Often, human innate instincts are also called basic instincts. These instincts are based on a person’s tendency to perform certain actions or avoid certain actions.

Of course, all innate human instincts are not fully realized, since social norms also play an important role.

It should be noted that in relation to people, precise definition instincts do not apply. That is, complex innate reactions that occur in the body practically unchanged, as a response to environmental stimuli, concern only animals.

Today, there are three groups of innate human instincts.

So, the first group includes:

Predispositions that appear at birth. These instincts are responsible for a person’s desire to save his life.

The signs of these instincts are:

the presence of dissatisfaction leads to the fact that the human individual has a significantly reduced chance of survival;

no need for another object in order to satisfy one’s needs.

In addition, this group includes such predispositions as:

The instinct of self-preservation. This instinct is innate, since every person from his very birth strives to avoid situations that could cause harm to him or his health.

Evolutionary phobias. For example, some people from birth feel fear of certain objects, for example, fear of snakes, spiders, and the dark.

Predilections or aversions. At the genetic level, a person may experience aversion or addiction to a particular food. For example, for some there is a strong and irresistible desire to try something new, experiencing a new taste, for others there is a desire to eat salty, mineral-filled or high-calorie foods.

Regulation of body temperature.

The desire to stay awake and, when feeling tired, to sleep so that the body is filled with strength and energy for further existence.

The desire to see or feel flight. Often at the genetic level, many people have a desire to feel or look at flight. Thus, for some individuals, the view from above is especially popular, other people, at the first sign of danger, try to hide as high as possible, and some people are so attached to brachiation that they associate their main activity with air and flight. For example, skydiving or flying an airplane.

Another innate instinct of the first category is defecation. That is, every person needs to urinate and defecate processed foods.

Another innate instinct is the passion for collecting or collecting.

Biological clocks and rhythms. That is, interaction with the outside world occurs as a result of a person’s adaptation to environmental factors that change periodically. That is, getting used to temperature fluctuations, changing seasons, etc.

Sleep and rest mode. That is, every human individual from birth has a need for rest to restore their strength.

Today, many scientists identify a second category of innate human instincts, which are called social.

The peculiarity of these instincts is that the process of their formation occurs only if one individual has interaction with another.

This group identifies the following predispositions:

A kind of continuation instinct. That is, every person has an innate desire to continue his family, creating his own offspring.

Parental behavior. This instinct manifests itself when a person has children; on a subconscious level, he has a desire to patronize and care for his offspring.

Dominance and submission. This instinct manifests itself in some people as a desire to subjugate other people (pronounced leadership qualities), and in others - to obey.

Appeasement and aggression.

Territorial instincts. That is, a clear delineation of one’s territory.

Group behavior. It is characterized by a person’s desire to obey the opinion of the majority as the only correct one.

The third group of instincts consists of innate programs of ideal needs. The peculiarity of this category is due to the fact that it is not tied to individual or species adaptation to reality. That is, these instincts cannot be derived; they can only exist independently and in general.

These instincts include:

• learning instinct;
• the existence of games;
• presence of imitation;
• having your own preferences in art.

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Human life is based on three basic instincts:

• The instinct of self-preservation
• Hierarchical instinct
• Instinct for procreation

Whether we want it or not, willingly or unwillingly, our whole life is essentially these three instincts, on which our survival, social fulfillment and simple human happiness depend.

The instinct of self-preservation

Ensures the preservation of its own life, itself as a unit of living matter. It works in critical situations, disasters, various threats to life, illnesses, acute and chronic stress.

Hierarchical instinct

Determines our social behavior, our desire to occupy a position in society, success in work, education, desire for career growth, advancement in business, politics, sports, hierarchy of relationships in the team, family, society, rivalry, intraspecific struggle, internal sexual struggle (women with a woman, man with a man), clarification of gender relations (man and woman).

Instinct for procreation

Determines all of our sexual behavior, sexual identification, puberty, reproduction. This instinct is responsible for the preservation of humanity as a living species on planet Earth.

A person spends his hormonal reserves on the implementation of these basic instincts. Thus, a person spends androgens on the hierarchical instinct, estrogens on the implementation of sexual function, and homeostasis hormones on the instinct of self-preservation. All these hormones are produced from a single precursor.

If we take all available progesterone in the human body as 100%, then we can roughly imagine that all three basic instincts should be provided by approximately 33.3% of the hormone. Perhaps this is true. But then the level of claims in all three areas should be minimal. When the load increases in any of the three directions, there will be a compensatory increase in exactly those hormones that are needed to implement this function. This will happen due to a decrease in other hormones. With excessive long-term loads and stress, this will lead to rapid depletion of the system and may cause the death of the body.

In order for a woman to have enough hormonal reserves for female realization, she must have a reduced level of social demands and stress levels, then testosterone will be used for the production of estrogen, ovulation, a normal menstrual cycle, love, family, childbirth, and the level of female diseases will be minimal. The woman will not have a desire to have an abortion, and pregnancy and childbirth will proceed favorably.

But the continuation of the human race is not entirely a biological process.

I asked the same question many times at my lectures: “Please tell me, when does a person have a desire to have children?” The answer was always the same: “When you have an apartment, a car, money, an education, etc. etc.”, i.e. some social levels of development have been achieved, accumulated material goods, there is a job, a stable source of income. Everything is confused in people's heads.

No one has ever answered this question as follows: “When will I meet the man (woman) with whom I want to have children!”

