types of installations:

1) Situational-motor (motor) set (for example, the readiness of the hand to operate large or small objects).

2) Sensory-perceptual setting (waiting for a call, highlighting a significant signal from the general background noise).

3) Social-perceptual attitude - stereotypes of perception of socially significant objects (for example, the presence of tattoos is interpreted as a sign of a criminalized person).

4) Cognitive-cognitive attitude (the prejudice of the investigator regarding the guilt of the interrogated person leads to the dominance of accusatory evidence in his mind, while exculpatory evidence recedes into the background).

5) Mnemic setting - setting for memorizing significant material.

But in most cases, a person is aware of the actions necessary under given conditions, anticipates their results in ideal images, and is aware of the purpose of these actions. The objective conditions of behavior are realized in the system of concepts.