Human consciousness is a mysterious subject that has not been studied to the end. It is a form of mental reflection of reality, peculiar only to man and is inextricably linked with speech, sensation and thinking. Thanks to him, a person can overcome, for example, his insecurity, fear , anger and control desires.
The functions of consciousness in psychology are a set of tools necessary to understand oneself and the surrounding world, to formulate specific goals, an action plan, to foresee their result, to regulate one's own behavior and activities. More details about this we will tell in our article.
The main functions of consciousness
As the well-known German philosopher Karl Marx wrote: "My attitude to my environment is my consciousness," and this is actually so. In psychology, the basic functions of consciousness are distinguished, thanks to which a certain attitude is formed to the very environment where the individual is. Let's consider the most basic of them:
- The cognitive function of consciousness is responsible for cognizing everything around, forming an idea of reality and acquiring factual material, through sensation, thought and memory .
- The accumulative function is generated by a cognitive feature. Its meaning lies in the fact that a lot of knowledge, feelings, impressions, experiences, emotions "gathered" in human consciousness and memory, not only from own experience, but also from the actions of other contemporaries and predecessors.
- Appraisal function of consciousness or reflective, with its help, a person compares his own needs and interests with data about the external world, knows himself and his knowledge, distinguishes between "I" and "not I", which promotes the development of self-knowledge, self-awareness and self-esteem.
- The function of purposefulness , i.e. as a result of analyzing the experience, a person who is not satisfied with the world around him, tries to change it for the better, forming for himself certain goals and ways to achieve them.
- The creative or creative function of consciousness is responsible for the formation of new, previously unknown images and concepts through thought, imagination and intuition.
- Communicative function is carried out with the help of the language. People work together, communicate and enjoy it, keeping in their memory the information they have received.
This is not the entire list of the basic functions of consciousness in human psychology, in connection with the new ideas of the science of consciousness it can still be replenished with points for a long time.