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Re: [xmca] Question

Mike, your point about controlling ourselves from the outside reminds me of an interesting experiment Leontiev talked about, which I found rewarding to look back at and try to describe. I like it because it has such a nice visual aspect, jumping off a seven-story tower. Do you see this as an example of the idea of acquiring the ability to control oneself from the outside?
AN Leontiev in an informal article entitled "Will" (in JREEP July Aug 2005) tells of an interesting experiment he was involved in in the 1930's at an amusement park where people jumped off a high platform and parachuted down to the ground. The ride was safe, but sometimes people would get the equipment strapped on and would get to the jump platform and would choose not to jump, which was called a refusal. However, these refusals were rare. Leontiev and his team investigated these occasional refusals - why were they rare? What caused them? Apparently the research was at the behest of the military.
Two motives were in conflict in this situation, a desire to jump, and motive stemming from a fear of stepping into an abyss. They created a plank that was sensitive to weight shifts to better understand the person's movements and discovered that while the person was making their initial tentative move forward over the ledge, there was a momentary "backward push," an unconscious micro-movement away from the initial forward motion. It was at this point that the person either would then make the step forward, pushing themselves off, and enter the jump, or step back, and refuse. The conflict of motives could be detected as different aspects of the motor system going in opposite directions (which I would like to understand better - this seems important as part of studying conflicts of motives, how it is expressed in our bodies).
Naturally, of course, the experimenters tinkered with how the person was strapped in and instructed, to see what they could change regarding the rate of refusals.
The usual and normally successful procedure employed on the ride was to strap people in, tell them to look at their parachute (in other words, at themselves, and not down) and tell them "you do not have to jump, just step forward." People would usually tentatively step a little forward, do the "backward push" thing, and then go through with the jump.
A way the experimenters modified the usual procedures for sending people on their jumps predictably increased the number of refusals. They fumbled with the equipment while strapping them into it, giving the impression there was some difficulty, they pointed to something on the ground 7 stories below pointing out how far down it was, whereupon the person would naturally look, and they complicated the final instructions with a remark that "it is not dangerous because the parachute is balanced." Refusals increased.
They also devised a mechanism that got nearly anyone who had initially refused to wind up jumping anyway. This mechanism, a translucent tissue, was stretched out in such a way as to obscure most of the field of vision over the abyss. It obscured objects, depth perception, etc. The parachutists were told the tissue of course would not stop their fall. Now, almost everyone who had originally refused went through with it. The tissue itself was attached to an apparatus on a hinge, so it fell perpendicular to the tower, and could therefore be reused (and was not actually broken by the parachutist).
The external device of the tissue seemed to demonstrate that with the visual field over the abyss covered up, the motive to avoid stepping into the void was almost completely overridden by the motive to jump. 

- Steve




On Aug 1, 2010, at 5:13 PM, mike cole wrote:


Could it have to do with the idea of acquiring the ability to control
oneself from the outside, Steve?
mike

2010/7/31 Steve Gabosch <stevegabosch@me.com>
Monica, what suggests to you that will has an early-age-based entanglement 
factor that is different from that of other functions?
On motives, we get some of Vygotsky's thoughts also in that chapter on will - such as "in voluntary selection [decision-making], it is not stimuli, but 
motives that are in conflict ..."  V4 p 215.

- Steve


On Jul 31, 2010, at 1:52 PM, Monica Hansen wrote:
Your last question, Steve is what I have been playing with for a while and
one of the reasons I asked the question about the differentiation of the terms motivation and volition. Is "will" a high mental process? I have 
been
thinking about the possibility of part of "will" as being a disposition of an intermediate process, maybe a neurobiological process, a somatic state 
(Damasio) that cannot be disentangled from our conscious subjective
experience of situations associated with it in early development. I am 
interested to see what other ideas and connections come from this
discussion.

-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu ] On 
Behalf Of Steve Gabosch
Sent: Friday, July 30, 2010 1:29 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: Re: [xmca] Question
Elina, you ask many intriguing and very good questions! The symposium 
you are developing will be very interesting.  A side point in your
discussion here on the nature of self-consciousness or reflection
struck me - you suggest that will may not be a higher psychological
function. I happen to have some Vygotsky quotes handy to think about 
that with.
In studying Vol 4 The History of the Development of the Higher Mental Functions - a difficult but rewarding book - I have been struck by how much emphasis Vygotsky puts on will, self-mastery, self-control as an essential aspect of the development of all the higher mental functions. 

Some of this is new to me and quite fascinating.  So here is a quick
synopsis of what I am getting from this so far. See what you think. 

