Our practice as psychologists in the field of education is clearly and decidedly positioned in a sociocultural perspective. This theory is characterized by the following suppositions: 1) the use of genetic analysis which implies going to the genesis, to the origin of the phenomenon in question, and studying it in its development, not simply as a final product; 2) its emphasis on the social origin of psychological phenomena; 3) the proposition that the higher mental functions and human action are mediated by tools and signs (Wertsch, 1991), among which language is the most outstanding, and 4) a proposal of methodological character which has to do with the unit of analysis of psychological phenomena: the mediated action.

With this focus regarding the psychological processes we seek to explain the complex relationships between learning and development by extending the notion of semiotic mediation toward a greater comprehension of thought and of its relationship with speech, as well as other phenomena implicated in the social life of language. These include "voices," discourse modes, social language and dialogue. Along this line of theoretical reflection we constructed our ideas and developed the actions which guide the empirical approaches we make in the field of education.

Constructivism, a recent line of pedagogical action in education, has found strong backing in the theoretical and methodological fundamentals of this focus because of its emphasis on the notion of appropriation and the social character, active and communicative, of the subjects implied in the construction of knowledge which occurs in the classroom (Coll, 1990).

On the basis of these supposed fundamentals of focus, in a later part of this work I will bring out the aspects which have constituted part of its applications to the field of education, one of the most important situations in which we can study the development of human beings.

For our purposes, and within this line of argument, it is proper to show that while the psychological development had traditionally been conceived as an individual process that occurred in the interior of the subject with an almost total independence from the influence of external factors, this idea has been almost entirely overthrown, fortunately, and today it is difficult that there should still be schools of psychology that deny the powerful influence exercised by social and cultural environment in the formation of the psychological processes. In this sense, education as a powerful social influence cannot be separated from the analysis of external influences which should be contemplated when one approaches the study of psychological development.

From the point of view of the sociocultural focus, the psychological processes are conceived as the result of mutual interaction between the individual and the culture. In this process of development the key to psychological function lies in the construction of meanings, concretely, in the meanings that we attribute to objects, words, and the actions of those about us. Also, individual creation of meanings is considered to be part of an active and social construction which we share with the other members of the social and cultural context in which we develop.

This process of coming to know the meaning of things is generated in the relationships we establish with other social agents, such as in the deliberate intervention of adults in children's learning, and occurs by means of a mediation which is eminently semiotic. In other words, it is in the processes of instruction that interactions come into play -principally linguistic interactions- between adults, children and their companions, and higher psychological functions are generated; from this comes their social and interactive character.

After this brief presentation, I will approach the following points with the intention of developing more deeply:

a) The genetic domains of psychological function.
b) The social origins of the psychological processes.
c) The semiotic mediation of the of the processes.
d) Action as a principle and as an object of study.

The problem, according to Vygotsky, was that: "These views do not take into account the reorganization of the very process of development, by virtue of which the importance and the meaning of each one of its characteristics is found in the continuity of transition from one state to another." Moreover, we should consider that "child development is a highly complex process which cannot be defined in any of its states on the basis of just one of its characteristics" (Vygotsky, 1972, quoted in Wertsch, 1985.).

His strategy consisted in examining as higher psychological functions, such things as attention, memory, thought, etc. These first appear in their elementary form, and later change to higher forms. He believed that lines of natural and cultural development are responsible for this, and argued that it is precisely cultural development which transforms the elementary processes into higher processes.

It is this point of view regarding the study of the development of psychological processes that has produced the concept of domains or genetic dimensions of elementary and higher psychological functions. As well, it serves Vygotsky in distinguishing between elementary and higher functions, and in following their evolution from their phylogenesis, passing through the first manifestations of intelligent conduct in human beings, via the historico-cultural method, till he comes to his study on ontogenesis, which integrates the domains of the different genetic fields.

In the genetic study of the psychological processes, Vygotsky distinguished four domains:

a) Phylogenetic
b) Historico-cultural
c) Ontogenetic
d) Microgenetic

The phylogenetic domain is centered in the study of the manner in which a specific psychological function emerges in the human species. For example, work with monkeys and chimpanzees in which researchers seek a phylogenetic continuity between biological transformations and the appearance of abilities such as problem-solving or human functions such as speech.

