A. Leontyev. The life and creative path of A.N. Leontiev A h Leontiev

(1903–1979)

Alexey Nikolaevich Leontiev is widely known as the recognized leader of Soviet psychology of the 40s–70s. His services to Russian science are great and varied. At Moscow University, he first created the department of psychology at the Faculty of Philosophy, and then the Faculty of Psychology, which he headed for many years, was one of the leaders of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the RSFSR and the USSR (in particular, its vice-president), wrote many scientific works, including several books, each of which has been translated into dozens foreign languages, and one of them, “Problems of psychic development,” was awarded the Lenin Prize 4 years after its publication. Almost all university psychologists of the middle and older generation are his direct students and collaborators.

Alexey Nikolaevich Leontyev was born in Moscow on February 5, 1903 in the family of an employee. After graduating from a real school, he entered the Faculty of Social Sciences of Moscow University, which, according to the official version, he graduated in 1924. However, as A.A. writes about it. Leontyev and D.A. Leontyev (the scientist’s son and grandson, also psychologists) in the comments to his biography, in fact, he did not manage to graduate from the university, he was expelled. There are two versions about the reasons. More interesting: as a student, in 1923 he filled out some kind of questionnaire and to the question “How do you feel about Soviet power? allegedly replied: “I consider it historically necessary.” This is what he told his son himself. The second version: Leontiev publicly asked everyone’s unloved lecturer on the history of philosophy how to treat the bourgeois philosopher Wallace, a biologizer and generally an anti-Marxist. The not very educated lecturer, afraid that he would be caught lacking erudition, spent a long time and convincingly explaining to the breathless audience the errors of this bourgeois philosopher, invented by the students on the eve of the lecture. This version also goes back to the oral memoirs of A.N. Leontyev.

At the university, Leontyev listened to lectures by a variety of scientists. Among them was the philosopher and psychologist G.G. Shpet, philologist P.S. Preobrazhensky, historians M.N. Pokrovsky and D.M. Petrushevsky, historian of socialism V.P. Volgin. In the Communist Auditorium of Moscow State University, N.I. taught a course on historical materialism for the first time. Bukharin. Leontyev also had a chance to listen to lectures by I.V. Stalin's national question, about which, however, half a century later he spoke more than restrainedly.

Initially, Leontyev was attracted to philosophy. There was a need to comprehend ideologically everything that was happening in the country before his eyes. He owes his turn to psychology to G.I. Chelpanov, on whose initiative he wrote the first scientific works- abstract “James' Doctrine of Ideomotor Acts” (it has survived) and an unsurvived work on Spencer.

Leontiev was lucky: he got a job at the Psychological Institute, where even after Chelpanov left, first-class scientists continued to work - N.A. Bernstein, M.A. Reisner, P.P. Blonsky, from the youth - A.R. Luria and, since 1924, L.S. Vygotsky.

There is a textbook version: young psychologists Luria and Leontiev came to Vygotsky, and Vygotsky’s school began. In fact, young psychologists Vygotsky and Leontiev came to Luria. At first, this circle was headed by Luria, a senior official at the institute, already a well-known psychologist, who by that time had several published books. Only then did a regrouping take place, and Vygotsky became the leader. Leontiev's very first publications were in line with Luria's research. These works, devoted to affects, conjugate motor techniques, etc., were carried out under the leadership of Luria and in collaboration with him. Only after several works of this kind do work in Vygotsky’s cultural-historical paradigm begin (Leontiev’s first publication on this topic dates back to 1929).

By the end of the 20s. The situation in science began to develop unfavorably. Leontiev lost his job, and in all the Moscow institutions with which he collaborated. Around the same time, the People's Commissariat of Health of Ukraine decided to organize a psychology sector at the Ukrainian Psychoneurological Institute, and later, in 1932, at the All-Ukrainian Psychoneurological Academy (it was located in Kharkov, which was then the capital of the republic). The post of head of the sector was offered to Luria, the post of head of the department of child and genetic psychology - to Leontyev. However, Luria soon returned to Moscow, and almost all the work was carried out by Leontyev. In Kharkov, he simultaneously headed the department of psychology at the Pedagogical Institute and the department of psychology at the Research Institute of Pedagogy. The famous Kharkov school arose, which some researchers consider an offshoot of Vygotsky’s school, while others consider it a relatively independent scientific entity.

In the spring of 1934, shortly before his death, Vygotsky took several steps to gather all his students - Moscow, Kharkov and others - in one laboratory at the All-Union Institute of Experimental Medicine (VIEM). Vygotsky himself was no longer able to head it (he died in the early summer of 1934), and Leontiev became the head of the laboratory, leaving Kharkov for this. But he didn't last long there. After a report to the Academic Council of this institute on the psychological study of speech (the text of the report was published in Volume I of his selected works, and today everyone can form an unbiased opinion about it), Leontyev was accused of all possible methodological sins (the matter came to the city party committee!), after which the laboratory was closed and Leontyev was fired. He was left without work again. He collaborated at a small research institute at VKIP - the Higher Communist Institute of Education, studied the psychology of art perception at GITIS and at VGIK, where he constantly communicated with S.M. Eisenstein (they knew each other before, from the late 20s, when Leontyev taught at VGIK, until the latter was declared a nest of idealists and Trotskyists with understandable consequences).

In July 1936, the famous decree of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks “On pedological perversions in the system of People’s Commissariat of Education” was issued. This decree meant the complete destruction of the nursery and educational psychology and “worthy” crowned a series of resolutions of the Central Committee of the early 30s, which reversed Soviet school, which canceled all innovations and experiments and made the former democratic school authoritarian and militarized. The ideologists of the democratic school, Vygotsky and Blonsky, especially suffered. Vygotsky, however, posthumously. And some of those who had previously declared themselves students of Vygotsky began to condemn him and their mistakes with no less enthusiasm.

