Pedagogical psychology Vygotsky Lev Semenovich. Lev Vygotsky

“Consciousness as a problem of behavior” (1925), “Development of higher mental functions” (1931), “Thinking and speech” (1934)

L.S. Vygotsky developed the doctrine of the development of mental functions in the process of communication-mediated acquisition by an individual of cultural values. Cultural signs(primarily signs of language) serve as a kind of tools, using which the subject, influencing another, forms his own inner world, the main units of which are meanings (generalizations, cognitive components of consciousness) and meanings (affective-motivational components). Mental functions given by nature (“ natural"), are transformed into functions of the highest level of development (" cultural"). Thus, mechanical memory becomes logical, the associative flow of ideas becomes goal-directed thinking or creative imagination, impulsive action - voluntary, etc. Is everything internal processes- product interiorization. “Every function in the cultural development of a child appears on the scene twice, on two levels - first social, then psychological. First between people as an interpsychic category, then within the child as an intrapsychic category.” Originating in the child’s direct social contacts with adults, higher functions are then “grown” into his consciousness” (“History of the Development of Higher Mental Functions,” 1931). Based on this idea of ​​Vygotsky, a new direction in child psychology was created, including the provision of "zone of proximal development" which had a great influence on simultaneous domestic and foreign experimental studies of the development of child behavior. The principle of development was combined in Vygotsky’s concept with the principle of systematicity. He developed the concept of " psychological systems", which were understood as integral formations and forms various forms cross-functional connections (for example, connections between thinking and memory, thinking and speech). In building these systems main role was initially given to a sign, and then to a meaning as a “cell” from which the tissue of the human psyche grows, in contrast to the psyche of animals. Together with his students, Vygotsky experimentally traced the main stages of transformation of meanings in ontogenesis (Thinking and Speech, 1934), proposed adequate to the principle development of a hypothesis about the localization of mental functions as structural units of brain activity. Vygotsky’s ideas are used not only in psychology and its various branches, but also in other human sciences (in defectology, linguistics, psychiatry, art history, ethnography, etc.).

Considering the state of psychological science, L.S. Vygotsky noted that domestic science is characterized by the closed nature of the problem of personality and its development. He identified four main ideas of the concept of personality.

The first idea is the idea of ​​individual activity. Interpreting the signs of language as mental tools, which, unlike tools of labor, do not change physical world, but the consciousness of the subject they operate on. The tool was considered as a possible point of application of the individual’s forces, and the individual himself acted as a carrier of activity. Vygotsky discovered the development of the meanings of words in ontogenesis, the change in their structure during the transition from one stage of mental development to another. Before a person begins to operate with words, he already has pre-verbal mental content (elementary mental functions), to which psychological development gives a qualitatively new structure (higher mental functions arise) and the laws of the cultural development of consciousness, qualitatively different from the “natural”, come into play development of the psyche (as observed, for example, in animals).

The second idea is Vygotsky’s thought about the main feature of human mental functions: their indirect nature. The mediation function is provided by signs with the help of which behavior is mastered and its social determination occurs. The use of signs rebuilds the psyche, strengthening and expanding the system of mental activity.

The third idea is the provision of interiorization social relations. Acts of internalization, as Vygotsky noted, are carried out mainly in the processes of communication. Communication was seen as a process based on intellectual understanding and the conscious transmission of thoughts and experiences through a known system of means. The latter means that social relations, while remaining instrumentally mediated, bear the imprint of individuality, there is a transfer of individual characteristics of communicating people and the formation of their ideal representation in someone else’s “I”. In this, Vygotsky sees the difference between teaching and upbringing, since the first is the transmission of “meanings,” and the second is the transmission of “personal meanings” and experiences. In this regard, he introduces the concept of the “zone of proximal development” for learning. By it we mean the discrepancy between the level of tasks that a child can solve independently or under the guidance of an adult. Training, by distributing such a “zone”, leads to development.

And finally, the fourth idea - the formation of personality consists of transitions between the states of “in oneself”, “for others”, “being for oneself”. According to Vygotsky, a person becomes for himself what he is in himself, through what he presents to others. A personality as a system reveals itself twice: the first time - in acts of socially oriented activity (in actions and deeds), the second time - in acts that complete an act, based on the counter activity of another person.

Vygotsky’s views lead to an understanding of personality as a special form of organizing the mutual activity of a given individual and other individuals, where the real existence of an individual is connected with the ideal existence of other individuals in him and where, at the same time, the individual is ideally represented in the real existence of other people (aspects of individuality and personalization). Thus, Vygotsky’s ideas, which developed mainly in the psychology of cognitive processes, laid the foundation for the Russian approach to understanding psychology.