According the Vygotsky, the higher mental functions themselves (e.g.
attention, perception, memory, imitation, thinking, speech, counting, 
personality, world view) are the psychological aspect of cultural
behavior. The development of the higher mental functions is an
essential aspect of cultural behavior, they are part and parcel of
cultural behavior.  They are all, without exception, derived from
social processes - encountered first externally as a relationship with 
another person, and then internalized.  They are by no means fixed,
but develop historically, based on the society, social relations,
forms of culture, etc.
The concept of "the mastery of behavior through internal processes" is 
a core theme for Vygotsky's theory of the higher mental functions.
This is the essence of will.  He emphasizes that human freedom and
freedom of the will can be found in the recognition of necessity (per Hegel, Engels, etc.), and that "Human freedom consists specifically of 
man's ability to think."   Vol 4 p 209.  But humans can only control
their behavior by controlling their stimuli and situations.  So he
says ": the great uniqueness of the will consists of man having no
power over his own behavior other than the power that things have over 
his behavior. But man subjects to himself the power of things over
behavior, makes them serve his own purposes and controls that power as he wants. He changes the environment with his external activity and in 
this way affects his own behavior, subjecting it to his own
authority." p 212

One way to describe his concept of will might be to say that will is
not a direct two-step process of willing-getting, but a mediated three 
step process of willing-creating-getting.  "... will is never a
direct, unmediated process." p217 "We ... [can] not bring forth any
process of behavior and control it other that by creating an
appropriate stimulus." p 210

So with those ideas in mind, I am curious what the concept of the
higher mental functions might look like if we view will as being
something other than a higher mental process.  Thoughts?

- Steve




Elina said:
Part of this conversation was discussion of the nature of higher
psychological functions. I am still puzzled with what Vygotsky meant by 
function ( Seth Chaiklin and I posed this question in 2002 and as we
discussed recently and are still looking for an answer...:-), but
Gennadi
and I believe that reflection and will are not higher psychological
functions. We are in the process of developing a proposal for the ISCAR 
symposium on these issues.



On Jul 30, 2010, at 11:11 AM, Elina Lampert-Shepel wrote:

Dear Achilles,

Thank you very much for the contribution. There can't be an
interruption as
it is a polylogical space I suppose.If we connect the Vygotskian
description
of development of self/ "ya" in the ontogenesis, then it points to the 
important connections between reflexivity and self consciousness.
- Crisis of seven years. Generalization of "perezivaniya" or as
Vygotsky
calls it logic of feelings. The dual position of the child in play ( 
Imaginary situation:" I am a soldier in pain as I was wounded " and
Real
situation: My Mom is calling me for dinner and I am hungry) allows
the child
to reflect on one of this "perezivanij' as the other, as object of
reflection. In the process of the crisis of seven years as it is
noted in
your last quote, the child because of the ability to distinguish
external
and internal, evaluate her own success and failure develops self-
esteem and
self -evaluation. It seems to me that reflection as a psychological
tool of
experiencing imaginary and real position in play as well as the
psychological tool that helps the child to look at herself as the
other is
the condition for the development of the initial forms of self-
evaluation
and self esteem through the crises of seven years.
Interestingly enough in the research of Alexander Dusavitskii it was 
argued
that when elementary school students in Davydov-El'konin classrooms
were
asked to evaluate themselves, they would always evaluate their work
lower
that it was, because the self-evaluation that emerged through the
crisis of
seven years was not developed in the context of learning activity.
How to
evaluate my own learning was "terra incognita" for them.

*But the question is what is the role of "perezivaniye' in the
development
of self-consciousness? * "Perezhivaniye" captures the unity of
affect and
intellect and this unity seems very important for the development of 
self-consciousness.

These are my thoughts so far...




2010/7/30 Achilles Delari Junior <achilles_delari@hotmail.com>



Hi Mike and Elina,
This will not so deep as all you are talking about, but when I was
reading
here I remember of your discussion, I made a little connection,
because an
"auto-consciousness" influx for "auto-concept" (see the text about
the
Crisis of Seven Years), and the first consciousness of child own
perezhivaniia, etc... Then this influx for me to the problem of the 
concept
of our own "Ya" ... Please if this could seems much extemporaneous, 
by my
part, delete this message... But, let me try:
I - From Slovar' L.S. Vigoskogo (ed. A.A. Leont'ev, 2007):
Я - Понятие о <<Я>> развивается у
ребенка из понятия о других. (31.1, 163) Тот факт, что с дошкольного 
возраста человек начинает по-мнить
последовательность событий, -- это то, что
старые психологи называли единством и тождеством <<Я>>. (5.2, 130)
<...> ребенок учит-ся в игре своему <<Я>>: создавая фиктивные точки 
идентификации -- центры <<Я>>: irde социальная
природа <<Я>>. Ср. Rollenspiel (ролевая игра). <...> ребенок имеет
уже <<Я>>, но не осознает его, имеет внутренние процессы, но не
сознает их --
в игре prise de conscience о себе и своем сознании <...>
Обозначение <<Я>> в
игре, осознание мысли, <<я хочу>> -- в игре <."> Парадокс <<Я>>: в
игре то
радует, что я хочу,
эгоцентри-ческая деятельность; но здесь же ограничение изнутри от
своего
мо-ментального
<<Я>>. (23.1, 291)