However, neither Luria, nor Leontiev, nor other genuine disciples of Vygotsky, no matter how much pressure was put on them, said not a single bad word about Vygotsky, either publicly or in print, and in general they never changed their views. Oddly enough, they all nevertheless survived. But VKIP was closed, and Leontyev was again left without work.

Just at this time, Kornilov again became the director of the Institute of Psychology, and he hired Leontyev. Of course, there could be no talk of any methodological issues; Leontyev dealt with very specific topics: the perception of drawing (continuation of research from the Kharkov school) and the photosensitivity of the skin.

Leontiev's doctoral dissertation on the topic “Development of the psyche” was conceived by him as a grandiose project. Two voluminous volumes were written; the third volume, dedicated to the ontogenesis of the psyche, was partially prepared. But B.M. Teplov convinced Leontyev that what he had was enough for protection. In 1940, the dissertation in two volumes was defended. Its first volume was a theoretical and experimental study of the emergence of sensitivity, which was included practically unchanged in all editions of the book “Problems of Psychic Development.” The most interesting thing is that, as can be clearly seen today, this is a parapsychological study dedicated to learning to perceive light with your hands! Of course, Leontyev presented this research differently, putting on a materialistic gloss and talking about the degeneration of certain cells in the epidermis of the palms, but this quasi-physiological interpretation of the clearly proven facts of the development of the ability to perceive light signals with the fingers is no more convincing than the assumption of the extrasensory nature of this phenomenon.

The second volume was devoted to the development of the psyche in the animal world. “Problems of Mental Development” included relatively small fragments of this part of the dissertation, and the most interesting fragments that remained outside the scope of textbook texts were published posthumously in the collection scientific heritage Leontiev “Philosophy of Psychology” (1994).

Another work that dates back to approximately the same period (1938–1942) is his “Methodological Notebooks,” notes to himself, which in a fairly complete form were also included in the book “Philosophy of Psychology.” They are devoted to a variety of problems. It is characteristic that many of the things described here briefly were first made public decades later or were not published at all. For example, Leontiev’s first publication on personality problems dates back to 1968. In its completed form, his views on personality, which formed the last chapter of the book “Activity. Consciousness. Personality,” published in 1974. But almost everything that was included in this chapter was written down and substantiated in the “Methodological Notebooks” around 1940, that is, simultaneously with the publication of the first Western generalizing monographs on the problem of personality by K. Levin (1935), G. Allport (1937), G. Murray (1938). In our country, it was impossible to consider the problem of personality in this vein (through the concept of personal meaning). The concept of “personality” has been found in the works of a number of psychologists - Rubinstein, Ananyev and others - since the late 40s. in a single meaning - as denoting what is socially typical in a person (“the totality of social relations”), in contrast to character, which expresses what is individually unique. If we turn this formula around a little, taking into account the social context, the ideological background of this understanding is revealed: what is individually unique in a person is permissible only at the level of character, but at the level of personality, all Soviet people are obliged to be socially typical. It was impossible to talk seriously about personality back then. Therefore, Leontiev’s personality theory “stood” for three decades.

At the beginning of July 1941, like many other Moscow scientists, Leontyev joined the ranks of the people's militia. However, already in September the General Staff recalled him to carry out special defense assignments. At the very end of 1941, Moscow University, including the Institute of Psychology that was part of it at that time, was evacuated first to Ashgabat, then to Sverdlovsk. Near Sverdlovsk, in Kisegach and Kaurovsk, two experimental hospitals were established. The first was headed by Luria as a scientific director, the second by Leontyev. A.V. worked there. Zaporozhets, P.Ya. Galperin, S.Ya. Rubinstein and many others. It was a rehabilitation hospital that focused on restoring movement after injury. This material brilliantly demonstrated not only practical significance theory of activity, but also absolute adequacy and fruitfulness physiological theory N.A. Bernstein, who a few years later, at the end of the forties, was completely excommunicated from science, and it is unknown what would have happened to him if Leontyev had not taken him on as an employee in the psychology department. The practical result of the work of the experimental hospitals was that the time for the wounded to return to duty was reduced several times through the use of techniques developed on the basis of the activity approach and Bernstein's theory.

At the end of the war, already a doctor of science and head of a laboratory at the Institute of Psychology, Leontyev published a small book “Essay on the Development of the Psyche” based on his dissertation. Immediately, in 1948, a devastating review of it came out, and in the fall another “discussion” was organized. Many now widely known psychologists spoke in it, accusing the author of the book of idealism. But Leontyev’s comrades came to his defense, and the discussion had no consequences for him. Moreover, he was accepted into the party. Here is what his son and grandson, the most knowledgeable biographers, write about this: “He hardly did it for career reasons - rather, it was an act of self-preservation. But the fact remains a fact. We must not forget that Alexei Nikolaevich, like his teacher Vygotsky, was a convinced Marxist, although by no means an orthodox one... Membership in the party, of course, contributed to the fact that from the beginning of the 50s. Leontyev becomes academician-secretary of the Psychology Department of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, then academician-secretary of the entire academy, and later its vice-president..."

In 1955, the journal “Questions of Psychology” began to be published. During these years, Leontyev published a lot, and in 1959 the first edition of “Problems of Psychic Development” was published. Judging by the number of publications, the late 50s - early 60s are his most productive period.