1896-1934) - famous in world psychology of owls. psychologist. The greatest fame was brought to V. by the cultural and historical concept of the development of higher mental functions he created, the theoretical and empirical potential of which has not yet been exhausted (which can be said about almost all other aspects of V.’s creativity). IN early period creativity (until 1925) V. developed the problems of the psychology of art, believing that the objective structure of a work of art evokes in the subject at least two opposing affects, the contradiction between which is resolved in catharsis, which underlies aesthetic reactions. A little later, V. develops problems of methodology and theory of psychology (“The Historical Meaning of the Psychological Crisis”), outlines a program for constructing a concrete scientific methodology of psychology based on the philosophy of Marxism (see Causal-dynamic analysis). For 10 years, V. was engaged in defectology, creating in Moscow a laboratory for the psychology of abnormal childhood (1925-1926), which later became an integral part of the Experimental Defectology Institute (EDI), and developing a qualitative new theory development of an abnormal child. IN last stage In his creative work he dealt with the problems of the relationship between thinking and speech, the development of meanings in ontogenesis, the problems of egocentric speech, etc. (“Thinking and Speech”, 1934). In addition, he developed problems of the systemic and semantic structure of consciousness and self-awareness, the unity of affect and intellect, various problems of child psychology (see Zone of proximal development, Learning and development), problems of mental development in phylo- and sociogenesis, the problem of cerebral localization of higher mental functions and many etc.

He had a significant influence on domestic and world psychology and other sciences related to psychology (pedology, pedagogy, defectology, linguistics, art history, philosophy, semiotics, neuroscience, cognitive science, cultural anthropology, systematic approach etc.). V.’s first and closest students were A. R. Luria and A. N. Leontiev (“troika”), later they were joined by L. I. Bozhovich, A. V. Zaporozhets, R. E. Levina, N. G. Morozova, L.S. Slavina (“five”), who created their original psychological concepts. V.'s ideas are developed by his followers in many countries of the world. (E. E. Sokolova.)

Added ed.: Main works of V.: Collection. op. in 6 vols. (1982-1984); "Educational Psychology" (1926); "Sketches on the History of Behavior" (1930; co-authored with Luria); "The Psychology of Art" (1965). The best biographical book about V.: G. L. Vygodskaya, T. M. Lifanova. "Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky" (1996). See also Instrumentalism, Intellectualization, Interiorization, Cultural-historical psychology, Double stimulation method, Functionalism, Experimental genetic method for studying mental development.