In phylogeny, the principal acting force is the Darwinian principle of natural selection, but homo sapiens having once appeared, along with the social organization which characterizes him, the explanatory focus of development changes. According to this author, what brought about the transformation of ape into man were new forms of adaptation to the natural environment. It was work and the consequent use of tools with which they mediated their actions on nature, that favored the emergence of higher psychological functions. Following Engels we may say that work created human beings.

The historico-cultural domain is the study of man, beginning with the use of signs which have been historically developed, and which are employed in cultural contexts. This is precisely the origin of the position we are examining here. While in phylogeny the principal role in explanation is played by the biological processes, in the historico-cultural domain it is played by the appearance of psychological tools: signs. In phylogeny, the acting force is the principle of natural selection; in the cultural dimension the explanatory force rests on the appearance of the instruments of mediation.

When man begins to use signs as means of communication, as a means of establishing links between the material aspects and the symbols he employs to express them or to create them by linguistic means, he changes his whole psychological structure. The act of establishing links between the material symbols of origin and thought, was a landmark in the evolution of homo sapiens. The possibility of creating inter- and intralinguistic contexts took him to other levels of development of the psychological functions.

This is what Wertsch means when he refers to the appearance of another principle which he calls "the principle of contextualization and decontextualization." Starting with the existence of the differences found in the transition of these new men coming from a primitive society, to a society which leaves traces of their cultural activity, of their civilization -that is, that they have gone from one stage of social development to another- it shows that they have been able to generate processes which have permitted them to use instruments of decontextualization, as would be the case in the appropriation of reading and writing or in the processes of education which eventually followed them. This in turn implies that in these men now appear psychological processes of a higher order. Vygotsky and Luria set out to prove this in the research they directed among the peasants of Uzbekistan in the thirties.

However, as Wertsch (1985) points out, the preceding has not been clearly substantiated. In fact, the studies done by Vygotsky and Luria were centered on the analysis of the decontextualization of the mediation instruments and the type of cognitive operations employed by the peasants of that era and of that region to solve problems, syllogisms and other questions related to attention, memory, and logical thought. Their findings were not confirmed by new research carried out within the framework of transcultural psychology (i.e. the work done by Scribner & Cole, 1981). According to Wertsch, the results of this later research indicate that "it is not possible to establish a sole dichotomy between literate, educated subjects capable of using decontextualized mediation instruments and advanced forms of higher psychological function on the one hand, and subjects with none of the these characteristics on the other. These relationships are more complex" (Wertsch, 1985, p. 56.).

The ontogenetic plane is related to studies about the evolution of the processes of a particular individual, and of the developmental forces which affect him -that is, the natural and cultural lines-.

The ontogenetic dimension is distinguished by the operation of more than one developmental force, and the competition between them, that is to say, it lies between the natural and cultural lines. While in the former domain the developmental course of the psychological processes is closely linked to the historical development of society, on an ontogenetic plane, the explanation is oriented toward the intersection of the natural and cultural lines, as well as the difference between the higher and elementary psychological functions.

Vygotsky, sorting out the biological and cultural reductionist explanations, argued that these forces were joined together in a process of "emerging interaction" between the natural and the social. In fact, he paid little attention to the course of natural development -just enough to introduce the debate over the sociocultural factors, according to Wertsch (1985)-.

The major part of the research which has given birth to a broad, systematized body of knowledge on child psychology is found in the dimension of ontogenesis, and the explanations it offers vary from a biologist-type point of view to a sociologist type. Vygotsky and his coworkers focused especially on the study of psychological phenomena from the ontogenetic domain. As previously mentioned (Cubero & Santamaría, 1992), studies of this type analyze the genesis and the transformation of a process in a specific individual.

The last of these domains is the microgenetic, which although it was sketched by Vygotsky, was later developed by his followers (Wertsch, 1985) to complete the vision of these domains. It has to do with the study of the formation of psychological processes in settings characteristic of experimental psychological procedures. Microgenetic analysis is centered on the detailed study of learning and developmental processes during very short periods of time. It constitutes a very important source of data for the comprehension of these processes. As well, the microgenetic domain refers to the formation process of a psychological function in a concrete, limited context of time and space.