См. Возраст, Игра, Понятие
See: "prise de conscience о себе"

The actual references:
* 33.1: Эйдетика // Хрестоматия по ощущению и восприятию. М., 1975. 
С.
275-281 (1930)
* 5.2: Обучение и развитие в дошкольном
возрасте // Выготский. М.,1.С. 123-134
(1933)
* 23.1: Из записок-конспекта Л.С.
Выготского к лекциям по психоло-гии детей дошкольного возраста //
Эльконин
Д.Б. Психология игры. М., 1978. С. 289-294 (1933)
************************

II - From "Seven Years Crisis" (Tom IV):
"В 7-летнем возрасте мы имеем дело с началом возникновения такой
структуры
переживаний, когда ребенок начинает понимать, что значит <<я
радуюсь>>, <<я
огорчен>>, <<я сердит>>, <<я добрый>>, <<я злой>>, т. е. у него
возникает
осмысленная ориентировка в собственных переживаниях. Точно так, как 
ребенок
3 лет открывает свое отношение с другими людьми, так семилетка
открывает сам
факт своих переживаний. Благодаря этому выступают некоторые
особенности,
характеризующие кризис семи лет.
1. Переживания приобретают смысл (сердящийся ребенок понимает, что он 
сердит), благодаря этому у ребенка возникают такие новые отношения
к себе,
которые были невозможны до обобщения переживаний. Как на шахматной
доске,
когда с каждым ходом возникают совершенно новые связи между
фигурками, так и
здесь возникают совсем новые связи между переживаниями, когда они
приобретают известный смысл. Следовательно, весь характер переживаний 
ребенка к 7 годам перестраивается, как перестраивается шахматная
доска,
когда ребенок научился играть в шахматы.
2. К кризису семи лет впервые возникает обобщение переживаний, или
аффективное обобщение, логика чувств. Есть глубоко отсталые дети,
которые на
каждом шагу переживают неудачи: обычные дети играют, ненормальный
ребенок
пытается присоединиться к ним, но ему отказывают, он идет по улице, 
и над
ним смеются. Одним словом, он на каждом шагу проигрывает. В каждом
отдельном
случае у него есть реакция на собственную недостаточность, а через
минуту
смотришь -- он совершенно доволен собой. Тысячи отдельных неудач, а 
общего
чувства своей малоценности нет, он не обобщает того, что случалось
уже много
раз. У ребенка школьного возраста возникает обобщение чувств, т.
е., если с
ним много раз случалась какая-то ситуация, у него" (page 379, S.S.
Tom. IV -
1984)
"возникает аффективное образование, характер которого так же
относится к
единичному переживанию или аффекту, как понятие относится к
единичному
восприятию или воспоминанию. Например, у ребенка дошкольного
возраста нет
настоящей самооценки, самолюбия. Уровень наших запросов к самим
себе, к
нашему успеху, к нашему положению возникает именно в связи с
кризисом семи
лет.
Ребенок дошкольного возраста любит себя, но самолюбия как обобщенного 
отношения к самому себе, которое остается одним и тем же в разных
ситуациях,
но самооценки как таковой, но обобщенных отношений к окружающим и
понимания
своей ценности у ребенка этого возраста нет. Следовательно, к 7 годам 
возникает ряд сложных образований, которые и приводят к тому, что
трудности
поведения резко и коренным образом меняются, они принципиально
отличны от
трудностей дошкольного возраста.
Такие новообразования, как самолюбие, самооценка, остаются, а
симптомы
кризиса (манерничанье, кривляние) преходящи. В кризисе семи лет
благодаря
тому, что возникает дифференциация внутреннего и внешнего, что
впервые
возникает смысловое переживание, возникает и острая борьба
переживаний.
Ребенок, который не знает, какие взять конфеты -- побольше или
послаще, не
находится в состоянии внутренней борьбы, хотя он и колеблется.
Внутренняя
борьба (противоречия переживаний и выбор собственных переживаний)
становится
возможна только теперь. (etc.)"(page 380. S.S. Tom IV - 1984)
*********************
Well, here in this second quote, I'm no so insecure as about the
"concept
of Ya". Because I understand that there is something related to your 
discussion, in important ontogenetic terms... I only remain don't
contributing about the own "name" that you search for... But the
process
itself seems to be within the same semantic field.
Thank you, and forgive me the interruption.
Best wishes.Achilles,from Brazil
*************