Since 1954, the restoration of international relations between Soviet psychologists began. For the first time after a long break, a fairly representative delegation of Soviet psychologists took part in the next International Psychological Congress in Montreal. It included Leontyev, Teplov, Zaporozhets, Asratyan, Sokolov and Kostyuk. Since that time, Leontyev has devoted a lot of time and effort to international relations. The culmination of this activity was the International Psychological Congress in Moscow, organized by him in 1966, of which he was president.

At the end of his life, Leontyev many times turned to the history of Soviet (and partly world) psychological science. This was probably primarily due to personal motives. On the one hand, always faithful to the memory of his teacher Vygotsky, he sought to popularize his work and, at the same time, to identify the most promising ideas in it, as well as to show the continuity of the ideas of Vygotsky and his school. On the other hand, it is natural to strive for reflection on one’s own scientific activity. One way or another, Leontiev - partly in co-authorship with Luria - owns a number of historical and psychological publications that have completely independent theoretical value.

Today historical works are already written about him (for example, “Leontyev and modern psychology", 1983; “Traditions and prospects of the activity approach in psychology. School A.N. Leontyev", 1999). His works are to this day systematically republished abroad, and sometimes even here, despite the craze for pseudo-psychological manipulations. In a telegram sent upon Leontiev’s death, Jean Piaget called him “great.” And as you know, the wise Swiss did not waste words.

Alexey Nikolaevich Leontiev (1903-1979) - an outstanding Soviet psychologist, full member of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the RSFSR, Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences, professor.

Together with L. S. Vygotsky and A. R. Luria, he developed a cultural-historical theory, conducted a series experimental research, revealing the mechanism of formation of higher mental functions (voluntary attention, memory) as a process of “growing”, internalization of external forms of instrumentally mediated actions into internal mental processes. Experimental and theoretical works are devoted to problems of mental development, problems of engineering psychology, as well as the psychology of perception, thinking, etc.

He put forward a general psychological theory of activity - a new direction in psychological science. Based on the scheme of activity structure proposed by Leontiev, a wide range of mental functions (perception, thinking, memory, attention) were studied.

From the editors.

INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY

Lecture 1. Mental phenomena and life processes.

Lecture 2. History of the development of views on mental phenomena.

Lecture 3. The formation of psychology as an independent science.

Lecture 4. Crisis in psychology. Prerequisites for the emergence of objective psychology.

Lecture 5. Projects for creating a Marxist-oriented psychology: K.N. Kornilov and L.S. Vygotsky.

Lecture 6. The problem of the emergence of the psyche. Irritability and sensitivity.

Lecture 7. Objective activity as the basis of the psyche.

Lecture 8. Possibilities for studying the psyche of animals.

Lecture 9. Species-specific and individually acquired behavior. Stage of sensory psyche.

Lecture 10. Development of animal activity. Perceptual psyche and intelligence.

Lecture 11. Forms of mental reflection in humans.

Lecture 12. Features of the structure of human activity.

Lecture 13. Language and consciousness.

Lecture 14. Structure of consciousness: sensory tissue, meaning, personal meaning.

PERCEPTION

Lecture 15. General idea of ​​perception.

Lecture 16. Sensations and reality. Sense organs.

Lecture 17. Development and functioning of sensory systems.

Lecture 18. Image of the world.

Lecture 19. Perception as an activity.

Lecture 20. Tactile perception.

Lecture 21. Visual perception.

Lecture 22. Eye movements and visual perception.

Lecture 24. Auditory perception.

Lecture 25. Pitch hearing.

ATTENTION AND MEMORY

Lecture 26. Phenomenology of attention.

Lecture 27. Involuntary and voluntary attention.

Lecture 28. Mechanisms of attention.

Lecture 29. N.N. Lange’s theory of attention.

Lecture 30. Types and phenomena of memory.

Lecture 31. Answers to questions.

Lecture 32. Studies of voluntary memorization.

Lecture 33. Indirect memorization.

Lecture 34. Memory and activity.

THINKING AND SPEECH

Lecture 35. Types of thinking. Thinking and sensory cognition.

Lecture 36. Thinking and activity.

Lecture 37. The genesis of human thinking.

Lecture 38. Thinking and speech.

Lecture 39. Types and transformations of speech.

Lecture 40. Concept. Development of generalizations in ontogenesis.

Lecture 41. The problem of goal setting.

Lecture 42. Creative thinking.

MOTIVATION AND PERSONALITY

Lecture 43. Needs: biological aspect.

Lecture 44. Fundamental needs. Production needs.

Lecture 45. The problem of classification of needs. Motives.

Lecture 46. Motivation and goal setting.

Lecture 47. The meaning-forming function of motive.

Lecture 48. Emotional phenomena. Affects.

Lecture 49. Expression of emotions. Emotions, moods, feelings.

Lecture 50. The problem of will.

Lecture 51. Individual and personality.

Lecture 52. Some issues of personality formation.

Notes

O T R E D A C T O R O V

The book offered to the reader's attention contains unique material - previously unpublished text of oral lectures on general psychology, given by the largest Russian psychologist of the 20th century, Alexei Nikolaevich Leontiev (1903-1979). Lectures were given at the Faculty of Psychology of Moscow State University. M.V.Lomonosov in 1973-1975 They present all the main sections of the traditional course. general psychology for students of psychological faculties and departments: “Introduction to psychology” (lectures 1 - 14), “Psychology of cognitive processes” (lectures 15-42), “Personality psychology” (lectures 43-52).

