Man's vigorous activity is aimed at transforming the world around him. It contains a creative principle that can take creative, destructive or neutral forms.
The theory of activity was developed in the 1920s and 1930s by Soviet psychologists Alexei Nikolaevich Leontiev and Sergei Leonidovich Rubinstein on the basis of the cultural-historical school of Lev Semenovich Vygotsky. The scientist saw the need for a fundamental distinction between lower and higher mental functions, biological and social, "nature" and "culture".
Through activities, a person wants to achieve a consciously visible goal, to realize his needs and interests, to fulfill the role assigned to him by society. That is, the transformation of reality is determined by the external environment and the inner world of a person. For activity, a person needs motivation. Characterizing the subject's activity, one considers its structure, content, methods and methods and fixes the final result. Activity in psychology should be distinguished from impulsive behavior caused by emotions and not associated with perceived goals.
Psychologists distinguish three main types of activity: work, learning and play. The formation of the individual as a subject of activity begins in the game: this is the earliest form of activity available to a person. A socially significant product is created in the process of directed labor: a crop, a household item, a work of art, an invention, a scientific discovery. Teaching directly prepares a person for work, develops it. If the game is motivated by a thirst for pleasure, then study and work are a sense of duty and responsibility.
So, thanks to activity, a person materially embodies his potential. Unlike purely animal existence, human activity is productive, and not just consumer. In addition, the activity of animals is due only to biological mechanisms, while that of a person is due to artificial needs, higher ones, generated by the influence of the cultural and historical field.
