A subject in psychology is an individual person or group of people who takes an active position in the transformation of reality, provokes changes in other people - objects - and in himself.
What is psychology?
The word "psychology" comes from the Greek "soul". Now this science is studying the nature of the psyche, its mechanisms and manifestations. In the entire history of the formation of the discipline's attention, both the soul and consciousness, then behavior, and now science is studying the psyche with all its manifestations.
As you can see, the subject of psychology was replaced several times, the object always remained a person with his psychological manifestations.
Like any self-respecting science, psychology, in addition to the object and subject, also has tasks, principles and methods.
Psychology Objectives
The tasks of science change slightly in parallel with the subject. At this stage, the following have been formed:
- the study of the influence of activity on the human psyche, on its interpersonal and intergroup relations;
- study of the psychological conditions of professional activity;
- the study of ways to influence the individual, the collective and the masses;
- the establishment of patterns of dynamics of disability;
- revealing the features of individual qualities, patterns and ways of personality formation in modern society.
Object and subject
These are two concepts that are opposite in meaning. The concept of “subject” in psychology is a carrier of action, an active participant in a certain process, and an object is someone who is influenced. The first is an active position, and the second is a passive one.
For example, the subject in the woodworking activity is the master, and the object itself is the tree; the subject of education is the educator, and the object is the child; the subject of education is the teacher (teacher), and the object is the student. But some teachers believe that the learning process is so complex that without the active position of the student it is impossible. That is, the student is both an object (for example, at a lecture, when he listens and writes material), and the subject (when self-learning, preparing for practical or control) education.
In the "man - man" sphere, the roles of the object and subject have a fine line and can have some metamorphoses.
Subject Definition
In psychology, this is a separate person who refers to the manifestations of his psyche as objects, capable of self-knowledge and reflection. A subject can be not only one person who sees himself from the outside and perceives himself as an object, but also a group of people, and even a whole society.
The subjects of psychology as a science are psychologists who conduct experiments, surveys, tests, etc.
There are several branches of psychology, and in each of them the understanding of a person as a subject of psychology will slightly change.
Synonyms in Psychology
In psychology, the concepts of "personality", "subject", "individual" and "individuality" are very often intertwined, confused and unjustifiably identified.
The subject may be natural, social, and cultural. The natural subject is an individual, and the social and cultural is a person.
Individual
This subject in the psychology of personality is considered as a separate organism. A newborn baby is already an individual, but not yet a person, just a representative of the Homo genus.
Nevertheless, at this early stage, this biological unit is something integral and can function relatively independently.
Often in everyday speech, this word is equated to individuality, which sometimes provokes ridiculous incidents, since calling a person an individual, you are unlikely to give him a compliment.
Personality
Only by introducing oneself into microsocium, and then into society, does an individual begin to develop as a person. If you think mathematically, then for the formation of a social subject, at least two people are needed.
Mowgli can not be called a person, since he did not interact with people. He developed in a society, but in a different, not human.
However, there are several levels of development of social subjects: on the first, mental processes are formed, on the second - intelligence, on the third - general culture and upbringing, further communicative and social skills develop, etc.
It is easy to distinguish a well-mannered person from someone who clearly lacks culture.
Individuality
Under individuality is meant a combination of traits, habits, habits, reactions, relationships and other manifestations of a personality that distinguish it from all others.
Despite the fact that an individual who has not grown to the level of personality (the same Mowgli) may possess a pronounced individuality, it is customary to call it the highest manifestation of personality.
In order to develop your individuality on a solid foundation, you need to grow into a personality, become a full-fledged subject of society, understand that you have successfully joined the society, that you are like everyone else, and only then emphasize and develop your individuality.
Branches of psychology
Psychology has become incredibly popular these days. In the era of computer technology and artificial intelligence, it became interesting for humanity to study the human soul as a comparison.
Sections of psychology are formed on the basis of whose psyche focuses attention, in what conditions it is located. Many other criteria are involved.
If a young girl without a psychological education says that she is fond of psychology, most likely she means the psychology of relationships or family psychology.
The following branches can be called the most popular and necessary: general, since without it there is nowhere; social; age or developmental psychology; pedagogical; medical; military; legal; gender family; pathopsychology; differential, etc.
General psychology
The subject of this generalized industry is a person or several people who are a source of knowledge and a change in reality, their distinguishing feature is activity.
The subject provokes changes both in other people and in himself, looking at himself as if from the outside.
The subject of psychology as a science will not already be every person, but a scientist who is engaged in research on various aspects of the subject of psychology.