In preparing the lectures for publication, we encountered a number of difficulties. Some lectures survived only in typewritten form with some omissions that could not always be filled in by context, others existed only in the form of tape recordings, and the quality of these recordings did not always allow the text to be fully identified. If the text of the lectures was preserved in two versions - tape-recorded and typewritten - these versions could be so different from each other that special work was required to harmonize both texts. We faced a difficult choice of text editing measures, oscillating between the need, on the one hand, to preserve the authentic author’s word as much as possible, and, on the other hand, to make the text of the lectures as clear and understandable as possible. Considering that this book valuable not only and not so much as a historical document, but as training manual For today's students (and not only students), we have clarified the content of statements (where this content is obvious to us), eliminated repetitions and some deviations to the side, and added links to some literary sources. Otherwise, the text was subject to minimal editing during publication, and the features of A. N. Leontiev’s oral speech were deliberately preserved. Necessary editorial comments on the text are given in angle brackets (< >). We have also given a short title for each lecture according to its main content to make it easier for the reader to navigate the book.

As a result, we managed to collect almost all of A.N. Leontiev’s lectures on the course of general psychology. They, in our opinion, are of interest to readers because they provide an opportunity to become familiar with the activity-based interpretation of the problems and patterns of general psychology, as they say, “first hand.” And the peculiar construction of oral speech, dialogues with the audience and other “rough edges” give the text special persuasiveness.

The main technical work on decoding the tape recordings was carried out by D.G. Polovnev and A.I. Chekalina, to whom the editors express their gratitude. The Open Society Institute deserves special thanks, without whose financial support the preparation of the publication would have taken many years.

D.A. Leontiev,

Alexey Nikolaevich Leontyev was born in Moscow on February 5, 1903, his parents were ordinary employees. Naturally, they wanted to give Alexey good education. Therefore, it is not surprising that Alexei Leontiev’s scientific activity dates back to his student years. In 1924 he graduated from the Faculty of Social Sciences of Moscow University, where G.I. Chelpanov read general course psychology. - Chelpanov headed the Institute of Psychology at Moscow State University in those years, leading a group of students for research work. It was within the walls of this university that Alexei Nikolaevich wrote his first scientific works - the abstract “James' Doctrine of Ideomotor Acts” and a work on Spencer. After graduating from the university, Alexey Nikolaevich became a graduate student at the Institute of Psychology. Here in 1924 A.N. met. Leontyev with L.S. Vygotsky and A.R. Luria. And soon their joint work began, as these three people with outstanding abilities quickly found common language, and their union foreshadowed many useful things. But, unfortunately, this activity was interrupted. Lev Semenovich Vygotsky died. For so much short term collaboration The results of their activities were still impressive. The article “The Nature of Human Conflict” published by Leontiev and Luria was a stunning success, because It was there that the technique of “conjugate motor reactions” was presented and the idea of ​​mastering affect through speech output was born. Next, Leontyev personally developed the idea and embodied it in an article entitled “Experience structural analysis chain associative series." This article, published in the Russian-German medical journal, is based on the fact that associative reactions are determined by the semantic integrity that lies “behind” the associative series. But this particular development did not receive worthy recognition. He met his wife in 1929, when he turned 26 years old. After dating for a short time, they got married. His wife never interfered scientific activity Alexei Leontyev, on the contrary, helped and supported him in the most difficult moments. Leontyev's interests lay in the most various areas psychology: from psychology creative activity to the experimental human perception of objectivity. And to the need to search for a completely new approach to the subject and content of psychophysiological research, now developing from common system psychological knowledge, Alexey Nikolaevich Leontyev applied many times. At the end of 1925, his famous “cultural-historical concept” was born, which was based on the well-known formula of L.S. Vygotsky S-X-R, where S is incentive, motive; X - means; R is the result of the activity. Alexey Leontiev began to develop the ideas of this work, but at the Institute of Psychology, which at that time was busy with completely different issues, it was not possible to implement this undertaking. It is for this reason that A.N. Leontyev and A.R. Luria moved to the Academy of Communist Education, also working simultaneously at VGIK, at GITIS, at the clinic of G. I Rossolimo and at the Institute of Defectology. Around 1930, the Ukrainian Health Committee decided to organize a psychology sector at the Ukrainian Psychoneurological Institute, where A. R. Luria temporarily took over as head, and A.N. Leontyev - head of the department of child and genetic psychology. By this time, Alexey Nikolaevich had already left VGIK and AKV, and Vygotsky was forced to return to Moscow. Consequently, Leontiev, who later became the leader, took over all the work Ukrainian group psychologists. Developing more and more new projects, Alexey Leontiev published the book “Activity. Consciousness. Personality”, where he defends his point of view that a person not only adjusts his activities to the external conditions of society, but these same conditions of society carry within themselves the motives and goals of his activities. In parallel, A.N. Leontyev begins work on the problem of mental development, namely, the study of extrapolation reflexes in animals. In 1936, Alexey Nikolaevich returned to the Institute of Psychology, where he worked before leaving for the psychology department of Moscow State University. At the institute he studies the issue of skin photosensitivity. At the same time, A. N. Leontyev teaches at VGIK and GITIS. He collaborates with SM Eisenstein and conducts experimental studies of the perception of films. In the pre-war years, he became the head of the psychology department at the Leningrad State Pedagogical Institute. N.K. Krupskaya. In the second half of the 1930s. Leontiev developed the following problems: a) phylogenetic development of the psyche, and in particular the genesis of sensitivity. b) “functional development” of the psyche, that is, the problem of the formation and functioning of activity, c) the problem of consciousness These problems were well covered in the doctoral dissertation of A. N. Leontiev “Development of the psyche,” defended at the Leningrad State Pedagogical Institute named after. A. I. Herzen in 1940. Only part of the results of his research were included in the dissertation. But this work of Leontiev was not fully preserved. The dissertation contained articles devoted, in particular, to memory, perception, emotions, will and volition. There is also a chapter called “Activity-action-operation”, where the basic conceptual system of activity psychological theory is given. According to Leontyev, activity is inseparable from the object of its need, and in order to master this object it is necessary to focus on such of its properties that in themselves are vitally indifferent, but are closely related to other vital properties of objects, i.e. “signal” about the presence or absence of the latter. Thus, due to the fact that the animal’s activity acquires an objective character, a form of reflection specific to the psyche arises in rudimentary form - the reflection of an object that has properties that are vitally significant and properties that signal them. Sensitivity A.N. Leontyev defines, respectively, as irritability in relation to to these kinds of influences that are correlated by the body with other influences, i.e. which orient a living being in the objective content of its activity, performing a signaling function. Leontyev undertakes research in order to test the hypothesis he put forward. First in Kharkov, and then in Moscow, using the experimental methodology he developed, he reproduces in artificially created conditions the process of transforming imperceptible stimuli into perceptible ones (the process of a person developing a sensation of color on the skin of his hand). Thus, A.N. Leontiev, for the first time in the history of world psychology, made an attempt to determine the objective criterion of the elementary psyche, taking into account the sources of its origin in the process of interaction of a living being with environment. Summing up the data accumulated in the field of zoopsychology and based on his own achievements, Leontyev developed new concept mental development animals as the development of a mental reflection of reality, caused by changes in the conditions of existence and the nature of the process of animal activity at different stages of phylogenesis: the stages of sensory, perceptual and intellectual psyche. This area of ​​work by A.N. Leontyev was directly related to the development of the issue of activity and the problem of consciousness. While developing the problem of personality, Alexey Leontyev adhered to two directions of his activity. He worked on problems of the psychology of art. In his opinion, there is nothing where a person could realize himself as holistically and comprehensively as in art. Unfortunately, today it is almost impossible to find his works on the psychology of art, although during his lifetime Alexey Nikolaevich worked a lot on this topic. In 1966, Alexey Nikolaevich Leontiev finally moved to the Faculty of Psychology at Moscow University; from that time until the last day of his life, Leontiev was the permanent dean and head of the department of general psychology. Alexey Nikolaevich left our world on January 21, 1979; It is impossible to overestimate his scientific contribution, because it was he who managed to force many to reconsider their views and approach the subject and content of psychophysiological research from a completely different angle.