VYGOTSKY Lev Semenovich

Lev Semenovich (1896-1934) - Russian psychologist who made a great scientific contribution to the field of general and educational psychology, philosophy and theory of psychology, developmental psychology, psychology of art, and defectology. Author of the cultural-historical theory of behavior and development of the human psyche. Professor (1928). Having graduated from the Faculty of Law of the First State Moscow University and at the same time from the Faculty of History and Philology of the People's University A.L. Shanyavsky (1913-1917), taught from 1918 to 1924 at several institutes in Gomel (Belarus). Played an important role in literary and cultural life of this city. Even in the pre-revolutionary period, V. wrote a treatise on Hamlet, which contains existential motifs about the eternal sorrow of existence. He organized a psychological laboratory at the Gomel Pedagogical School and began work on the manuscript of a textbook on psychology for secondary school teachers (Pedagogical Psychology. Short Course, 1926). He was an uncompromising supporter of natural science psychology, focused on the teachings of I.M. Sechenov and I.P. Pavlov, which he considered the foundation for building a new system of ideas about the determination of human behavior, including in the perception of works of art. In 1924, V. moved to Moscow and became an employee of the Institute of Psychology of Moscow State University, of which K.I. was appointed director. Kornilov and who was given the task of restructuring psychology on the basis of the philosophy of Marxism. In 1925, V. published the article Consciousness as a problem in the psychology of behavior (Collected Psychology and Marxism, L.-M., 1925) and wrote the book Psychology of Art, in which he summarizes his work of 1915-1922. (published in 1965 and 1968). He subsequently returned to the topic of art only in 1932 in a single article, dedicated to creativity actor (and from the standpoint of socio-historical understanding of the human psyche). From 1928 to 1932 V. worked at the Academy of Communist Education named after. N.K. Krupskaya, where he created a psychological laboratory at the faculty, the dean of which was A.R. Luria. During this period, V.'s interests concentrated around pedology, which he tried to give the status of a separate discipline and conducted research in this direction (Pedology of the Adolescent, 1929-1931). Together with B.E. Warsaw published the first domestic Psychological Dictionary (M., 1931). However, political pressure on Soviet psychology was increasing. The works of V. and other psychologists were sharply criticized in the press and at conferences ideological positions, which made it very difficult to further develop research and introduce it into pedagogical practice. In 1930, the Ukrainian Psychoneurological Academy was founded in Kharkov, where A.N. Leontyev and A.R. Luria. V. often visited them, but did not leave Moscow, because During this period, he established relations with the Leningrad State University. In the last 2-3 years of his life, he began to formulate the theory child development, creating the theory of the zone of proximal development. Ten years on the road to psychological science V. created a new scientific direction, the basis of which is the doctrine of the socio-historical nature of human consciousness. At the beginning of his scientific career, he believed that new psychology was called upon to integrate with reflexology into a single science. Later, V. condemns reflexology for dualism, since, ignoring consciousness, it took it beyond the limits of the bodily mechanism of behavior. In the article Consciousness as a problem of behavior (1925), he outlined a plan for the study of mental functions, based on their role as indispensable regulators of behavior, which in humans includes speech components. Based on K. Marx’s position on the difference between instinct and consciousness, V. proves that thanks to work, experience is doubled and a person acquires the ability to build twice: first in thoughts, then in deeds. Understanding the word as an action (first a speech complex, then a speech reaction), V. sees in the word a special sociocultural mediator between the individual and the world. He attaches special importance to its iconic nature, due to which the structure changes qualitatively mental life a person and his mental functions (perception, memory, attention, thinking) from elementary become higher. Interpreting the signs of language as mental tools, which, unlike tools of labor, do not change the physical world, but the consciousness of the subject operating them, V. proposed an experimental program for studying how, thanks to these structures, a system of higher mental functions develops. This program was successfully carried out by him together with the team of employees who formed School B. The center of interests of this school was the cultural development of the child. Along with normal children, V. paid great attention to abnormal ones (suffering from defects of vision, hearing, mental retardation), becoming the founder of a special science - defectology, in the development of which he defended humanistic ideals. V. outlined the first version of his theoretical generalizations concerning the patterns of development of the psyche in ontogenesis in the work Development of Higher Mental Functions, written by him in 1931. This work presented a scheme for the formation of the human psyche in the process of using signs as a means of regulating mental activity - first in the external interaction of an individual with other people, and then the transition of this process from outside to inside, as a result of which the subject gains the ability to control his own behavior (this process was called interiorization). In subsequent works, V. focuses on the study of the meaning of a sign, that is, on the (mainly intellectual) content associated with it. Thanks to this new approach, he, together with his students, developed an experimentally substantiated theory of child mental development, embodied in his main work Thinking and Speech (1934). He closely connected these studies with the problem of learning and its impact on mental development, covering wide circle problems of great practical importance. Among the ideas he put forward in this regard, the position on the zone of proximal development gained particular popularity, according to which only that learning is effective that runs ahead of development, as if pulling it along with it, revealing the child’s ability to solve, with the participation of the teacher, those tasks that he can independently solve. can't cope. V. attached great importance to the crises that a child experiences during the transition from one age level to another in the development of a child. Mental development was interpreted by V. as inseparably linked with motivational (in his terminology, affective), therefore, in his research, he affirmed the principle of the unity of affect and intelligence, but he was prevented from implementing a research program analyzing this principle of development early death. Only preparatory work in the form of a large manuscript, The Doctrine of Emotions. A historical and psychological study, the main content of which is the analysis of the Passions of the Soul by R. Descartes - a work that, according to V., determines the ideological appearance of modern psychology of feelings with its dualism of lower and higher emotions. V. believed that the prospect of overcoming dualism was contained in the Ethics of V. Spinoza, but V. did not show how it would be possible to rebuild psychology based on Spinoza’s philosophy. V.'s works were distinguished by a high methodological culture. The presentation of specific experimental and theoretical problems was invariably accompanied by philosophical reflection. This was most clearly reflected both in works on thinking, speech, emotions, and in the analysis of the ways of development of psychology and the causes of its crisis at the beginning of the 20th century. V. believed that the crisis has a historical meaning. His manuscript, which was first published only in 1982, although the work was written in 1927, was called - The historical meaning of the psychological crisis. This meaning, as V. believed, was that the disintegration of psychology into separate directions, each of which presupposes its own, incompatible with the other, understanding of the subject and methods of psychology, is natural. Overcoming this tendency towards the disintegration of science into many separate sciences requires the creation of a special discipline of general psychology as a doctrine of fundamental general concepts and explanatory principles that allow this science to maintain its unity. For these purposes, the philosophical principles of psychology must be rebuilt and this science must be freed from spiritualistic influences, from the version according to which the main method in it should be an intuitive understanding of spiritual values, and not an objective analysis of the nature of the individual and his experiences. In this regard, V. outlines (also unrealized, like many of his other plans) a project for developing psychology in terms of drama. He writes that personality dynamics are drama. Drama is expressed in external behavior when there is a clash between people playing different roles on the stage of life. Internally, drama is associated, for example, with a conflict between reason and feeling, when the mind and heart are not in harmony. Although V.’s early death did not allow him to implement many promising programs, his ideas, which revealed the mechanisms and laws of the cultural development of the individual, the development of his mental functions (attention, speech, thinking, affects), outlined a fundamentally new approach to the fundamental issues of the formation of this personality. This has significantly enriched the practice of teaching and raising normal and abnormal children. V.'s ideas received wide resonance in all sciences that study man, including linguistics, psychiatry, ethnography, sociology, etc. They defined an entire stage in the development of humanities in Russia and still retain their heuristic potential. Proceedings.V published in Collected Works in 6 volumes - M, Pedagogy, 1982 - 1984, as well as in the books: Structural Psychology, M., Moscow State University, 1972; Problems of defectology, M., Education, 1995; Lectures on pedology, 1933-1934, Izhevsk, 1996; Psychology, M., 2000. L.A. Karpenko, M.G. Yaroshevsky

