Thinking, its forms and types. Thinking and its forms Forms of thinking concept and representation

Thinking is a cognitive mental process of a generalized and indirect reflection of connections and relationships between objects of objective reality. Thinking is the process involved in processing information, either received through sensations or stored in memory as a result of personal experience, in order to be able to respond to a new situation. The following distinctive features are distinguished:
1. The main function of thinking is to identify internal connections in objects.
2. Thinking relies in its knowledge on these sensory images;
3. Thinking can be divorced from the real world, since for cognition it can use a “substitute” for objects of the external world - a sign, a symbol
4. Thinking proceeds as a whole based on previously acquired knowledge;
5. Feature - mental results are initially generalized;
6. We can think not only in terms of the present, but also the past and the future.
Types of thinking:
1. By the nature of the tasks being solved:
- theoretical – aimed at finding general patterns.
- practical - aimed at solving particular specific problems.
2. According to the method of solving problems (according to the genesis of development):
-visual-effective (subject-effective) - the instrument is the object.
The peculiarity is that with its help it is impossible to solve the problem without the participation of practical actions. That is why he has such a close connection with practice.
-visual-figurative - allows you to understand the real world without the participation of practical actions, can only be carried out in an ideal way. Distinctive features: simultaneity (simultaneity), impulsiveness and syntheticity.
-verbal-logical (conceptual) - using this type of thinking, a person can analyze, compare phenomena, objects, situations, evaluating the object, situation, phenomenon, both from his own point of view and from other points of view.
- abstract-logical (abstract) - highlighting the essential properties and connections of an object and abstracting from other, unimportant ones.
3. By degree of deployment:
-discursive (logical) - mediated by the logic of reasoning, not perception.
-intuitive - thinking based on direct sensory perceptions and direct reflection of the effects of objects and phenomena of the objective world.
4. according to the degree of novelty and originality:
-creative (productive) - thinking based on creative imagination.
-recreating (reproductive) - thinking based on images and ideas drawn from certain sources.
5. By means of thinking:
- verbal - thinking that operates with abstract sign structures.
- visual - thinking based on images and representations of objects.
6. By function:
- critical - aimed at identifying shortcomings in the judgments of other people
- creative - associated with the discovery of fundamentally new knowledge, with the generation of one’s own original ideas, and not with the evaluation of other people’s thoughts.
Basic forms of thinking:
Concept is a form of thinking that reflects the essential properties of objects and phenomena
Judgment is a form of thinking that reflects connections between objects and phenomena
Inference is a form of thinking in which a certain conclusion is drawn based on judgments.
Thinking operations:
-analysis (mental separation) - highlighting in an object certain of its sides, elements, properties, connections, relationships, etc.; This is the division of a cognizable object into various components.
-synthesis (mental unification) is a mental operation that allows one to move from parts to the whole in a single analytical-synthetic process of thinking.
- generalization (mental unification into a class or category) - the unification of many objects or phenomena according to some common characteristic.
- comparison - an operation consisting of comparing objects and phenomena, their properties and relationships with each other and identifying the commonality or differences between them.
-abstraction (isolating some features and distinguishing them from others) is a mental operation based on abstracting from the unimportant features of objects, phenomena and highlighting the main, main thing in them.
- classification - systematization of subordinate concepts of any field of knowledge or human activity, used to establish connections between these concepts or classes of objects.
- categorization is the operation of assigning a single object, event, experience to a certain class, which can be verbal and non-verbal meanings, symbols, etc.

Logical forms (processes) of thinking: concept, judgment, inference.

Concept– a form of thinking that reflects the general, essential properties and distinctive features of objects and phenomena. Each concept has volume (the totality of all objects included in this concept) and content (knowledge about these objects and subjects). Concepts do not remain unchanged, they deepen and expand.

According to the nature of the reflection of connections and relationships, concepts are divided into two types: concrete concepts (which reflect connections and relationships between really existing objects), abstract concepts. The content of a concept is always revealed in a judgment; it is expressed verbally or in writing.