LEONTIEV Alexey Nikolaevich

(1903 1979) - Russian psychologist, philosopher and teacher. Specialist in the field of general and experimental psychology, engineering and cognitive psychology, problems of methodology and philosophy of psychology. Doctor of Psychology Sciences (1940), Professor (1941). D. member APN RSFSR (1950), APN USSR (1968), in the 1950s. was academic secretary and vice-president of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the RSFSR. Medal winner K.D. Ushinsky (1953), Lenin Prize (1963), Lomonosov Prize, 1st degree (1976), honorable mention. Dr. foreign high fur boots, including the Sorbonne. Graduated from the Faculty of Social Sciences of Moscow State University (1924) and began his professional activity at the Moscow Institute of Psychology and other Moscow scientific institutions(1924-1930). In 1930 he moved to Kharkov, where he headed the sector of the All-Ukrainian Psychoneurological Academy (until 1932 - the Ukrainian Psychoneurological Institute) and the department of the Kharkov Pedagogical Institute (1930-1935). Returning to Moscow in 1936, he worked at the Moscow Institute of Psychology and at the same time at the Leningrad State Pedagogical Institute named after. N.K. Krupskaya. In 1940 he defended his doctorate. diss: Genesis of sensitivity and main stages of development of the psyche, in 1941 received the title of professor. In 1942-43 L. is the scientific director of the evacuation hospital in the Urals. Since 1943 - head. laboratory, then the department of child psychology at the Institute of Psychology, and since 1949 - head. Department of Psychology, Moscow State University. From 1966 to 1979 - Dean of the Faculty of Psychology of Moscow State University and Head. Department of General Psychology. Leitmotif scientific creativity L. throughout his life was the development of philosophical methodological foundations Aniy of psychological science. L.'s professional development as a scientist occurred in the 1920s. under the influence of his direct teacher L.S. Vygotsky, who literally blew up traditional psychology with his methodological, theoretical and experimental work who laid the foundations of a new psychology. With his works of the late 20s. L. also contributed to the development of the cultural-historical approach to the formation of the human psyche created by Vygotsky. However, already in the early 1930s. L., without breaking with the cultural-historical paradigm, begins to discuss with Vygotsky about the ways of its further development. If for Vygotsky the main subject of study was consciousness, then L. considered the analysis of human practice and life activity that forms consciousness to be more important. In L.'s works of the 30s, published only posthumously, he sought to establish the idea of ​​the priority role of practice in the formation of the psyche and to understand the patterns of this formation in phylogeny and ontogenesis. His doc. dis. was devoted to the evolution of the psyche in the animal world - from elementary irritability in protozoa to human consciousness. L. contrasts the Cartesian opposition between external and internal, which was dominant in old psychology, with the thesis about the unity of the structure of external and internal processes, introducing the categorical pair process-image. L. develops the category of activity as a real (in the Hegelian sense) relationship of a person to the world, which acts as the basis of this unity. This relationship is not strictly individual, but is mediated by relationships with other people and socioculturally developed forms of practice. The very structure of activity is sociogenic in nature. The idea that the formation of mental processes and functions occurs in activity and through activity served as the basis for numerous experimental studies of the development and formation of mental functions in ontogenesis, carried out by L. and his colleagues in the 1930-60s. These studies laid the foundation for a number of innovative psychological and pedagogical concepts of developmental training and education, which have become widespread in the last decade. pedagogical practice. The period of the late 30s and early 40s also saw the development of well-known L. ideas about the structure and units of analysis of activity and consciousness. According to these ideas, the structure of activity distinguishes three psychological level: the activity itself (an act of activity), distinguished by the criterion of its motive, actions identified by the criterion of focus on achieving conscious goals, and operations related to the conditions for carrying out the activity. For the analysis of consciousness, the dichotomy introduced by L. turned out to be fundamentally important - personal meaning, the first pole of which characterizes the impersonal, universal, socioculturally acquired content of consciousness, and the second - its bias, subjectivity, due to the unique individual experience and structure of motivation. In the second half of the 1950-60s. L. formulates a thesis about the systemic structure of the psyche and, following Vygotsky, develops the principle on a new conceptual basis historical development mental functions. Practical and internal mental activity are not only united, but can move from one form to another. Essentially we're talking about about a single activity that can move from an external, expanded form to an internal, collapsed one (interiorization) and vice versa (exteriorization), and can simultaneously include the actual mental and external (extracerebral) components. In 1959, the first edition of L.'s book Problems of Mental Development was published, summarizing his work of the 1930-50s, for which he was awarded the Lenin Prize. In the 1960-70s. L. continues to develop the activity approach or the general psychological theory of activity. He uses the apparatus of activity theory to analyze perception, thinking, mental reflection in the broad sense of the word. Considering them as active processes of an activity nature has made it possible to advance new level their understanding. In particular, L. put forward and supported by empirical data the hypothesis of assimilation, which states that in order to construct sensory images, counter activity of the organs of perception is necessary. At the end of the 1960s. L. addresses the problem of personality, considering it within the framework of a single system with activity and consciousness. In 1975, the book L. Activities was published. Consciousness. The personality in which he, summing up his works of the 60-70s, sets out the philosophical, methodological foundations of psychology, strives to psychologically comprehend the categories that are most important for building an integral system of psychology as a specific science about the generation, functioning and structure of mental reflection reality that mediates the lives of individuals. The category of activity is introduced by L. in this book as a way to overcome the postulate of the immediacy of the influence of external stimuli on the individual psyche, which found its most complete expression in the behaviorist formula stimulus-response. Activity acts as a molar, non-additive unit of life of a bodily, material subject. The key feature of activity is its objectivity, in the understanding of which L. is based on the ideas of Hegel and the early Marx. Consciousness is what mediates and regulates the activity of the subject. It is multidimensional. In its structure, three main components are distinguished: sensory tissue, which serves as material for constructing a subjective image of the world, meaning, connecting individual consciousness with social experience or social memory, and personal meaning, connecting consciousness with real life subject. The basis for the analysis of personality is also activity, or rather a system of activities that carry out various relationships of the subject with the world. Their hierarchy, or rather the hierarchy of motives or meanings, sets the structure of a person’s personality. In the 1970s L. again turns to the problems of perception and mental reflection, but in a different way. The key concept for him becomes the concept of the image of the world, behind which stands, first of all, the idea of ​​​​the continuity of the perceived picture of reality and the images of individual objects. It is impossible to perceive a separate object without perceiving it in the holistic context of the image of the world. This context sets the perceptual hypotheses that guide the process of perception and recognition. This line of work has not yet received any completion. L. created an extensive scientific school in psychology, his works had a noticeable influence on philosophers, teachers, cultural scientists and representatives of others humanities. In 1986 it was created International Society research in activity theory. L. is also the author of the books: Development of memory, M., 1931; Restoration of movement, co-author, M., 1945; Selected psychological works, in 2 vols., M., 1983; Philosophy of Psychology, M., 1994. A.A. Leontiev, D.A. Leontyev

Alexey Nikolaevich Leontiev (February 5 (18), 1903, Moscow - January 21, 1979, ibid.) - Soviet psychologist, philosopher, teacher and organizer of science.

Worked on problems of general psychology ( evolutionary development psyche; memory, attention, personality, etc.) and methodology psychological research. Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences (1940), full member Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the RSFSR (1950), first dean of the Faculty of Psychology at Moscow State University.

Laureate of the K. D. Ushinsky Medal (1953), Lenin Prize (1963), Lomonosov Prize of the 1st degree (1976), honorary doctor of the Universities of Paris and Budapest. Honorary member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.

Born into a family of philistines, the Leontyevs. After graduating from the First Real School (more precisely, the “unified labor school”), he entered the Faculty of Social Sciences of Moscow State University, which he graduated in 1923 [source not specified 1286 days] or 1924. Among his teachers at that time: G. I. Chelpanov and G. G. Shpet. After graduating from the university, he was left at the Psychological Institute to prepare for professorship; at this time, the founder of the Institute, G.I. Chelpanov, was removed from his post as director. According to the memoirs of his father cited by A. A. Leontyev, Chelpanov himself, who accepted Leontyev into the “graduate school,” advised him to stay there after this shift. Among Leontiev’s colleagues at the Institute during this period: N.A. Bernstein, A.R. Luria, with whom several early studies were co-authored, P.P. Blonsky, and later L.S. Vygotsky.

Since 1925, A. N. Leontiev worked under the leadership of Vygotsky on cultural-historical theory, more specifically, on the problems cultural development memory. The book reflecting these studies, “The Development of Memory: An Experimental Study of Higher Psychological Functions,” was published in 1931.