Years of life: 1896 - 1934

Homeland: Orsha ( Russian Empire)

Vygotsky Lev Semenovich was born in 1896. He was an outstanding Russian psychologist, the creator of the concept of the development of higher mental functions. Lev Semenovich was born in the Belarusian town of Orsha, but a year later the Vygodskys moved to Gomel and settled there for a long time. His father, Semyon Lvovich Vygodsky graduated from the Commercial Institute in Kharkov and was a bank employee and insurance agent. Mother, Cecilia Moiseevna, devoted almost her entire life to raising her eight children (Lev was the second child). The family was considered peculiar cultural center cities. For example, there is information that Vygodsky the father founded a public library in the city. Literature was loved and known in the house; it is no coincidence that so many famous philologists came from the Vygodsky family. In addition to Lev Semenovich, these are his sisters Zinaida and Claudia; cousin David Isaakovich, one of the prominent representatives of “Russian formalism” (somewhere in the early 20s he began to publish, and since both of them were engaged in poetics, it was natural to want to “distinguish themselves” so that they would not be confused, and therefore Lev Semenovich Vygodsky replaced the letter “d” in his last name with “t”). Young Lev Semenovich was interested in literature and philosophy. Benedict Spinoza became his favorite philosopher and remained until the end of his life. Young Vygotsky studied mainly at home. He studied only the last two classes at the private Gomel Ratner gymnasium. He showed extraordinary abilities in all subjects. At the gymnasium he studied German, French, Latin, and at home, in addition, English, ancient Greek and Hebrew. After graduating from high school, L.S. Vygotsky entered Moscow University, where he studied at the Faculty of Law during the First World War (1914-1917). Then he got carried away literary criticism, and his reviews of books by symbolist writers - rulers of the souls of the then intelligentsia: A. Bely, V. Ivanov, D. Merezhkovsky appeared in several magazines. In these student years he writes his first work - the treatise "The Tragedy of William Shakespeare's Danish Hamlet". After the victory of the revolution, Vygotsky returned to Gomel and took an active part in the construction new school. This period marks the beginning of his scientific career as a psychologist, since in 1917 he began to engage in research work and organized a psychological office at the pedagogical college, where he conducted research. In 1922-1923 he conducted five studies, three of which he later reported at the II All-Russian Congress on Psychoneurology. These were: “Methodology of reflexological research as applied to the study of the psyche,” “How psychology should be taught now,” and “Results of a questionnaire about the mood of students in the graduating classes of Gomel schools in 1923.” During the Gomel period, Vygotsky imagined that the future of psychology lay in the application of reflexological techniques to the causal explanation of the phenomena of consciousness, the advantage of which was their objectivity and natural scientific rigor. The content and style of Vygotsky’s speeches, as well as his personality, literally shocked one of the congress participants, A.R. Luria. New director Moscow Institute of Psychology N.K. Kornilov accepted Luria’s proposal to invite Vygotsky to Moscow. Thus, in 1924, the ten-year Moscow stage of Vygotsky’s work began. This decade can be divided into three periods. First period (1924-1927). Having just arrived in Moscow and having passed the exams for the title of 2nd category researcher, Vygotsky gave three reports in six months. In terms of further development of the new psychological concept conceived in Gomel, he builds a model of behavior, which is based on the concept of speech reaction. The term “reaction” was introduced to distinguish the psychological approach from the physiological one. He introduces into it features that make it possible to correlate the behavior of an organism, regulated by consciousness, with forms of culture - language and art. After moving to Moscow, he was attracted to a special area of ​​practice - working with children suffering from various mental and physical defects. Essentially, his entire first year in Moscow can be called “defectological.” He combines classes at the Institute of Psychology with active work at the People's Commissariat of Education. Showing brilliant organizational skills, he laid the foundations of the defectology service, and later became the scientific director of the special scientific and practical institute that still exists today. The most important direction of Vygotsky’s research in the first years of the Moscow period was the analysis of the situation in world psychology. He writes a preface to Russian translations of the works of the leaders of psychoanalysis, behaviorism, gestaltism, trying to determine the significance of each of the directions for the development new painting mental regulation. Back in 1920, Vygotsky fell ill with tuberculosis, and since then, outbreaks of the disease more than once plunged him into a “borderline situation” between life and death. One of the most severe outbreaks hit him at the end of 1926. Then, having ended up in the hospital, he began one of his main studies, to which he gave the name “The Meaning of the Psychological Crisis.” The epigraph to the treatise was the biblical words: “The stone that the builders despised has become the cornerstone.” He called this stone practice and philosophy. The second period of Vygotsky's work (1927-1931) in his Moscow decade was instrumental psychology. He introduces the concept of a sign, which acts as a special psychological tool, the use of which, without changing anything in the substance of nature, serves as a powerful means of transforming the psyche from natural (biological) to cultural (historical). Thus, the didactic “stimulus-response” scheme accepted by both subjective and objective psychology was rejected. It was replaced by a triadic one - “stimulus - stimulus - reaction”, where a special stimulus - a sign - acts as an intermediary between an external object (stimulus) and the response of the body (mental reaction). This sign is a kind of instrument, when operated by an individual, from his primary natural mental processes (memory, attention, associated thinking) a special system of functions of the second sociocultural order, inherent only to man, arises. Vygotsky called them higher mental functions. The most significant achievements of Vygotsky and his group during this period were compiled into a lengthy manuscript, “The History of the Development of Higher Mental Functions.” Among the publications that preceded this generalizing manuscript, we note “Instrumental method in pedology” (1928), “The problem of the cultural development of the child” (1928), “Instrumental method in psychology” (1930), “Tool and sign in the development of the child” ( 1931). In all cases, the center was the problem of the development of the child’s psyche, interpreted from the same angle: the creation of new ones from its biopsychic natural “material” cultural forms. Vygotsky becomes one of the country's main pedologists. "Pedology of School Age" (1928), "Pedology of Adolescence" (1929), "Pedology of Adolescents" (1930-1931) are published. Vygotsky strives to recreate big picture development of the mental world. He moved from the study of signs as determinants of instrumental acts to the study of the evolution of the meanings of these signs, primarily speech ones, in the mental life of a child. The new research program became the main one in his third and last Moscow period (1931-1934). The results of its development were captured in the monograph “Thinking and Speech.” Having taken up global questions about the relationship between teaching and upbringing, Vygotsky gave it an innovative interpretation in the concept he introduced of the “zone of proximal development,” according to which only that learning is effective that “runs ahead” of development. IN last period creative work, the leitmotif of Vygotsky’s quest, linking into a common knot the various branches of his work (the history of the doctrine of affects, the study of the age-related dynamics of consciousness, the semantic subtext of a word), became the problem of the relationship between motivation and cognitive processes. Vygotsky worked at the limit of human capabilities. From dawn until late, his days were filled with countless lectures, clinical and laboratory work. He made many reports at various meetings and conferences, wrote theses, articles, and introductions to materials collected by his collaborators. When Vygotsky was taken to the hospital, he took his beloved Hamlet with him. In one of the entries about the Shakespearean tragedy, it was noted that Hamlet’s main state is readiness. "I'm ready" - that's what it says nurse, were last words Vygotsky. Although his early death did not allow Vygotsky to implement many promising programs, his ideas, which revealed the mechanisms and laws of the cultural development of the individual, the development of his mental functions (attention, speech, thinking, affects), outlined a fundamentally new approach to the fundamental issues of personality formation. Bibliography of works by L.S. Vygotsky has 191 works. Vygotsky's ideas have received wide resonance in all sciences that study humans, including linguistics, psychiatry, ethnography, and sociology. They defined a whole stage in the development of humanitarian knowledge in Russia and to this day retain their heuristic potential.

