Hoff T L
Department of Psychology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada.
Brain Cogn. 1992 Nov;20(2):378-98. doi: 10.1016/0278-2626(92)90028-k.
Gall did not employ the term "function" to refer to adaptive mental processes or to observable behavior. To the contrary, he and the phrenologists took a traditional concept of function regarding the contribution or duties of a part within the overall "animal economy" and argued that the "faculties" of the soul are among the functions of the nervous system. In particular, he brought this psychophysiological use of the term into his Enlightenment perspective when he aligned it with internal essence, juxtaposed it to its external sign, and argued that the cerebral organs are the material instruments through which the internal faculties manifest themselves in behavior and in the shape of the skull. Gall did not believe that the faculties are a product of the organs but that the organs, being material incarnations of the internal functions, contain the power to express the faculties externally. Purely psychological uses of function are infrequent among the works of Gall and his followers. It was not until the functionalists at the turn of the century that the word was applied to the adaptive utility of mental processes in relation to the environment and not until the advent of behaviorism that it was employed to refer to the end or adaptive utility of a particular behavior.
加尔并未使用“功能”一词来指代适应性心理过程或可观察到的行为。相反，他和颅相学家采用了一种关于功能的传统概念，即某一部分在整体“动物机体”中的作用或职责，并认为灵魂的“官能”是神经系统的功能之一。具体而言，当他将这个术语的这种心理生理学用法与内在本质联系起来，将其与外在表征并列，并认为脑器官是内在官能在行为和头骨形状中得以显现的物质工具时，他将其带入了启蒙运动的视角。加尔并不认为官能是器官的产物，而是认为器官作为内在功能的物质体现，具有在外部表达官能的能力。在加尔及其追随者的著作中，“功能”的纯粹心理学用法并不常见。直到世纪之交的机能主义者，这个词才被应用于心理过程相对于环境的适应性效用，而直到行为主义出现，它才被用来指代特定行为的目的或适应性效用。