Judgment – a statement containing an affirmation or denial of connections and relationships between objects and phenomena. Judgments can be affirmative or negative. Examples of an affirmative judgment include statements such as “The student knows the lesson.” Negative judgments include those judgments that note the absence of certain characteristics in an object. For example: “This word is not a verb.” A judgment has a subject (subject) and a predicate (predicate). Judgments are expressed in sentences, which can be complete (subject) or incomplete (predicate).

There are judgments general, private And single. In general judgments, something is affirmed or denied regarding all objects and phenomena united by a concept, for example: “All metals conduct electricity.” In a private judgment, we are talking only about a part of objects and phenomena united by a concept, for example: “Some schoolchildren know how to play chess.” A single judgment is a judgment in which we are talking about some individual concept, for example: “Moscow is the capital of Russia”, “Pushkin is a great Russian poet”.

There are two main ways of forming judgments: directly - what we perceive is expressed in words. Indirectly - from one judgment, on its basis, we come to another judgment, as a result of inference. The truth of judgments is verified by a person’s social practice.

Inference - this form of thinking in which a person, comparing and analyzing various judgments, derives a new judgment from them. The judgment from which we draw a conclusion is called premises, and the new judgment is called a conclusion. A typical example of inference is the proof of geometric theorems.

A person uses mainly two types of inferences - inductive And deductive, but they also distinguish inference by analogy - conclusions based on partial similarities between objects.

Induction – derivation of a particular judgment from a general one.

Deduction – derivation of a general judgment from particular ones.

Types of thinking. Classification of thinking on different grounds

In psychology, there are several classifications of types of thinking. The most common is to distinguish types of thinking on various grounds.

1. In form - objective-effective, visual-figurative, abstract-logical (abstract, logical, judging by Mayer).

2. By the nature of the problems being solved - theoretical (theoretical conceptual, theoretical figurative) and practical.

3. According to the degree of development - discursive, intuitive.

4. According to the degree of novelty and originality - reproductive (reproducing), productive (creative).

1. These types of thinking can be considered as (object-actional, visual-figurative, verbal-logical) - three stages of the development of thinking in ontogenesis. And also, depending on what place the word, image and action occupy in the thought process, how they relate to each other, three types of thinking are distinguished: concrete-effective, or practical, concrete-figurative and abstract. These types of thinking are also distinguished on the basis of the characteristics of the tasks - practical and theoretical.

Subject-effective– a mental task is solved directly in the process of activity. Practical thinking is both historically and ontogenetically the earliest type of human thinking. It was with this type that the development of thinking in a person began in the process of the emergence of his work activity, when mental activity had not yet separated from objective-practical activity. The development of thinking in ontogenesis begins with this species. Initially, the child solves problems by directly interacting with the object. However, it is a mistake to think that this type of thinking is a primitive form of thinking. Having arisen at the dawn of mankind and appearing in every person in the first years of his life, it persists and develops throughout the history of mankind, at all age levels of each person. This type of thinking is indispensable when it is advisable to solve a mental problem directly in the process of practical activity.

Visual-figurative, or artistic thinking, is characterized by the fact that here the content of the mental task is based on figurative material. This type of thinking manifests itself when a person, solving a problem, analyzes, compares, and strives to generalize various images of objects, phenomena, and events.

Abstract, or verbal-logical, thinking is characterized by the fact that the problem here is solved in verbal form. Using the verbal form, a person operates with the most abstract concepts that do not have figurative expression: price, cost, etc.

Conclusion: All three types of thinking are closely related to each other. Many people have equally developed concrete-actional, concrete-imaginative and theoretical thinking, but depending on the nature of the problems that a person solves, first one, then another, then a third type of thinking comes to the fore.
If thinking is examined in the process of its development in children, then one can find that concrete-actional thinking arises first, then concrete-figurative and, finally, abstract-logical thinking. But the characteristics of each of these types of thinking in children are somewhat different, their connection is simpler.