The majority of work done in the area of education is located on these two last planes. I will speak about them in the last part of this text. Finally, we should remember that the concepts we have been discussing constitute the theoretical basis for the studies carried out, and are what orients and justifies them, that is: the social nature of the cognitive processes; its semiotically-mediated character and its emphasis on genetic analysis.

Now I will go on to give a brief review of the other previously-mentioned hypotheses.

In the child's cultural development, any function appears twice, or on two planes. First it appears on the social plane, and later, on the individual plane; first between personas (interpsychological) and later within the child (intrapsychological). This may be equally applied to voluntary attention, to logical memory and to the formation of concepts. All the higher functions originate as relationships between human beings (Vygotsky, 1979, p. 94).

The creation and utilization of signs as an auxiliary method for solving a specific psychological problem (remembering, comparing something, telling things, choosing, etc.) is a process analogous to the creation and utilization of instruments in reference to the psychological aspect. The sign acts as an instrument of psychological activity, just as a tool does in work (Vygotsky, 1979, p. 88).

a) An operation which initially represents an external activity is reconstructed and begins to take place internally; b) an interpersonal process is transformed into another which is intrapersonal; c) the transformation of an interpersonal process into an intrapersonal process is the result of a long series of evolutional processes (Vygotsky, 1979; pp. 93-94).

Vygotsky, in his search for the most appropriate unit of analysis for the study of psychological development, initially proposed the meaning of the word, since it already contains and reflects the basic properties of the group from which it starts out. However, later studies by his followers lead them to propose activity as the unit of analysis, not just as a "theoretical abstraction of the entire human universal practice", but as an explanatory principle and as the initial form of all types of human activity.

According to this focus, the essence of man's activity can be discovered in the process of the "analysis of the content of interrelated concepts such as work, social organization, universality, freedom, conscience, the statement of an objective whose bearer is the generic subject" (Davidov, 1988). Basing myself on this author (Davidov, 1988, and in texts by Leontiev, 1984, and Wertsch, 1985), I will try to give the reader a brief version of the theory of activity.

The original psychological theory of action proposed by Vygotsky was later developed by Leontiev (1984), and constitutes, in essence, his personal concept of the psyche as a product derived from the development of external physical life which in the course of historico-social development is transformed into internal activity -activity of the conscience-. In this theory, the basic task is researching the structure of activity and its interiorization.

From this point of view, the real explanation of conscience lies in the study of the social conditions and procedures of action which generate the need for a conscience -in other words, the work activity of individuals-. In work activity the objectivation of the image that motivates and regulates any activity of the subject has its place; but for this to be so, the object should appear to man as "having reproduced the psychological content of the activity."

The initial and basic activity is the external, practical, sensorial objective, which is derived from the internal psychic activity of the individual conscience. The activity is determined by the kinds of production of life conditions. It is constituted by its orientation toward the object, and toward the properties and relationships which define it.

The object of the activity presents itself to us in two ways: first in its real and independent existence, which captures the subject's attention; and later, as the image of the object, as a psychic reflection of its property which is formed as a result of the subject's activity. So, we may ask: what is it that directs the activity of the subject? The object first, and then the image of it, as a subjective product of the activity which carries with it the objective content. The image, in essence, constitutes the result of the proof of existence of the object. The image, in a way, absorbs the system of objective relationships and circumstantial properties in which the object is immersed (Davidov, 1988).

The activity of the subject begins with a need, from a lack of the object on the individual's part. But for that, an essential condition is that the object have had, and that it still have its own existence in the exterior reality. Starting from this act, there are generated certain actions that obey specific motives, which in their turn, are linked with the aims of the activity itself. In this sense, the activity is action with a goal. If the activity loses its motive, it can be transformed into action, and this, if its aim is modified, can become operation.

One of Leontiev's principal theses states that the objective determination of activity is possible thanks to a special quality which it has: universal plasticity, the ability to take on the properties, relationships and connections of the objective world (Davidov, 1988).

The acts through which we designate these aspects constitute the content of linguistic meaning. Behind the meanings are hidden the socially-formed procedures of actino -in other words, the operations in this theory- in the process of which, people know and modify objective reality. In the meanings is represented the ideal form of the existence of the objective world and its properties, connections and relationships, opened to view by common social practice (Leontiev, 1984).

The principal problem is how to explain the interiorization of this practical activity which, in the beginning is social and then goes on to be appropriated by the individual. If we carefully examine the type of activity we will see that this is characterized by a structure and by a dynamic that adopts different types and forms, etc. But the most important thing is that it does not exist outside the social relationships we establish with other people.

