In psychology, constructivism refers to many schools of thought which, though different in different branches of psychology using different techniques. Despite these differences, psychologists sharing a constructivist paradigm offer a common critique of previous standard approaches, such as behaviorism’s stimulus-reaction presentation of behaviour
or associatism, "by which the mind is conceived as a passive system that gathers its contents from its environment and, through the act of knowing, produces a copy of the order of reality". In contrast to these old approaches, constructivism asserts that all psychological phenomena – from physical actions to cognitive processes – are being constructed (generated) every time anew based on the current state of the body, context, available resources, previous experience and habits, and many other factors Construction of behaviour proceeds as selection and sequencing of actions, emotions and percepts.
The constructivism principles were observed and described in biology before the 20th century, and were reflected in the theories of evolution and genetics. Biological phenomena and behavioural are known for there generative nature, compositions and renovations of observed structures such as biomolecules, cell, human relationships, groups and organizations. The dependence of biological constructions from environment, past and current states and needs is seen in regeneration, DNA and Biosynthesis processes.
In psychology, however, the behaviourism paradigm (presenting behaviour as passive reaction to stimuli after associations have been established) continues being prominent even nowadays and is not compatible with constructism principles.
Experimental work in psychology demonstrated constructivism principles
Habit formation research by Bernstein
Experimental evidence for constructivism principles first emerged Nikolai Bernstein' work on habit formation and stages of action, which led to his “action construction” model and a theory. In 1930-s, Bernstein used his original tracking devices that were positioned on the bodies of experts and dilletants in various professions. These experiments described multiple examples of "repetition without repetition" in generation of actions, contrary to classical conditioning principles of behaviourism. According to Bernstein, there are simply too many “degrees of freedom” in actions that could be tuned to various stimuli – and so he was first to formulate the Degrees of freedom problem. If nervous system has such multiplicity in stimuli and responses, learned reflexes could act simultaneously and make behaviour very chaotic. Instead, as Bernstein had demonstrated with his measurements, the nervous system has several stages of selection and sequencing the “program of action” and then using feedback comparing the result with the planned program while executing the action. This process, starting from selection, sequencing and proceeding with execution and feedback, was named by Bernstein “action’s construction”. Bernstein’s methods and theory created a new discipline of kinesiology.
Cognitive psychology Around 1930-s, Frederic Bartlett’s experiments in cognitive psychology highlighted the (re-)constructive nature of memory’s recall.
From 1960s till nowadays, many researchers in cognitive psychology described constructivism phenomena. Karl Pribram described neuronal holographic effects in construction of cognitive processes in the brain highlighted the dependence of cognitive processes (such as memory, attention, thinking) from convergence of activations of multiple here-and-now networks. These activations change their contribution depending on various factors and, therefore, are variable and context-dependent. Ulric Neisser had much more extensive experimental demonstrations of context dependence of memory.
American Psychologist George Kelly (1905–1967) offered the Personal construct theory, underlying the observations that people use different, individually-developed criteria in estimations of events and information. Kelly’s theory became the bases of Charles Osgood’s Semantic differential method that was widely used in psychosemantics starting from 1960s. The research into generation of meaning using Kelly’s and Osgood’s methods showed that meaning attribution does not depend just on the context: it also depends on the state of the body, as it was shown in embodied cognition research. The key biologically-individual differences such as sex and temperament (endurance, tempo, emotionality) were found to influence high cognitive functions such as meaning attribution.
Constructivist cognitive psychologists also theorize about and investigate how human beings create systems for meaningfully understanding their worlds and experiences.
Neuroscience Constructivism phenomena in neuroscience were described in all fields of neuroscience.
In neurochemistry, practically all neurotransmitters regulating the behaviour are not permanently stored in the nerve endigs but have to be composed every time anew before neurotransmission. Neurochemical framework Functional Ensemble of Temperament that summarized teams-like relationships between neurotransmitters, hormones and opioid receptor systems, used Functional Constructivism approach in its structure. This approach suggests using the stages and universal functional aspects of behavioural constructions as the basis for biobehavioural taxonomies.
In neuroanatomy, brain’s neuroplasticity allows brain to develop (construct) and update the connectivity between brain cells.