Since the end of 1931 - head of the department in the psychology sector of the Ukrainian Psychoneurological Academy (until 1932 - Ukrainian Psychoneurological Institute) in Kharkov.

1933-1938 - head of the department at the Kharkov Pedagogical Institute.

Since 1941 - as an employee of the Institute of Psychology - professor at Moscow State University (since December 1941 in evacuation in Ashgabat).

1943 - headed the scientific department at the rehabilitation hospital (Kourovka village, Sverdlovsk region), from the end of 1943 - in Moscow.

Since 1951 - Head of the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy, Moscow State University.

1966 - founded the Faculty of Psychology at Moscow State University and directed it for more than 12 years.

In 1976, a laboratory for the psychology of perception was opened, which is still in operation today.

Books (12)

Motion restoration

Psychophysiological study of restoration of hand functions after injury.

Classic work by A.N. Leontyev and A.V. Zaporozhets, which summarizes the results of research on the restoration of motor functions after injuries.

The study was conducted on the material of the clinical work of a team of psychologists (A.N. Leontyev, Zaporozhets, Galperin, Luria, M.S. Lebedinsky, Merlin, Gellerstein, S. Ya. Rubinshtein, Ginevskaya, etc.) during the Great Patriotic War. Since its first publication in 1945 in Russian, the book has not been reprinted. Translated to English language and published in 1960 as Rehabilitation of Hand Function. London: Pergamon Press, 1960.

Activity. Consciousness. Personality

"In its composition, the book is divided into three parts. The first of them is formed by chapters I and II, devoted to the analysis of the concept of reflection and the general contribution that Marxism makes to scientific psychology. These chapters serve as an introduction to its central part, which examines the problems of activity, consciousness and personality.
The last part of the book occupies a very special place: it is not a continuation of the previous chapters, but represents one of the author’s early works on the psychology of consciousness."

Selected psychological works. Volume 1

The volume contains works grouped into three thematic sections. The first section includes works different years, reflecting the formation and development of the methodological foundations of modern Soviet psychology.

The second section includes two major works that reveal the provisions on the emergence of mental reflection and its development in the process of phylogenesis before the emergence of human consciousness. The third section contains works devoted to the study of mental development in the process of ontogenesis.

Selected psychological works. Volume 2

The second volume of works is divided into two thematic sections. To the "Operation" section various forms mental reflection" included works devoted to the experimental study of various mental processes and human functions.

Lectures on general psychology

Processed transcripts of a course of lectures on general psychology given by A.N. Leontiev in 1973-75. at the Faculty of Psychology of Moscow State University. Published for the first time based on tape recordings and typewritten transcripts from the archive of A.N. Leontyev. Psychologists, students of psychological specialties.

Mental development problems

The versatility and complexity of the problem of mental development requires that its development be carried out in many directions, in different plans and various methods. The experimental and theoretical works published in this book express only one of the attempts to approach its solution.

The book contains three sections that cover the issues of the genesis and nature of sensations, the biological evolution of the psyche and its historical development, and the theory of the development of the child’s psyche.

Psychological issues of consciousness of teaching

In the article " Psychological issues consciousness of teaching”, published in 1947 and then included in a revised form in the book “Activity. Consciousness. Personality", A.N. Leontyev put forward a number of provisions that reveal their heuristic potential in a special way in the current, changed cultural and historical situation; they turn with their new, previously hidden faces.

Among these provisions is proof that the problem of the consciousness of teaching should be considered primarily as a problem of the meaning that the knowledge acquired by him acquires for a person. For learning to be carried out consciously, it must have “vital meaning” for the student.

Years of life: 1903 -1979

Homeland: Moscow (Russian Empire)

Leontyev Alexey Nikolaevich - psychologist, full member of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the RSFSR (1950), Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences (in psychology) (1940), professor (1932).

In 1924 he graduated from the Faculty of Social Sciences of Moscow University. In 1924−31. conducted scientific and teaching work in Moscow (Institute of Psychology, Academy of Communist Education named after N.K. Krupskaya), in 1931-1935. - in Kharkov (Ukrainian Psychoneurological Academy, Pedagogical Institute).

In 1936-1956. - at the Institute of Psychology of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences. During the Great Patriotic War, he was the head of an experimental hospital for the restoration of movements near Sverdlovsk. Since 1941 - professor at Moscow State University, since 1950 - head. Department of Psychology, since 1966 - Dean of the Faculty of Psychology at Moscow State University. Academician-secretary of the psychology department (1950−1957) and vice-president (1959−1961) of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the RSFSR.

Leontyev's professional development as a scientist occurred in the 1920s. under the influence of his direct teacher L. S. Vygotsky, who literally blew up traditional psychology with his methodological, theoretical and experimental works, which laid the foundations of a new psychology. With his works of the late 20s. Leontiev also contributed to the development of the cultural-historical approach to the formation of the human psyche created by Vygotsky.

However, already in the early 1930s. Leontiev, without breaking with the cultural-historical paradigm, begins to discuss with Vygotsky about the ways of its further development. If for Vygotsky the main subject of study was consciousness, then for Leontiev the analysis of human practice and life activity that forms consciousness seemed more important. In Leontiev’s works of the 1930s, published only posthumously, he sought to establish the idea of ​​the priority role of practice in the formation of the psyche and to understand the patterns of this formation in phylo- and ontogenesis. His doctoral dissertation was devoted to the evolution of the psyche in the animal world - from elementary irritability in protozoa to human consciousness. Leontyev contrasts the Cartesian opposition “external - internal” that dominated in old psychology with the thesis about the unity of the structure of external and internal processes, introducing the categorical pair “process-image”. Leontyev develops the category of activity as a real (in the Hegelian sense) relationship of a person to the world, which acts as the basis of this unity. This relationship is not strictly individual, but is mediated by relationships with other people and socioculturally developed forms of practice.