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Everyone knows Freud, Jurg - the majority, Carnegie and Maslow - many. Vygotsky Lev Semenovich is a name more likely for professionals. The rest have only heard the name and, at best, can associate it with defectology. That's all. But this was one of brightest stars domestic psychology. It was Vygotsky who created a unique direction that has nothing to do with the interpretation of becoming human personality any of the science gurus. In the 30s, everyone in the world of psychology and psychiatry knew this name - Lev Semenovich Vygotsky. The works of this man created a sensation.

Scientist, psychologist, teacher, philosopher

Time does not stand still. New discoveries are being made, science is moving forward, restoring in some ways and rediscovering in others what was lost. And if you conduct a street survey, it is unlikely that many respondents will be able to answer who Lev Semenovich Vygotsky is. Photos - old, black and white, blurry - will show us the young handsome man with a thoroughbred elongated face. However, Vygotsky never became old. Perhaps fortunately. His life flashed like a bright comet on the arch of Russian science, flashed and went out. The name was consigned to oblivion, the theory was declared erroneous and harmful. Meanwhile, even if we discard the originality and subtlety of Vygotsky’s general theory, the fact that his contribution to defectology, especially children’s, is invaluable is beyond doubt. He created a theory of working with children suffering from damage to the sensory organs and mental disorders.

Childhood

November 5, 1986 It was on this day that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky was born in Orsha, Mogilev province. The biography of this person did not contain any bright and surprising events. Wealthy Jews: father is a merchant and banker, mother is a teacher. The family moved to Gomel, and there a private teacher, Solomon Markovich Ashpiz, was involved in teaching the children, a rather remarkable figure in those parts. He did not practice traditional teaching methods, but Socratic dialogues, which were almost never used in educational institutions. Perhaps it was this experience that determined unusual approach Vygotsky himself to teaching practice. Cousin, David Isaakovich Vygodsky, translator and famous literary critic also influenced the formation of the worldview of the future scientist.