2. Practical thinking – setting goals, developing a plan, carried out under time pressure. The main difference between theoretical and practical thinking is that they are related to practice in different ways. The work of practical thinking is aimed at solving particular, specific problems; the work of theoretical thinking is aimed at finding general patterns. Practical thinking is woven directly into practice and is constantly tested by practice, while theoretical thinking is tested by practice in the final result.

Theoretical conceptual thinking- this is thinking, using which a person, in the process of solving a problem, turns to concepts, performs actions in the mind, without directly dealing with the experience gained through the senses. He discusses and searches for a solution to a problem from beginning to end in his mind, using ready-made knowledge obtained by other people, expressed in conceptual form, judgments, and inferences. Theoretical conceptual thinking is characteristic of scientific theoretical research.

Theoretical figurative thinking differs from conceptual thinking in that the material that a person uses here to solve a problem is not concepts, judgments or inferences, but images. They are either directly retrieved from memory or creatively recreated by the imagination. This kind of thinking is used by workers in literature, art, and in general people of creative work who deal with images. In the course of solving mental problems, the corresponding images are mentally transformed so that a person, as a result of manipulating them, can directly see the solution to the problem that interests him.

3. Discursive – stage-by-stage development of the thought process. Intuitive – minimal awareness, rapidity of the thought process, non-step-by-step development.

4. Reproductive – application of ready-made knowledge and skills. Creative – aimed at creating new ideas or improving an old task.

Conclusion: all types of thinking are interdependent, transform into each other, depend on each other, in one type of thinking there may be elements of other types of thinking.

Exist 3 main forms of thinking – concept, judgment, inference.

Concept - this is an expression of the general and most essential in the objects and phenomena around us.

Basic concepts are formed during the entire historical development of human society and are the result of the mental activity of many generations of people. However, the assimilation of these concepts is carried out individually by each person in the process of his development.

For complete knowledge of an object or phenomenon, the connections between them, it is necessary to reveal the essential, most characteristic in them, which constitutes understanding.

Without understanding, there is no successful assimilation of knowledge about reality, there is no deep knowledge of reality. The process of understanding is greatly influenced by a person’s past experience and the wealth of those impressions.

Thought processes are carried out in the form judgments. Judgments reveal the essence of a concept. The formation of a judgment means the disclosure of connections and relationships between objects and phenomena of reality, that is, the disclosure of the essence of a concept.

Judgment is the affirmation or denial of any connections, relationships between objects and phenomena, between their properties and qualities.

Knowledge of any law or scientific position is the ability to make a correct judgment, that is, to reveal the essence of the content of a phenomenon, object, connections between them, formulated in some law or position.

Each judgment is a statement of facts, connections that exist between objects, phenomena, and practice shows how correctly the judgment reflects these connection facts.

Of great importance in checking the correctness of judgment are inferences.

Inference is a comparison and analysis of various judgments and the formation of new general or particular conclusions on this basis.

There are inferences inductive And deductive.

Inductive reasoning(induction) involves the establishment of general laws, rules, regulations based on the consideration of particular, individual facts, cases, phenomena.

Deductive reasoning(deduction) involves the disclosure of individual, particular phenomena and facts based on knowledge of general laws and regulations.

Induction and deduction are closely related. When discussing a particular phenomenon or object, a person makes conclusions not only of a general nature, but also draws particular conclusions based on general provisions and patterns. The close connection of both types of inferences contributes to the most complete disclosure of phenomena and objects of reality.

Types of thinking.

Depending on the combination of mental operations, forms of thinking, their content, and quality level, visual-effective, visual-figurative and verbal-logical thinking are distinguished.

Visually effective thinking - is a type of thinking associated with direct including it in practical

Typically, this type of thinking is clearly manifested in activities that require solving mental problems with simultaneous reinforcement by practical actions.