If in living nature the desire to give birth to offspring is strictly determined by the sexual behavior of the female - her egg matures, and the male experiences sexual arousal in response to this, then in humans the desire to have children has shifted from the biological plane to the social one. To have children, a person needs an apartment as a nest for offspring, money as a source of food for future offspring, social guarantees for a woman (maternity leave, child benefits, keeping her job, and in general it would be nice for a woman to be Married). The husband in this context acts as the guarantor of providing the woman with her daily needs. biological needs, i.e. provides her instinct for procreation not only with his sperm, but also with material wealth. And marriage for a woman in this sense is biological need, not social.

I have had patients for whom marriage was not only sufficient, but also a necessary condition(stamp in the passport - this must be legal marriage) for pregnancy. There is a contingent of women who are able (unconsciously) to suppress their ovulation so much that until they solve all their social problems, they cannot afford to get pregnant. This is an uncontrolled (unconscious) process.

On the surface, the woman will be concerned about the absence of children, and she will even go to doctors and get examined. But in fact, ovulation and the process of reproduction itself will be taboo (suppressed) by social desires (complete building a house, buy a car, pay off debts, etc., etc.). Therefore, to help such women find female happiness, it requires long-term work on herself and preferably accompanied by a psychotherapist.

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The article is interesting, informative and relevant. As the author writes in the introduction:

The term "instinct", like many other scientific terms - for example, "stress" or "ecology" - has long been in wide use, but its original meaning has undergone significant changes. Moreover, in everyday life they are so different from those accepted in the scientific community that sometimes scientists are recommended to introduce new terms to denote this or that concept. Such proposals are argued, for example, by the fact that the distorted meaning of the term “ecology” has taken root in the mass consciousness, and it is easier to propose a new term than to change the existing state of affairs. However, it should be noted that scientific terms and definitions have been honed over years and even centuries, and their correct understanding, coupled with appropriate use, is the key to the formation of an adequate picture of the world and way of thinking in people.

One cannot but agree that it is important to think about, understand and be aware of what familiar terms mean. However, it seems to me that the conclusion turned out to be too categorical.

So, based on the definition and structure of instinct, which we have just examined, we can now assume that humans, a creature whose development is much higher than cats, have no instincts in the classical sense.

[Although, to tell the truth, a person still has one single instinct, which was discovered by Irenius Eibl-Eibesfeldt, a student of K. Lorenz. When we meet someone we like, we not only smile and part our lips, but our eyebrows also involuntarily raise. This movement, which lasts 1/6 of a second, was recorded by Eibl-Eibesfeldt on film in people of different races. He conducted most of his research in the wild corners of the planet, among tribes that do not know not only television, but also radio, and have rare and superficial contacts with their neighbors. Thus, eyebrow raising could not have been shaped by imitation learning. The main argument was the behavior of children blind from birth. The voice of a person they like also raises their eyebrows, and for the same 150 milliseconds.]

If expressions like “instinct of self-preservation” are incorrect, what then is the “automatic” withdrawal of a hand from a hot stove or fire? A person has an innate need for self-preservation, but not an instinct, since there is no corresponding FKD - an innate program of motor activity that would satisfy this need. Having been pricked or burned, we withdraw our hand - but this is not an instinct, but just a reflex (unconditioned) to painful stimulation. In general, we have a lot of protective unconditioned reflexes, for example, the blink reflex, coughing, sneezing, vomiting. But these are the simplest standard reflexes. All other threats to the integrity of the body cause only those reactions that we acquire during the learning process.

“Maternal instinct”, “sexual instinct” and other similar expressions - they are all incorrect when applied to a person. And not only in relation to humans, but also to all highly organized animals. We have corresponding needs (Ptrb), but there is neither an innate program for their satisfaction, nor a key incentive (KS), nor a fixed set of actions (FCD).

Have you forgotten the Instinct formula yet, dear reader?

I = Ptrb + KS + FKD.

Thus, a person does not have instincts in a strict sense, and this is what makes our behavior plastic. However, the absence of rigid innate programs does not negate the fact that we are biosocial beings; and there are purely biological factors that determine many aspects of our behavior.

The fact is that the question of the presence of instincts in higher animals is a question of terminology, agreement. From the same series are questions about at what level of development a creature can be considered alive, whether viruses can be considered alive, at what level of development animals have consciousness, etc. In all these matters the differences are not qualitative, but quantitative.

The article says that a person does not have instincts because there is no innate and fixed set of actions.

What does fixed mean? Even the most primitive set of actions has some flexibility, convention, and variability. For example, the so-called appendage stage can be very diverse and include other instinctive subprograms. The chick can overcome obstacles in different ways when moving towards its mother. If the chick, say, is turned sideways or upside down and fixed, it adapts to feeding in this position. If during feeding there is a threat of attack, feeding will be temporarily interrupted, but why continue, etc.

In most cases, this refers to the motor component of the instinctive act itself, when a newborn baby performs its first acts of consummation very unstably and unclearly. Apparently, this is due to the incomplete process of formation of neural ensembles of the brain, which are normally responsible for this innate act. Therefore, the very first movements of an animal when carrying out an instinctive act are “immature”, “uncertain”, and only after several trials and errors do they acquire all their purely species-typical features.

Of course, in different animals the ratio of innate and acquired is different, but both components are always present.

So the difference is only in the complexity of behavioral programs, so a clear boundary cannot be drawn. And if you look at intelligence from the point of view of cybernetics as a tool for achieving goals, then the boundary becomes completely blurred.

Nature