Student years

Vygotsky knew several languages: Hebrew, Ancient Greek, Latin, English and Esperanto. He studied at Moscow University, first at the medical faculty, then transferred to law. For some time he studied science in parallel at two faculties - law and history and philosophy, at the University. Shanyavsky. Later, Vygotsky Lev Semenovich decided that he was not interested in jurisprudence and focused entirely on his passion for history and philosophy. In 1916, he wrote a two-hundred-page work devoted to the analysis of Shakespeare's drama Hamlet. He later used this work as his thesis. This work was highly appreciated by specialists, since Vygotsky used a new, unexpected method of analysis, allowing one to look at literary work from a different angle. Lev Semenovich was only 19 years old at that time.

When Vygotsky was a student, he worked a lot on literary analysis, published works on the works of Lermontov and Bely.

First steps into science

After the revolution, having graduated from university, Vygotsky first left for Samara, then with his family looked for work in Kyiv and, in the end, returned to his native Gomel, where he lived until 1924. Not a psychotherapist, not a psychologist, but a teacher - this is precisely the profession that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky chose. Brief biography those years can fit into a few lines. He worked as a teacher in schools, technical schools, and courses. He first headed the theater department of education, and then the art department, wrote and published ( critical articles, reviews). For some time, Vygotsky even worked as an editor for a local publication.

In 1923, he was the leader of a group of students at the Moscow Pedological Institute. The experimental work of this group provided material for study and analysis that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky could use in his works. His activity as a serious scientist began precisely in those years. At the All-Russian Congress of Psychoneurologists in Petrograd, Vygotsky made a report based on the data obtained as a result of these experimental studies. The work of the young scientist created a sensation; for the first time words were heard about the emergence of a new direction in psychology.

Start of a career

It was with this speech that the career of the young scientist began. Vygotsky was invited to the Moscow Institute of Experimental Psychology. Outstanding psychologists of that time - Leontyev and Luria - already worked there. Vygotsky not only organically fit into this scientific team, but also became an ideological leader, as well as an initiator of research.

Soon, practically every practicing psychotherapist and defectologist knew who Lev Semenovich Vygotsky was. The main works of this outstanding scientist will be written later, but at that time he was a brilliant practitioner for everyone, personally engaged in pedagogical and therapeutic activities. Parents of sick children made incredible efforts to get an appointment with Vygotsky. And if you managed to become an “experimental sample” in the laboratory of anomalous childhood, it was considered an incredible success.

How did a teacher become a psychologist?

What is so unusual about the theory that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky proposed to the world? Psychology was not his core subject; he was, rather, a linguist, literary critic, cultural critic, and practicing teacher. Why exactly psychology? Where?

The answer lies in the theory itself. Vygotsky was the first to try to move away from reflexology; he was interested in the conscious formation of personality. Figuratively speaking, if a person is a house, then Vygotsky psychologists and psychiatrists were interested exclusively in the foundation. Of course it is necessary. Without this there will be no home. The foundation largely determines the building - shape, height, some design features. It can be improved, improved, strengthened and isolated. But this does not change the fact. The foundation is just the foundation. But what will be built on it is the result of the interaction of many factors.

Culture determines the psyche

If we continue the analogy, it was precisely these factors that determine the final appearance of the house that Lev Semenovich Vygotsky was interested in. The main works of the researcher: “Psychology of Art”, “Thinking and Speech”, “Psychology of Child Development”, “Pedagogical Psychology”. The scientist's range of interests clearly shaped his approach to psychological research. A person who is passionate about art and linguistics, a gifted teacher who loves and understands children - this is Lev Nikolaevich Vygotsky. He clearly saw that it was impossible to separate the psyche and the products it produced. Art and language are products of the activity of human consciousness. But they also determine the emerging consciousness. Children do not grow up in a vacuum, but in the context of a certain culture, in a linguistic environment that has a great influence on the psyche.

Educator and psychologist

Vygotsky understood children well. He was a wonderful teacher and sensitive loving father. His daughters said that they had a warm, trusting relationship not so much with their mother, a strict and reserved woman, but with their father. And they noted that main feature Vygotsky's attitude towards children was a feeling of deep, sincere respect. The family lived in a small apartment, and Lev Semenovich did not have a separate place to work. But he never pulled the children back, did not forbid them to play or invite friends to visit. After all, this was a violation of the equality accepted in the family. If guests come to their parents, children have the same right to invite friends. To ask not to make noise for a while, as an equal to an equal, is the maximum that Vygotsky Lev Semenovich allowed himself. Quotes from the memoirs of the scientist’s daughter, Gita Lvovna, will allow you to look “behind the scenes” of the life of an outstanding Russian psychologist.

Vygotsky's daughter about her father

The scientist’s daughter says that there was not much separate time dedicated to her. But her father took her with him to work, to college, and there the girl could freely look at any exhibits and preparations, and her father’s colleagues always explained to her what, why and why she needed it. So, for example, she saw a unique exhibit - Lenin’s brain, stored in a jar.

Her father did not read children's poems to her - he simply did not like them, he considered them tasteless and primitive. But Vygotsky had an excellent memory, and he could recite a lot of things by heart. classical works. As a result, the girl developed excellently in art and literature, without at all feeling her age inadequacy.

