СИГНАЛЬНЫЕ СИСТЕМЫ

Signal Systems

The conditioned-reflex mechanism for reflecting reality. The main postulates of the doctrine of signal systems (formulated by the Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov) are as follows. In the higher animals, including man, the subcortex is the first region of intricate relationships of the organism and the environment. The subcortex closest to the cerebral hemispheres has its intricate unconditioned reflexes caused by a few unconditioned, i.e., inborn external agents. Hence, limited orientation in the environment.

The second region is the cerebral hemispheres, without the frontal lobes. Here a new principle of activity originates by means of conditioned connection: signalling of the few unconditioned agents by the innumerable mass of other agents which are analysed and synthesised and make possible greater orientation in the same environment. This is the only signal system in the animal organism and the first signal system in man.

Man has another (second) signal system located in the frontal lobes of the brain, signalling by word, by speech. This introduces a new principle of nervous activity—abstraction and generalisation of countless signals of the first system, followed by an analysis and synthesis of the generalised signals, a principle which makes for unlimited orientation in the external world.

Сигнальные системы

(Физиологические) системы нервных процессов, временных связей и реакций, формирующиеся в головном мозге в результате воздействия внешних и внутренних раздражений и обеспечивающие тонкое приспособление организма к окружающей среде. Понятия Первая сигнальная система и Вторая сигнальная система были введены в науку И. П. Павловым и развиты им в учении о высшей нервной деятельности.