In the outside world structure the major portion falls on the world of people, so that task number one in human everyday life becomes man’s ability to adapt to another person, to other people who are carriers of individual psychosocial “Egos” that are present from the very beginning of life and to the last breath. “Man is a tangle of interrelationships” is an ancient philosophical aphorism. And this kind of adaptation is a super task and super goal for any person. K. Cherry (1972) believes that every act of communication between people, each new perception of another person adds something to the experience and improves the adaptability. Communication with people of one’s own kind is already a subsystem of social contacts, leading to an expansion of mental adaptation which in fact becomes psychosocial adaptation. L. Feuerbach (1955) noted that the individual “as something isolated” could not comprise the human essence in himself “either as a moral being, or as a thinking entity”; the human essence is “evident only in communication, in the unity of man with man…”. Thus, a crucial adaptation to be performed by man is adaptation to the social structure and his participation in building it up (Bernfeld, 1931). This type can be attributed to the fourth form of adaptation. The SPA is characterized by the multidimensional self-organizing subsystems, which provide greater freedom and variability in the choice of adaptation.
The mechanisms of the SBA and SPA, which determine the vital activity of a person, are extremely complex structures containing multiple subsystems, interconnected and interdependent. N. P. Bekhtereva regarded the increasing number of flexible links in the control system of mental activity as the main principle of complicating the brain systems. She assumed that the mental activity was supported by the cortical-subcortical structural-functional system with links of varying degrees of rigidity. Human adaptive capabilities have the widest range of flexible links, which when interacting with the environment allow to keep “essential variables” within the physiological boundaries. This is reflected in the”interfunctional” reorganization of the entire structure of mental activity in the process of ontogenesis.
The system adaptive approach enables to present a complete picture of man in his onto- and phylogenetic development; in health and illness; a picture stipulated by psychosomatic interrelations between the component paradigms – the biological and the psychosocial.
A historical development of human consists in the fact that today we have a person as a conscious volitional trinity (biological, social and mental), for whom sense formation (meaning formation) has become a leading need. Sense formation is the main function of the brain distinguishing a person from all living beings, and it is this ability to attach personal significance to environmental signals that makes each person unique and unrepeatable. It is sense formation that underlies many conscious and unconscious psychological defenses that make up the core of the SPA.
Example. They say that “Rafael Santi was driven mad with love towards a model for the image of Psyche. Once he, a dreamy young man was walking in the park thinking about finding a model for his canvas “Cupid and Psyche”. Suddenly he noticed a beautiful girl resting in the shade. Such pure features, such angelic face he had never seen! “Psyche” looked with interest at Rafael blinded by her beauty. She was 17 years old. Her name was Margarita Luti. Rafael immediately invited her to become model for the image of Psyche. Painter offered her a gold ring for ten kisses. Maid graciously agreed. Rafael lost his head with passion. Rafael went mad with beautiful “Fornarina” (translated from Italian means “baker”). Her delicate face with expressive brown eyes, silky skin and lush shoulders forced him to get off the breath. But that was not the Fornarina, whom worshiped Rafael. The young mistress of Raphael, though living with him, twisted love affairs with wealthy Romans right and left, often returning home at dawn. What about Rafael Santi? He did his job – he painted, and his paintings have become part of the golden fund of world art. The beauty with innocent charm, that struck the painter’s heart, became a common courtesan. Rafael went crazy with countless betrayals of Margarita but in work continued to depict the ideal he “was looking for Psyche”. The most famous of his creations became written in the years 1512–1513 “Sistine Madonna.” Flying in the clouds the Virgin with child still touches deeply. The model for the image of Mary became the same Margarita Luti. The artist gave her face an expression that he would like to see and “saw”: a mother’s love, the fear of the loss of a child, tenderness. He loved and painted the one whom he sought, whom he loved and by virtue of whom created his works. He lived in his world woven out of values, desires and symbols. Suffering from reality, he immersed into work and came back to reality again. Rafael suffered unspeakably, like any addict, splashing his hidden feelings on canvas or wet plaster. Perhaps his work would not be so heartfelt, if his life with Fornarina evolved happily.
Patient's drawing.
Is it so or not – we will never know.
We will not make any conclusions with respect to a specific example, because we are deeply convinced that it will be another version and nothing more if follow the basic principle of psychology “That might be so, might be otherwise” of which we wrote at the beginning.
But it seemed to us that the example will help understand all of the above said on the individual, his life, motivation, adaptation, objective and subjective realities, psychological defense and the role of suffering in his deeds.
CORRELATION OF CONCEPTS:
“STRESS”, “EMOTIONAL STRESS”,
“TRAUMATIC STRESS” (APES)
Stress. For the first time the word “stress” emerged in the English language in 1303 when the poet R. Manning wrote: “The Lord had sent manna of heaven for the people in great stress”.
In the late eighteenth – early nineteenth centuries Goya, whose art was distinguished by passionate emotional and social orientation, created a series of paintings that he called “Desastress”. The series includes paintings reflecting the human grief and suffering, among them: “Unhappy mother” (Sheet 50 of the famous etchings), “I have seen it” (Sh. 44), “They are a different breed” (Sh. 61), “This is the worst” (Sh. 37).
The concept “stress”, introduced into biology and medicine, is associated with the name of H. Selye and it was used to refer to a non-specific response of the body to any harmful and subsequently a harmless effect too. It is a natural genetically programmed normal and necessary response of the body to provide its survival and development. The essence of Selye’s teaching is his discovery of the three-phase general adaptation syndrome (GAS).
The first phase (stage), called by Selye the “phase of combat alert” includes orientation reflex accompanied with restructuring of the whole body. It is mainly implemented by an automatic neurobiological mechanism, by the action of a sympato-parasympatic nervous system BSA and has a bioelectric character.
The second phase is the stage of resistance (strain); it is also figuratively referred to as the “stage of fight or flight”. If during the first stage the situation is assessed as dangerous, and anxiety as the expectation of an uncertain danger becomes a “concrete fear”, then through the activation of the endocrine glands the second stage of the stress reaction develops and stress hormones enter the bloodstream. Spread by blood to organ/systems, they put the body into the state of readiness either to flight from danger or to fight with it (muscles tense, heartbeat vigorous, pressure jumps, etc.). Self-preservation mode is triggered throughout the body.
The whole complex is a normal, necessary effect of self-preservation instinct and similar for both types of behavior. The choice of behavior depends on the impulsivity and genetic program; but in human more often on the acquired experience of response in the deadaptation situation. It is stipulated