People around about Vygotsky

The daughter also notes that Vygotsky Lev Semenovich was extremely attentive to people. When he listened to the interlocutor, he concentrated on the conversation completely. During the dialogue with the student, it was impossible to immediately make out who was the student and who was the teacher. The same point is noted by other people who knew the scientist: janitors, servants, cleaners. They all said that Vygotsky was an exceptionally sincere and benevolent person. Moreover, this quality was not demonstrative, developed. No, it was just a character trait. Vygotsky was very easily embarrassed; he was extremely critical of himself, but at the same time he treated people with tolerance and understanding.

Working with children

Perhaps it was sincere kindness, the ability to deeply feel other people and treat their shortcomings with condescension that led Vygotsky to defectology. He always maintained that limited abilities in one thing are not a death sentence for a child. The flexible child's psyche actively seeks opportunities for successful socialization. Dumbness, deafness, blindness are just physical limitations. And the child’s consciousness instinctively tries to overcome them. Main Responsibility doctors and teachers - to help the child, push him and support him, as well as provide alternative opportunities for communication and information.

Vygotsky paid special attention to the problems of mentally retarded and deaf-blind children as the most problematic socialized ones, and achieved great success in organizing their training.

Psychology and culture

Vygotsky was keenly interested in the psychology of art. He believed that this particular industry is capable of exerting a critical influence on the individual, releasing affective emotions that cannot be realized in ordinary life. The scientist considered art to be the most important tool of socialization. Personal experiences form personal experience, but emotions caused by the influence of a work of art form external, public, social experience.

Vygotsky was also convinced that thinking and speech are interconnected. If developed thinking allows the rich to speak, complex language, that is, there is an inverse relationship. The development of speech will lead to a qualitative leap in intelligence.

He introduced a third element into the consciousness-behavior connection familiar to psychologists - culture.

Death of a Scientist

Alas, Lev Semenovich was not a very healthy person. At the age of 19, he contracted tuberculosis. For many years the disease was dormant. Vygotsky, although he was not healthy, still coped with his illness. But the disease progressed slowly. Perhaps the situation was aggravated by the persecution of the scientist that unfolded in the 1930s. Later, his family sadly joked that Lev Semenovich died on time. This saved him from arrest, interrogation and imprisonment, and his relatives from reprisals.

In May 1934, the scientist’s condition became so severe that he was prescribed bed rest, and within a month the body’s resources were completely exhausted. On June 11, 1934, the outstanding scientist and talented teacher Lev Semenovich Vygotsky died. 1896-1934 - only 38 years of life. Over the years, he has accomplished an incredible amount. His works were not immediately appreciated. But now many practices of working with abnormal children are based precisely on the methods developed by Vygotsky.

Name: Psychology.

The book contains all the main works of the outstanding Russian scientist, one of the most authoritative and famous psychologists, Lev Semenovich Vygotsky.
The structural construction of the book is made taking into account the program requirements for the courses “General Psychology” and “Developmental Psychology” of psychological faculties of universities.
For students, teachers and everyone interested in psychology.

Lev Semenovich Vygotsky (1896-1934) - outstanding Russian psychologist, author large number works that influence the development of psychology and pedagogy both in our country and abroad. Although the scientific life of L. S. Vygotsky was extremely short (for example, it was five times shorter than the scientific life of Jean Piaget), he was able to open up for psychology such prospects for further movement, the significance of which is not fully realized today. That is why in psychology there is an urgent need to analyze the legacy of this outstanding thinker, the desire not only to develop his teaching, but also to try to look at the world from his position. There are different authors. Some are overwhelming with their erudition, others provide a huge amount of empirical material. When reading the works of L. S. Vygotsky, the reader not only gets acquainted with new ideas, but every time he finds himself in that interesting and intellectually intense scientific world. who begins to experience it. tempt to search for solutions to complex problems, elevate to the level of a theorist and involve in dialogue with the author. It is no coincidence that L. S. Vygotsky is called the Mozart of psychology. In his works he was extremely sincere and tried to present as fully as possible all the grounds for the theoretical and experimental study of the questions posed. Each of his works is a complete independent work and can be read as a separate book. At the same time, all his works constitute an integral scientific line, united under common name cultural-historical theory of the origin of higher mental functions. The works of L. S. Vygotsky need to be read more than once or twice. Each reading reveals new, previously unidentified contexts and ideas. One of his students, D. B. El-konin, noted: “... when reading and re-reading the works of Lev Semenovich, I always get a feeling. that there is something I don’t fully understand about them.” In this confession of a person who had a lot of direct contact with L. S. Vygotsky, one can discern the idea. that all his works contain tension, unspokenness. ready to generate new content. One gets the impression that L. S. Vygotsky possessed some special gift of scientific analysis. In other words, he was not only a psychologist, theorist, practitioner, but also a methodologist. He could and did apply special techniques for posing and solving scientific and practical questions.