What is important to remember here is that the concept of activity is linked with the certainty of its objective character: "that to which the act is addressed (...), in other words, as something with which the living being has a relationship -with the object of his activity, be this external or internal-." So, from this point of view the subject interacts actively and truly with the object; he seeks it and tries it and he "finds" it in a partial and selective manner (Davidov, 1988, p.28).

In summary, the psychological structure of activity is constituted by the need of the subject to reach this object in order to fill the lack of it; this; which becomes the motive, and then the aim of the activity. The unity of the aim and the conditions for reaching it come to make up the task. In this pattern the following transformations take place: activity » action » operation and motive » aim » conditions.

This is not the time to enter into an argument over some of the aspects mentioned in the development of the theory of activity, which have not yet been adequately explained, so we will only point out that with the passing of time its followers have come to modify some points of view and have come to propose action directed toward goals and mediated by instruments as the unit of analysis (Zichenko, 1985).

In action directed toward goals and mediated by instruments the psychological functions and the relationships existing among them are reflected. Signs and meanings are expressed, and we find other semiotic manifestations. Moreover, action directed toward goals implies an individual in communication with other agents of his environment. In other words, in it are reflected types of behavior that are organized and defined in a cultural manner, according to the patterns accepted in the social group to which he belongs. These are acquired through the interaction maintained by its members.

In this context we believe that for a theory to be considered complete, it should take into account the agents, their actions directed toward goals with certain definite purposes, the setting in which these actions are developed and the goals that motivate them, as well as the instruments they use for communication. In our cultural context we find settings such as school, work environments and the community in general that favor their study in an overall way.

The school is distinguished by favoring among its members forms of thought that have been accepted by a cultural group, so constituted in one of the principal institutions which presents new forms of confronting problems by means of the development of common cultural artifacts.

Moreover, in the school context the activity of study is generated; this, like that of play and work activity (all productive in one or another sense) gives clear examples of the subject's integrated activity in all its

The distance between the real level of development, determined by the ability to solve a problem independently, and the level of potential development, determined by solving a problem while guided by an adult or in collaboration with a more capable companion (p. 133).

(...) permits us to trace the immediate future of the child, as well as its dynamic evolutional status, showing not only what has been evolutionally completed, but also that which is in process of maturation (Vygotsky, 1979, p. 134).

First, I would begin by pointing out the social origin of knowledge and of the processes that make up the higher-order psychological functions, as well as the importance attributed to the mediation of adults in the appropriation by minors of these psychological processes which we have presented as interactive and primarily social. As we see it, the influence of adults is undoubtedly powerful. A child could not learn anything from memory if he did not observe the strategies an adult follows in learning a text or a list of items, etc. In this way, we can determine that a minor appropriates processes such as memorization or solving a problem, when he sees how an adult does it. We can verify this as much from an ontogenetic point of view as from a historico-cultural one, particularly if we remember that we "see" ourselves in the activity other human beings are doing.

Second, development should be seen as going beyond the present moment, in a prospective sense. Here it is important to remember Vygotsky's statement that the only good teaching is that which precedes development. As well, it is worthwhile to underline the importance of seeing development and learning as closely linked in a prospective vision, which can facilitate a clearly interactive attitude between teachers and students. In this sense, the teacher should be conscious that much of what his students learn, they learn in interaction with their classmates, and not only through direct contact with objects. From this stems the importance of mediational (semiotic) intervention by adults or by partners with more training. Consider, for example, a situation where a child is allowed to come into contact with an object, let us say a musical instrument, and see if he is able to obtain from it a coherent sequence of notes. Instead, let us put him in contact with an adult who can explain to him the language of the musical symbols and the movements necessary for managing the instrument, and in a short while we will see a clear interchange of actions that will lead him to learning (playing the instrument) and to the development of new abilities and knowledge.

From this perspective, there is a change in the conception of the roles traditionally attributed to teachers and students in a school context. The former may be seen as coordinators who help in the creation of support systems (in the sense of scaffolding) and reconstruct the space of the development zones between what the students know at that moment and what they can master tomorrow.