The subject of psychology as a science is the human psyche, and there can be a lot of objects: various developmental pathologies, mental processes (cognitive, communicative, emotional-volitional), mental states, properties, etc.
Labor psychology
The subject of labor is a person who works. It is he who is the object of study of this branch of psychology.
The psychology of labor as a separate sphere of knowledge stood out in the middle of the last century. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the worker was considered as an object of research, that is, a person who takes a passive position in his work. He works according to strictly regulated instructions, without the possibility and risk of independently making decisions, as well as being creative. In the second half of the twentieth century, a working person is already looked at as a subject, since he does not take a passive, but an active position.
This section of science was organized not only for analysis and observation of a person during his labor activity as one of the main areas of life, but also for further optimization of the vocational training procedure, increasing productivity, studying labor motivation and other peripheral tasks.
Social Psychology
The subject in this case will be the same person, only he will be considered as a social unit.
Some researchers consider society to be the subject of this industry, and a separate individual as the object of its activity.
Social psychology studies the patterns of human behavior in society in the course of their interaction.
In turn, this branch of psychology has three main areas of study: groups, communication in society and personality in society.
Ambiguous understanding
In a science such as psychology, personality is the subject of activity, and it is also an object. Since the middle of the last century, the views of this branch of knowledge on the position of the subject and object have changed somewhat.
A person who works, studies, communicates, was earlier rightly considered an object of research. That's right, because it focuses the attention of the person who is doing this - the subject.
But if we talk about activity and passivity, then the worker, student and other acting person cannot be an object. The process of doing itself transfers it from a passive to an active state.
Therefore, it is now most correct to say this: the object of psychological research in a particular area is a person or group of people as the subject of some activity.
Such an ambiguity of the concepts of “subject” and “object” can be traced in the sphere of “man - man”, where the latter is either an active or a passive participant in the process.
If a doctor gives instructions to his patient, and he performs them, he is simultaneously an object of the therapeutic process (he has a mentor who has set a number of specific tasks for him) and his subject (since he takes a pill, drinks it, makes compresses and etc.).
In the case of a surgeon, the patient will only be an object during the operation, because he is passive and is under anesthesia.
Subject through object
You can consider the term "subject" as all that is not an object, and vice versa. The subject is I. I All that a person can point to is an object. Moreover, I will never be an object. By "I" in this case we mean perception. “What is self-perception then?” You ask.
Self-perception in the course of operating with these categories is equated with the term “perception”, which cannot become an object, since this is us. You can perceive individual objects, phenomena and even your body - these are objects, but when we think about our perception, thoughts become objects, not perception. Therefore, the subject can be called the totality of all objects perceived by us.
A person can separate the perception of one thing from the perception of another, but a holistic perception cannot be separated from anything and cannot be compared with anything. Since we can compare objects with each other, compare, see some of them at the same time, but with a full perception of such manipulations it is impossible to carry out.
Perception and Self-Perception
Perception is the process of cognition of the surrounding world with the help of the senses. It forms our knowledge.
The images of objects and phenomena are fixed in our consciousness due to perception. But the way we see the world is a subjective representation, not a real one.
Each person perceives the world in his own way based on the acquired life experience, knowledge, type of temperament and a number of other reasons.
If you put a guitar in the center of the circle of the training group, then everyone will see it from different angles, and therefore the description of this subject will be different.
Subjective and objective opinion
Just as the concept of “subject” is opposed to the concept of “object,” so is “subjectivity” opposed to “objectivity.”
Although the subject takes an active position, he still has one significant “flaw”: he sees the world from only one point - from the position of his perception.
Let's go back to the guitar example. Imagine that people are sitting in a circle, and in the center is a musical instrument. The person to whom she is turned with the back side will confidently say that she does not have strings, the bar does not know how to attach, and she can not say a word about the thickness. The one who sits opposite, on the contrary, will violently convince the opponent that the strings are still present. A person who sees a guitar in profile will have no doubt that this is a rather narrow subject, etc.
There can be a thousand subjective opinions, and one object can be a guitar. If one of the participants stands up and goes around the circle, then in this case he will be able to describe the object objectively.
Based on this equation, we can say that objective opinion is a combination of subjective.
Subjects of communication
In psychology, it is customary to call subjects of communication an individual who has communicative skills, knows how to interact with other people, and has socio-cultural skills.
The subject of communication can be called not only adults, but also primary schoolchildren and children of preschool age, who, in the course of communication, try to build personal social contacts.