Visual-figurative thinking - This is thinking based on ideas. A characteristic feature of this type of thinking is the extensive use of specific visual images in the process of solving a particular mental problem.

There are three main forms of thinking: concept, judgment and inference.
Concept. A concept is a form of thinking that reflects the general and, moreover, essential properties of objects and phenomena.
Every object, every phenomenon has many different properties and characteristics. These properties, signs can be divided into two categories - essential and non-essential. For example, each individual triangle has three angles, certain dimensions - the length of the sides and area, a certain size of the angles, and shape. But only the first sign makes the figure a triangle and allows it to be distinguished from other figures: rectangle, circle, trapezoid. The remaining features distinguish one triangle from another; if they change, the triangle will not cease to be a triangle. Equally, each individual tree also has characteristics that make it possible to distinguish it from a bush or grass (i.e., essential characteristics), for example, the presence of a trunk, and those that distinguish one tree from another, for example, age, number of branches, preservation of bark, presence of a hollow, etc.
The concept contains only properties that are common and essential for a number of homogeneous objects: for the concept “student” the general and essential property is schooling (but not age, nationality, eye color or hair color); for the concept of “thermometer” - that it is a device for measuring the ambient temperature (and not its shape, size, etc.).
A concept exists in the form of the meaning of a word and is denoted by a word. Each word generalizes (except, of course, words denoting proper names). In concepts, our knowledge about objects and phenomena of reality crystallizes in a generalized and abstract form. In this respect, the concept differs significantly from the perception and representation of memory: perception and representation are concrete, figurative, and visual; the concept has a generalized, abstract, non-visual character.
A representation is an image of a specific object. A concept is an abstract thought about a class of objects.
Perception and representation are always a reflection of the concrete, the individual. None of us have ever seen or can see a book in general, a tree in general, a dog in general, even a person in general, since it is impossible to imagine an object absolutely devoid of any individual characteristics. But you can think about it.
A concept is a more developed and comprehensive form of cognition; it reflects reality much broader and more completely than a concept. A clear illustration of this situation is given by V.I. Lenin when he says that it is impossible to visually imagine movements at a speed of 300 thousand kilometers per second (the speed of light), but such movement can be thought of.
In the process of socio-historical development of knowledge, the content of the concept expands, deepens and changes. Thus, the concept of “atom” used to have one content, but with the development of science and technology, the content of this concept has changed, expanded, and deepened.
Judgment. Judgments reflect connections and relationships between objects and phenomena of the surrounding world and their properties and characteristics. Judgment is a form of thinking that contains the affirmation or denial of any position regarding objects, phenomena or their properties.
Examples of an affirmative judgment include statements such as “The student knows the lesson” or “The psyche is a function of the brain.” Negative judgments include those judgments that note the absence of certain characteristics in an object. For example: “This word is not a verb” or “This river is not navigable.”
Judgments can be general, particular and individual. In general judgments, something is affirmed or denied regarding all objects and phenomena united by a concept, for example: “All metals conduct electricity.” In a private judgment, we are talking only about a part of objects and phenomena united by a concept, for example: “Some schoolchildren know how to play chess.” A single judgment is a judgment in which we are talking about some individual concept, for example: “Moscow is the capital of the USSR”, “Pushkin is a great Russian poet”.
Judgment reveals the content of concepts. Consequently, in order to make a particular judgment, a person must know the content of the concepts that make up the judgment. If a person expresses the judgment that “the psyche is a function of the brain,” he must have corresponding concepts about the psyche and the brain. To know “any object or phenomenon means to be able to make a correct and meaningful judgment about it, that is, to be able to judge it. The truth of judgments is verified by human social practice.
Conclusion. Inference is a form of thinking in which a person, comparing and analyzing various judgments, derives a new judgment from them. A typical example of inference is the proof of geometric theorems.
A person uses mainly two types of inferences - inductive and deductive.
