Key Insights into Basic Mechanisms of Mental Activity

The findings in this book come from researchers from around the world, including the Author's own studies about the process of judgment. The scientific progress was facilitated by the existence of detailed knowledge about scientific concepts that relate to the central states and processes of mental activity. Examples of the findings include knowledge about cortical and emotional/affective arousal, perceptual learning (this is the most influential form of non-verbal and verbal learning), perceptual judgment (e.g., “This flower is a rose”), decision-making, self-regulation, and functions of the prefrontal cortex.

Essential was also the discovery of close relations between research results of different areas. An important example is the relation between concepts that are simple linguistic units (especially words) with perceptual and verbal meanings and memory structures that exist in the brain. Another example is perceptual judgment. The correct identification of an object, for example a rose, is not possible without concepts/memory structures that contain features that are distinctive to the features of other flowers.

Despite its brevity, this volume provides new knowledge about essential forms of mental activity. The interdisciplinary approach is based on the S-O-R-model (S = stimulation, O = organism, R = behavior). The organismic component, which mediates between stimulation and behavior, includes perceptual learning, perception, mental processes (judgment, thinking, and decision-making), and the underlying neural systems. Remarkable progress has also been made in understanding the development, functions, and neural basis of memory structures and of self-regulation. The findings led to conclusions about the causes of behavior and have implications for psychiatric nosology and practice. For that reason, the implications are also essential for clinical psychology and psychotherapy.

Otto Buxbaum, born 1942 in Vienna, Austria. Studies in psychology, anthropology and philosophy (1966-1972, Vienna). Dissertation: Uber den Ausdruck von Sprachlauten (About the expression of speech sounds). 1972-1983 Assistant at the Institute of Psychology, University of Graz. Habilitation in 1982 (Habilitationsschrift: Kognitionspsychologische Analysen von Kategorisierungsvorgangen) (Thesis: Cognitive analysis of categorization processes). Since then private lecturer. Many years of research on personality theories, person perception and psychiatric-psychological assessment, more and more with reference to human information processing and neuroscience. The current work comprises three studies. These are ?Neues Wissen uber Grundfragen der Psychiatrie” (New knowledge about basic questions of psychiatry) published by Springer 2015, the planned book and ?Neues Wissen uber grundlegende padagogisch-psychologische Begriffe” (New knowledge about basic pedagogical-psychological concepts) submitted for publication.