Plan
► Historical preconditions of theory of functional systems of P.K. Anokhin.
► Scheme of the functional system of purposive behavioral act. Role of individual functional blocks in implementation of behavioral action:
• afferent synthesis - initial stage of organization of purposive behavior;
• decision-making as mechanism of limitation of liberty of purposive behavior;
• efferent synthesis - stage of formation of program of actions in realization of purposive behavior;
• acceptor of results of behavior - mechanism of evaluation of results of purposive behavior;
• useful adaptive result of behavior - system-forming factor of purposive behavior.
Historical Preconditions of Theory of Functional Systems of P.K. Anokhin
I. Pavlov's scientific school considers mechanisms of purposive behavior in higher animals and humans in terms of reflex theory. This means that this scientific school attempted to explain all diversity of the purposive behavior of animals and humans from the point of view of reflexes. A reflex is a mechanism of reflective activity of a human, and it terminates with a change in the state of an effector organ. Here, the extent of adaptive significance of this
change does not depend on a reflex scheme. Besides, according to reflex theory, all forms of purposive behavior must be stimulus-dependent, that is, behavior must be determined by external and internal stimuli. But factors that determine purposive behavior in real life, are more complicated, and behavior sometimes cannot be explained by reflex mechanisms alone. In this context there arose a need in some theory which, without denying reflex principles of behavior could explain the logical organization of behavior on a higher level of generalization. In our opinion, such a theory was proposed by a Russian physiologist P.K. Anokhin and is called a theory of functional systems.