Induction is a method of reasoning from particular judgments to a general judgment, the establishment of general laws and rules based on the study of individual facts and phenomena.
Deduction is a method of reasoning from a general judgment to a particular judgment, the knowledge of individual facts and phenomena on the basis of the building of general laws and rules.
Induction begins with the accumulation of knowledge about the largest possible number of homogeneous objects and phenomena, which makes it possible to find similarities and differences in objects and phenomena and omit the unimportant and secondary. By summarizing the similar characteristics of these objects and phenomena, they draw a general conclusion or conclusion, establish a general rule or law. For example, when mastering the concept of “domestic animals,” students establish that a cow is useful, a horse is useful, a sheep, and a pig are also useful. Then, based on this, schoolchildren build a general conclusion: “All pets are useful.” Deductive inference gives a person knowledge about the specific properties and qualities of an individual object based on knowledge of general laws and rules. For example, knowing that all bodies expand when heated, a person can foresee that railroad rails on a hot summer day will also expand, and therefore, when laying a railroad track, builders leave a certain gap between the rails.
In addition to psychology, another science studies human thinking - logic. She studies the rules for constructing correct conclusions, correct (i.e. leading to correct conclusions) reasoning. Therefore, logical thinking is called reasoned, evidence-based thinking, which, based on correct initial judgments, necessarily leads to correct, objective conclusions.
Solving mental problems. The thinking of a person, and in particular of a schoolchild, is most clearly manifested when solving problems.
Any mental activity begins with a question that a person poses to himself without having a ready answer to it. Sometimes this question is posed by other people (for example, a teacher), but the act of thinking always begins with the formulation of a question that needs to be answered, a problem that needs to be solved, with the awareness of something unknown that needs to be understood, clarified. Does the doctor set himself the task of determining what disease the patient has; does the mechanic ask himself to find out the cause of the mechanism malfunction; Whether a teacher gives a student a problem to solve, thinking is always determined by the need to find something that is still unknown.
The teacher must keep in mind that the student sometimes does not realize the problem or question even when the teacher sets the corresponding task for him. There are cases when a student said in bewilderment: “The teacher drew two identical triangles on the board and spent the entire lesson proving that they are equal. I do not understand why". The question, the problem must be clearly understood, otherwise the student will have nothing to think about.
Solving a mental problem begins with a thorough analysis of data, understanding what is given and what a person has at his disposal. These data are compared with each other and with the question, and correlated with the person’s previous knowledge and experience. A person tries to use principles that have been successfully applied before in solving a problem similar to a new one. On this basis, a hypothesis (assumption) arises, a method of action is outlined; solution path. Practical testing of the hypothesis and testing of the solution path can show the fallacy of the intended actions. Then they look for a new hypothesis, a different method of action, and here it is important to carefully understand the reasons for the previous failure and draw appropriate conclusions from it.
When searching for a solution, it is important to rethink (reformulate) the initial data of the problem, try to visualize the situation of the problem, rely on visual images. The latter is very important not only for the younger ones. schoolchildren whose thinking generally needs to be supported by visual representations, but also for teenage schoolchildren. Try giving a student in grades IV-V the following problem: “A train passes a telegraph pole in 15 s, and a bridge 540 m long takes 45 s. What is the length of the train and its speed? Students will not solve this problem if they do not visualize the situation clearly. A train passes a telegraph pole in 15 s - this means that in 15 s it covers a distance equal to its length. In 45 seconds the train passes the bridge. It begins to pass it when the locomotive enters the bridge, and ends when the last carriage leaves the bridge, i.e. in 45 s the train travels 540 m plus a distance equal to its length, or 540 m in 30 s. The further solution is simple (train length 270 m, speed 64.8 km/h).
The solution of the problem is completed by checking, comparing the obtained result with the initial data.
All of these points can be easily traced by solving any practical problem (for example, determining why a table lamp does not light), any educational problem (for example, solving a complex mathematical problem).