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[STUDY OF REFLEXES] Biologicheskoye razvitiye mimiki s ob"yektivno-psikhologicheskoy tochki zreniya [i.e.Biological development of facial expressions from an objective psychological point of view]

Bekhterev, V.M.

Item #2475

St. Petersburg: Tovarischestvo Khudozhestvennoi Pechati, 1910. 3-38 p.: ill.; 24,4x15,6 cm. Printed without the title page. First and only edition. Signed by Bekhterev on the title page ‘To Pavel Alekseevich Neznamov. From V.Bekhterev’.

Speech delivered at the ceremonial meeting of the Council of the Psychoneurological Institute, dedicated to the memory of C. Darwin in April 1909.

Vladimir Bekhterev (1857-1927) - Russian and Soviet psychiatrist, neurologist, physiologist, psychologist, founder of reflexology and pathopsychological direction in Russia. Academician of the Military Medical Academy (1902), Honored Full Professor (1907).
In 1907, he founded the Psychoneurological Institute in St. Petersburg - the world's first scientific center for the comprehensive study of man and the scientific development of psychology, psychiatry, neurology and other "human studies" disciplines, organized as a research and higher educational institution, now bearing his name. After completing the seven volumes of the "Fundamentals of the Theory of Brain Functions", Bekhterev's attention as a scientist began to be drawn to the problems of psychology. Based on the fact that mental activity arises as a result of the brain's work, he considered it possible to rely mainly on the achievements of physiology and, above all, on the theory of associative (conditioned) reflexes.
This edition is important because it could be placed on the crossroads from Bekhterev’s research of Brain activity as a physiologist into looking at the problem from pathopsychological and psychological points of view. The study of mimics allowed Bekhterev announce the beginning of the new decline - reflexology, that was supposed to study the human nervous system and its manifestations in facial expressions, gestures and speech.

In this edition for the first time Bekhterev postulated the theory, that all human behavior can be explained by objectively studying reflexes. In this speech Bekhterev credited Charles Darwin with giving him this idea, that he has developed. He mentions that in Darwin’s work he has wrote, that ‘contraction of the orbicularis oculi muscle during crying is a movement that protects the eyeball from excessive blood flow’ and decided to take this idea further.

Not in the Worldcat.

Price: $2,500.00