Implications for Biology

7 Dimensions of Functioning

From an evolutionary perspective, it is our capacity for endeavours that sets us apart from other species and enables human dominance. These endeavours are expressions of 'whole person' functioning.

Each of the primary domains of personal functioning—action, inquiry, change, experience, communication, purpose and willingness—appears to have 7 dimensions that correspond to the Root Levels, and do so in the same order:

1. an action dimension found in L1.
2. an inquiry dimension found in L2.
3. a state-change dimension found in L3.
4. an experiential dimension found in L4.
5. a communication dimension found in L5.
6. a purposive dimension found in L6.
7. a willingness dimension found in L7.

While the Taxonomy enables conscious creative functioning, these intrinsic dimensions would seem to correspond to tendencies that are instinctive and biological. Such a biological underpinning is presumably primarily neurophysiological i.e. brain-based.

Features of Psychosocial Instincts

«Instinct» is a problematic notion in studies of human behaviour, although still a focus of ethologists. So the concept is not well-defined. It was transmuted in the psychology of motivation to «biological drive» e.g. hunger as a drive for food, thirst as a drive for water.

However, the instincts relevant for endeavour are affective (emotional, volitional, social) rather than purely sensory (physiological). Some of our physiological needs (e.g. temperature control) do not immediately call for the creation of endeaours. However, other needs, e.g. for food or water, do commonly require endeavours in adult life.

■ Psychosocial needs must be met for survival.

Children that are provided with adequate physical care in institutions but do not have proper care and individual attention fail to thrive and may die.

Severe mental illness (e.g. schizophrenia, depression, autism) impedes pursuit of endeavours and psychosocial needs are not met. Without extra care from others, they are liable to ill-health and death, often by accident or suicide.

It is now well-established that biological processes regulate our moods, mental processes and social life. Neuro-mental systems relevant to affect and whole animal behavior, and hence social existence, are known to exist in mammals, birds, and even reptiles and invertebrates. Even consciousness seems present, according to the international group of leading neuroscientists who signed "The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness" (7 July, 2012).

Proposition: The elements that constitute personal functioning and are expressed in endeavours are the outcome of neurobiological capacities with the following features:

• found universally in human beings,
• unmodifiable in their fundamentals,
  
• emerges or operates automatically during development,
• can lie quiescent and be triggered by a situation,
  
• irresistible as an inner state but suppressible as an external interaction
  
• require no training, but skills or attitudes may enhance usefulness—and so it invites training, learning from experience and reflective awareness.

Pressures (Affective) v Drives (Sensory)

The proposition is that «psychosocial survival» complements «biological survival».

Primitive instincts related to biological survival manifest as drives e.g. hunger drive with food-seeking behaviours, sex drive with efforts for satisfaction from a partner. Their urgency, when activated, is marked. Once satisfied, the drive recedes. The result is a rhythm or cycles.

A different term is required for the manifestation of instincts related to psychosocial survival: psychosocial pressure.

■ This pressure can be more insistent and inexorable than a drive, and satiation does not occur. Manifestation is constant or episodic rather than rhythmic or cyclic.

■ Pressures arise within oneself and are felt from others in regard to activities that impinge on them. Pressure may be perceived weakly as a mild wish or intensely as a peremptory demand.

■ The neurophysiological basis appears to be Jaak Panksepp's neurobiological circuits, as explained here.

The proposed pressures are shown in the Table below in regard to the analyses just completed.

Levels in the PHs	Proposed Root Level Input	Psychosocial Pressure
L7s	Willingness-RL7	Selflessness
L6s	Purpose-RL6	Autonomy
L5s	Communication-RL5	Understanding
L4s	Experience-RL4	Well-being
L3s	Change-RL3	Acceptability
L2s	Inquiry-RL2	Certainty
L1s	Action-RL1	Performance

While the ideas were stimulated by the present investigation, details and confirmations emerged in studying the Root projection to Principal Typology Complexes; and then further confirmed in studying Root projection to the Structural Hierarchies. Each Psychosocial Pressure is examined in more detail in the next topic.

The presence of these pressures (or usually patterns of pressures) throughout the Taxonomy is conjectured to be the basis for the phenomenon of resonance. Resonance refers to the psychosocial similarity between two taxonomic elements that flows from a similarity in their formulae. The more similar the formulae, the greater the resonance to the point at which people may argue that the two entities are actually the "same thing".

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• Now consider these pressures level by level in each of the Primary Hierarchies.

Initially posted: 2-Aug-2013. Amended: 28-Jan-2015. Last updated: 8-Jan-2023.