Date: Thu, 29 Jul 2010 21:03:45 -0400
Subject: Re: [xmca] Question
From: ellampert@gmail.com
To: lchcmike@gmail.com; xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
CC:

Mike -
I can relate to a LOT of trouble. Both notions are used in many
different
ways in the contexts of development and learning. A few weeks ago, 
during
Vygotsky Summer School, Gennadiy Kravtsov and I had a long
conversation
about my cross-cultural research on reflection or as you say
"reflexia".


He


talked about reflection/reflexivity in the context of


"self-consciousness"
and we discussed reflexivity as a condition for the development of 
self-consciousness. He believes that the notion of "self-
consciousness" (
that I distinguish from reflexivity) was never developed fully in
cultural-historical tradition. Knowing that there is still lack of 
bridge
between Russian and the rest of the world cultural-historical
research, I
wanted to learn whether there are studies that connect reflection ( 
"reflexia") and self-consciousness. It is interesting that you
mentioned
both "reflexia" and "self-consciousness' in the context of


meta-cognition.


It seems to me that learning activity theory conceptualized
reflection as


a


metacognitive process, although Vygotsky never discussed it as a


cognitive,


or metacognitive process. There is also an important language
difference,
Russian language doesn't have an everyday use of the word
reflection, it
only exists as a philosophical or psychological notion.

Part of this conversation was discussion of the nature of higher
psychological functions. I am still puzzled with what Vygotsky
meant by
function ( Seth Chaiklin and I posed this question in 2002 and as we 
discussed recently and are still looking for an answer...:-), but
Gennadi
and I believe that reflection and will are not higher psychological 
functions. We are in the process of developing a proposal for the
ISCAR
symposium on these issues.

In any case, I was just wondering if there are studies on the
development


of


self-consciousness and/or reflexivity that are not necessarily
rooted in
Russian philosophical thought.
As you can see, I am in the state of questioning, so directions for 


further


questioning will be highly appreciated.

Elina

On Thu, Jul 29, 2010 at 7:49 PM, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>
wrote:

Elina--
I spent a great many sessions with Russian grad students who were 
interested
in this issue. We had a LOT of trouble with the fact that there
seem to


be



a

whole lot of words that appear to refer in overlapping ways with
"self-consciousness."  Terms in the family of reflectivity,
reflexivity
came
up a lot among the Russian students, but they were trying hard to 


figure



out

what the right English words were for whatever Russian term was
being


used.



Not just "samo-soznanie" was used in their conversations as well,

with
meta-cognition slipping in along with "reflexia."

I am unsure what to suggest. What is occasion for the question?
mike
On Thu, Jul 29, 2010 at 9:14 AM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com > 


wrote:





Elina


I wanted to express my appreciation of the quote you sign off
with by
Tagore.  It  captures the central imperative of foregrounding


context



and
traditions in the emergence of self-consciousness [the string] BUT 


that



without the string there is no violin.

I find myself often reflecting on the implications this
perspective
elaborates.

One suggestion I would like to suggest on the emergence of
self-consciousness is Andy's vimeo podcast on the Historical
roots of
cultural-historical theory. [Hegel is central]

Larry
On Thu, Jul 29, 2010 at 6:23 AM, Elina Lampert-Shepel
<ellampert@gmail.com>wrote:

Hi, everyone,

I would appreciate if anyone can recommend publications on
self-consciousness in cultural-historical tradition. I am


interested in



any



references on this issue.
Thanks in advance,
Elina

--
I have on my table a violin string. It is free. I twist one end 
of


it



and



it

responds. It is free. But it's not free to do what a violin
string


is



supposed to do - to produce music. So I take it, fix it in my



violin



and
tighten it until it is taut. Only then is it free to be a violin 


string.



-Sir Rabindranath Tagore

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--
I have on my table a violin string. It is free. I twist one end of 
it and


it
responds. It is free. But it's not free to do what a violin string 
is
supposed to do - to produce music. So I take it, fix it in my
violin and
tighten it until it is taut. Only then is it free to be a violin
string.
-Sir Rabindranath Tagore
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--
I have on my table a violin string. It is free. I twist one end of
it and it
responds. It is free. But it's not free to do what a violin string is supposed to do - to produce music. So I take it, fix it in my violin 
and
tighten it until it is taut. Only then is it free to be a violin
string.
-Sir Rabindranath Tagore
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