One last thing it seems important to me to point out, is that in these reciprocal instructional spaces there are also created atmospheres which, when one knows how to take advantage of them, function as learning communities in which new knowledge is constructed and higher level psychological functions are developed through the arrival of other points of view and opinions of unquestionable value and sociocultural origin. In this field it is possible also to promote the application of some new methodology (constructivist, ethnographic) derived from explanatory principles offered by disciplines such as cultural anthropology, which through the evidence they provide have proved their usefulness in the study of the sociogenetic processes for the explanation of psychological development.

Translator: Lessie Evona York Weatherman
School of Languages
Autonomous University of Baja California at Mexicali

Bruner, J. S. (1991). Actos de significado. Más allá de la revolución cognitiva. Madrid: Alianza.

Bruner, J. S. (1995). Meaning and self in cultural perspective. In D. Bakjust & C. Spynowich (Eds.), The social self (pp. 18-29). Londres: Sage.

Cole, M. (1985) The zone of proximal development: where culture and cognition create each other. In J. Wertsch (Ed.), Culture, communication and cognition: Vygotskian perspectives (pp. 146-161). Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

Cole, M. & Scribner, S. (1977) Cultura y pensamiento. Relación de los procesos cognoscitivos con la cultura. México: Limusa. (Original work published 1974). Cole, M. & Wertsch, J. V. (1996) Beyond the individual-social antinomy in discussions of Piaget and Vygotsky. Human Development, 39 (5), 250-256.

Coll, C. (1998). La teoría genética y los procesos de construcción del conocimiento en el aula. In J. A. Castorina, C. Coll, A. Díaz Barriga, F. Díaz Barriga, B. García, G. Hernández, L. Moreno, I. Muriá, A. M. Pessoa de C. & C. E. Vasco, Piaget en la educación (pp. 17-52). México: Paidós Educador-UNAM.

Cubero, M. & Santamaría, A. (1992). Una visión social y cultural del desarrollo humano. Infancia y Aprendizaje, 35, 17-30.

Davidov, V. (1988). La enseñanza escolar y el desarrollo psíquico. Moscú: Progreso.

Huertas, J. A., Rosa, A. & Montero, I. (1991). La troika: un análisis del desarrollo de las contribuciones de la escuela sociohistórica de Moscú. Anuario de Psicología, 4 (51), 113-128.

Karmiloff-Smith, A. (1979). A functional approach to child language. A study of determiners and reference. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

Leontiev, A. N. (1984). Actividad, conciencia y personalidad. México: Cártago.

Moll, L. (1993). Vygotsky y la educación. Connotaciones y aplicaciones de la psicología sociohistórica a la educación. Argentina: Aique.

Ramírez, J. D. (1996). Usos de la palabra y sus tecnologías. Una aproximación dialógica al estudio de la alfabetización. Buenos Aires: Miño y Dávila.

Scribner, S. & Cole, M. (1981). The psychology of literacy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Vygotsky, L. S. (s/f). Pensamiento y lenguaje. Teoría del desarrollo cultural de las funciones psíquicas. México: Ediciones Quinto Sol.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1972). El problema de la periodización por etapas del desarrollo del niño. Problemas de Psicología, 2, 114-123.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1979). El desarrollo de los procesos psicológicos superiores. Barcelona: Grijalbo.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1982). Obras Escogidas (Vol. 2). Madrid:Visor Distribuciones.

Wertsch, J. V. (1985). Vygotsky y la formación social de la mente. Barcelona: Paidós.

Wertsch, J. V. (1989). Los mecanismos semióticos en la actividad cognitiva conjunta. Infancia y aprendizaje, 47, 2-22.

Wertsch, J. V. (1991). Voces de la mente. Un enfoque sociocultural para el estudio de la acción mediada. Madrid: Visor Distribuciones.

Wertsch, J. V. & Sohmer, R. (1995). Vygotsky on learning and development. Human Development, 38, 332-337.

Wertsch, J. V. & Stone, C. A. (1985). The concept of internalization in Vygotsy's account of the genesis of higher mental functions. In J. Wertsch (Ed.), Culture, communication and cognition: Vygotskian perspectives (pp. 162-179). Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

Zichenko, V. P. (1985). Vygotsky' s ideas about units of analysis of mind. In J. Wertsch (Ed.), Culture, communication and cognition: Vygotskian perspectives (pp. 94-118). Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.