5 pages, 2401 words

Vygotsky studies · Leontiev, A.N. The problem of activity in the history of Soviet psychology, Questions of Psychology, 1986, ... Psychopathology and politics: the formation of ideas and practices of mental hygiene in Russia · Savenko, Yu. ... were prohibited and were absorbed into psychology. The years of the Great Terror (1937-38... entitled The Historical Meaning of the Psychological Crisis, which became a manifesto of cultural-historical psychology 1927 · April...

The very structure of activity is sociogenic in nature. The idea that the formation of mental processes and functions occurs in activity and through activity served as the basis for numerous experimental studies of the development and formation of mental functions in ontogenesis, carried out by Leontiev and his colleagues in the 1930−60s. These studies laid the foundation for a number of innovative psychological and pedagogical concepts of developmental training and education, which have become widespread in pedagogical practice in the last decade.

The period of the late 30s - early 40s also included the development of Leontiev’s well-known ideas about the structure and units of analysis of activity and consciousness. According to these ideas, three psychological levels are distinguished in the structure of activity: the activity itself (an act of activity), distinguished by the criterion of its motive, actions identified by the criterion of focus on achieving conscious goals, and operations related to the conditions for carrying out the activity. The dichotomy “meaning - personal meaning” introduced by Leontiev turned out to be fundamentally important, the first pole of which characterizes the “impersonal”, universal, socio-culturally acquired content of consciousness, and the second - its bias, subjectivity, determined by the unique individual experience and structure of motivation.

12 pages, 5606 words

The essence of the activity approach was the work of Leontiev Activity. Consciousness. Personality. In his theory of activity, Leontiev put forward the following scientific ideas: 1. Activity is a process that carries out the life of a subject... scales personal growth and goals in life decrease. Conclusion The analysis of activity and individual consciousness, of course, proceeds from the existence of a real bodily subject. However...

In the second half of the 1950−60s. Leontiev formulates a thesis about the systemic structure of the psyche and, following Vygotsky, develops the principle of mental functions on a new conceptual basis. Practical and “internal” mental activity are not only united, but can move from one form to another. In essence, we are talking about a single activity that can move from an external, expanded form to an internal, collapsed one (interiorization) and vice versa (exteriorization), and can simultaneously include the actual mental and external (extracerebral) components.

In 1959, the first edition of Leontiev’s book “Problems of Psychic Development” was published, summarizing his works of the 1930s–50s, for which he was awarded the Lenin Prize.

In the 1960−70s. Leontiev continues to develop the “activity approach” or the “general psychological theory of activity.” He uses the apparatus of activity theory for thinking and mental reflection in the broad sense of the word. Considering them as active processes of an activity nature has allowed us to advance to a new level of understanding. In particular, Leontiev put forward and supported by empirical data the hypothesis of assimilation, which states that in order to construct sensory images, counter activity of the organs of perception is necessary.

At the end of the 1960s. Leontyev addresses the problem of personality, considering it within the framework of a single system with activity and consciousness.

6 pages, 2758 words

Rituals contribute to the formation of a certain religiosity. Religious ideas are the reproduction in the consciousness of the subject of idealized and hypostatized objects. These objects evoke different feelings - awe... etc. Psychological factors of personality are determined by the joint activities of people and their dependence on each other in this activity. The individual needs help...

In 1975, Leontyev’s book “Activity. Consciousness. Personality", in which he, summing up his works of the 60-70s, sets out the philosophical and methodological foundations of psychology, strives to "psychologically comprehend the categories that are most important for building an integral system of psychology as a specific science about the generation, functioning and structure of mental reflection reality that mediates the lives of individuals." The category of activity is introduced by Leontyev in this book as a way to overcome the “postulate of immediacy” of the impact of external stimuli on the individual psyche, which found its most complete expression in the behaviorist formula “stimulus-response”. Activity acts as “a molar, non-additive unit of life of a bodily, material subject.” The key feature of activity is its objectivity, in the understanding of which Leontyev relies on the ideas of Hegel and the early Marx. Consciousness is what mediates and regulates the activity of the subject. It is multidimensional. In its structure, three main components are distinguished: sensory tissue, which serves as material for constructing a subjective image of the world, meaning, connecting individual consciousness with social experience or social memory, and personal meaning, connecting consciousness with the real life of the subject.

The basis for activity, or rather a system of activities that carry out various relationships of the subject with the world. Their hierarchy, or rather the hierarchy of motives or meanings, sets the structure of a person’s personality. In the 1970s Leontiev again addresses the problems of perception and mental reflection, but in a different way. The key concept for him becomes the concept of the image of the world, behind which stands, first of all, the idea of ​​​​the continuity of the perceived picture of reality and the images of individual objects. It is impossible to perceive a separate object without perceiving it in the holistic context of the image of the world. This context sets the perceptual hypotheses that guide the process of perception and recognition. This line of work has not yet received any completion. Leontiev created an extensive scientific school in psychology, his works had a significant influence on philosophers, educators, cultural scientists and representatives of other humanities.

8 pages, 3706 words

Activities of the subject. A.N. Leontyev notes that the concept of subjectivity of an image includes the concept of the subject’s partiality... - P. 107-113. Leontyev A. N. Activity. Consciousness. Personality. M., 1975. ... subject-activity-object”, where the subject appears as a “unit” of a “real individual”, activity as a “unit” of the life process, and an object as a “unit” of the world. Thus the activity...

____________________