SECTION I. METHODOLOGY
HISTORICAL MEANING OF PSYCHOLOGICAL CRISIS
SECTION II. GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY
PSYCHOLOGY
About behavior and reactions
Three elements of reaction
Reaction and reflex
Hereditary and acquired reactions
Hereditary or unconditioned reflexes
Instincts
Origin of hereditary reactions
The doctrine of conditioned reflexes
Super reflexes
Complex forms of conditioned reflexes
The most important laws of higher nervous activity (behavior) of a person
Laws of inhibition and disinhibition
Psyche and reaction
Animal behavior and human behavior
Adding reactions into behavior
The principle of dominance in behavior
The constitution of man in connection with his behavior
Instincts
Origin of instincts
The relationship between instinct, reflex and reason
Instincts and biogenetic laws
Two extremes in views on instinct
Instinct as a mechanism of education
The concept of sublimation
Emotions
Concept of emotions
Biological nature of emotions
Psychological nature of emotions
Attention
Psychological nature of attention
Installation characteristics
Indoor and outdoor installation
Attention and distraction
Biological significance of the installation
Attention and habit
Physiological correlate of attention
The work of attention in general
Attention and apperception
Memory and imagination: consolidation and reproduction of reactions
The concept of plasticity of matter
Psychological nature of memory
Composition of the memory process
Memory types
Individual characteristics of memory
Limits of memory development
Interest and emotional coloring
Forgetting and erroneous remembering
Psychological functions of memory
Memory technique
Two types of playback
Reality of fantasy
Functions of the imagination
Thinking as a particularly complex form of behavior
The motor nature of thought processes
Conscious behavior and will
Psychology of language
Me and It
Analysis and synthesis
Temperament and character
Meaning of terms
Temperament
Body structure and character
Four types of temperament
The problem of vocation and psychotechnics
Endogenous and exogenous character traits
ABOUT PSYCHOLOGICAL SYSTEMS
CONSCIOUSNESS AS A PROBLEM OF BEHAVIORAL PSYCHOLOGY
PSYCHE, CONSCIOUSNESS, UNCONSCIOUS
THINKING AND SPEECH
Preface
Chapter one. Problem and research method
Chapter two. The problem of child speech and thinking in the teachings of J. Piaget
Chapter three. The problem of speech development in the teachings of V. Stern
Chapter Four. Genetic roots of thinking and speech
Chapter five. Experimental study of concept development
Chapter six. Development Research scientific concepts in childhood
Chapter seven. Thought and word
SECTION III. DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
HISTORY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF HIGHER MENTAL FUNCTIONS
Chapter one. The problem of the development of higher mental functions
Chapter two. Research method
Chapter three. Analysis of higher mental functions
Chapter Four. Structure of higher mental functions
Chapter five. Genesis of higher mental functions
Chapter six. Oral speech development
Chapter seven. Background to the development of written speech
Chapter eight. Development of arithmetic operations
Chapter Nine. Mastering attention
Chapter ten. Development of mnemonic and mnemotechnical functions
Chapter Eleven. Development of speech and thinking
Chapter twelve. Mastering your own behavior
Chapter thirteen. Upbringing higher forms behavior
Chapter fourteen. The problem of cultural age
Chapter fifteen. Conclusion. Further avenues of research. Development of the child’s personality and worldview
LECTURES ON PSYCHOLOGY
Lecture one. Perception and its development in childhood
Lecture two. Memory and its development in childhood
Lecture three. Thinking and its development in childhood
Lecture four. Emotions and their development in childhood
Lecture five. Imagination and its development in childhood
Lecture six. The problem of will and its development in childhood
TOOL AND SIGN IN CHILD DEVELOPMENT
Chapter one. The problem of practical intelligence in animal psychology and child psychology
Experiments on the practical intelligence of a child
The function of speech in the use of tools. The problem of practical and verbal intelligence
Speech and practical action in child behavior
Development of higher forms practical activities in a child
Path of development in the light of facts
Function of socialized and egocentric speech
Changing the function of speech in practical activities
Chapter two. The function of signs in the development of higher mental processes
Development of higher forms of perception
Division of the primary unity of sensorimotor functions
Rebuilding memory and attention
Arbitrary structure of higher mental functions
Chapter three. Sign operations and organization of mental processes
The problem of the sign in the formation of higher mental functions
Social genesis of higher mental functions
Basic rules for the development of higher mental functions
Chapter Four. Analysis of the child’s sign operations
Structure of a sign operation
Genetic analysis of sign surgery
Further development of sign operations
Chapter five. Methodology for studying higher mental functions
Conclusion. The Problem of Functional Systems
Use of tools in animals and humans
Word and action
ISSUES IN CHILD PSYCHOLOGY
Age problem
1. The problem of age periodization of child development
2. Structure and dynamics of age
3. The problem of age and the dynamics of development Infancy
1. Newborn period
2. Social situation of development in infancy
3. Genesis of the main neoplasm of infancy
5. Main neoplasm of infancy
6. Basic theories of infancy
Crisis of the first year of life
Early childhood
Crisis of three years
Seven Years Crisis
LITERATURE