In neuroelectrophysiology, Karl Pribram’s holonomic theory of the brain also highlighted the generative, constructive (and not reactive) nature of mental processes and behavoiur. American neuroscientist Walter Jackson Freeman III, a analysed neuroelectrodynamics of the brain and described development of chaotic attractors in neurodynamics of electric potentials, which generate perceptual and cognitive dispositions, helping individuals to recognize environmental information faster and in subjectively relevant way. Trofimova presented Freeman’s anticipatory attractors theory as example of “Throw and Catch mechanism illustrating constructivism principles in nervous system. Freeman summarized his conclusions in the statement “behavior is proactive, not reactive”.
Psychology of emotions In psychology of emotions, prominent constructivism approach was offered by American psychologists Barrett, Lindquist, Russell and others. They showed that emotions are generated based on the context, state of the body and previous experience and can be compositions and variations of several “basic emotions”.
Gibson’s ecological approach in psychology James J. Gibson highlighted the fact that that behaviour always has “psychological ecology”, i.e. social and physical contexts defining the choice of actions. The context can have individual ecological compatibility with individual’s capacities and motivation and, therefore, affects the construction of behaviour.
Psychology of education
Constructivist psychology when applied to education emphasizes that students are always engaged in a process of actively constructing meaning—a process which "the teacher can only facilitate or thwart, but not himself invent".
Jean Piaget's theory describes how children do not simply mimic everything that is part of the external environment, but rather that developing and learning is an ongoing process and interchange between individuals and their surroundings, a process through which individuals develop increasingly complex schemas. According to Angela O'Donnell and colleagues, constructivism describes how a learner constructs knowledge via different concepts: complex cognition, scaffolding, vicarious experiences, modeling, and observational learning. This makes students, teachers, the environment and anyone or anything else with which the student has an interaction active participants in their learning.
Constructivism in psychotherapy
Constructivist psychotherapy is a broad family of psychological approaches that share the idea that human beings do not simply perceive and respond to an objective reality. Rather, they actively organize experience through systems of meaning, interpretation, and personal knowledge. From this perspective, psychological problems are not understood exclusively as the result of distorted perceptions or maladaptive behaviors. They can also arise when a person's established ways of interpreting experience become rigid, inadequate, or unable to accommodate new experiences..
Some particularly influential approaches of constructivist psychotherapy are: George Kelly's Personal Construct Psychology, Vittorio Guidano's post-rationalist cognitive approach, and the narrative therapy developed by Michael White and David Epston. Although these approaches differ considerably in their theoretical assumptions and therapeutic techniques, all three reject the idea that psychological functioning can be adequately understood by treating the individual as a passive recipient of external information.
George Kelly and Personal Construct Psychotherapy
George Kelly's Personal Construct Psychology (PCP) represents one of the foundational formulations of constructivist psychotherapy. Kelly developed his theory most systematically in The Psychology of Personal Constructs (1955). His central proposition was that people function as scientists: they continually develop hypotheses about the world, anticipate events, test those anticipations against experience, and revise their systems of interpretation when necessary.
For Kelly, people do not encounter reality in a completely unmediated way. Instead, they construe events through personal constructs. A construct is a dimension of meaning that allows a person to distinguish between experiences. Constructs are typically bipolar, such as “trustworthy–untrustworthy,” “independent–dependent,” or “successful–unsuccessful.” Through these constructs, individuals organize their experiences and anticipate what is likely to happen.
Kelly formulated this idea in his famous “fundamental postulate”: “A person's processes are psychologically channelized by the ways in which he anticipates events” (Kelly, 1955). The important point is that psychological functioning is organized around anticipation. People construct meanings partly because these meanings allow them to predict and navigate future experiences.
Personal constructs are not necessarily conscious. Individuals may possess highly elaborated systems of meaning without being able to articulate them explicitly. Furthermore, constructs are organized hierarchically and interconnectedly. A change in one construct may therefore affect the meaning of many other experiences.
Psychological difficulties can emerge when a person's construct system becomes overly rigid or when it fails to provide adequate alternatives for interpreting experience. A person who has constructed the world primarily in terms of “strong versus weak,” for example, may experience vulnerability, dependence, or uncertainty as unacceptable because these experiences cannot easily be incorporated into the existing system.
Psychotherapy consequently involves exploring the client's personal construction system rather than simply correcting supposedly irrational beliefs. The therapist seeks to understand how the client construes significant people, events, and the self, and how these constructions organize anticipation and action.