Aleksei N. Leontiev facts for kids

Alexei Nikolaevich Leontiev (born February 18, 1903 – died January 21, 1979) was an important Soviet psychologist and philosopher. He is known for creating a special way of understanding how people learn and develop, called activity theory.

His Life and Work

Alexei Leontiev's journey in psychology began at Moscow State University. He started studying there in 1921. He learned psychology from a teacher named G. I. Chelpanov.

From 1924 to 1930, Leontiev worked closely with two other famous psychologists, Lev Vygotsky and Alexander Luria. Together, they wanted to create a new kind of psychology. They aimed to understand human behavior better than the ideas popular at the time, which focused only on simple reactions to things.

Leontiev moved to another city, Kharkov, in 1931, but he still kept in touch with Vygotsky about their scientific ideas. Later, in 1934, Leontiev returned to Moscow. He became the head of the Psychology Department at Moscow State University.

In 1966, something big happened: Moscow State University created a brand new department just for psychology, called the Faculty of Psychology. Alexei Leontiev became its very first leader, or Dean. He continued to work there until he passed away in 1979.

His Scientific Ideas

Leontiev's early work explored how culture and history influence how we think and remember. For example, he studied how children and adults develop their memory skills.

His most famous idea is called activity theory. This theory looks deeply at how people do things and why. Leontiev and a group of psychologists in Kharkov started developing this idea in the 1930s. After World War II, when Leontiev moved back to Moscow, activity theory became a very important way of thinking about psychology in the Soviet Union.

Leontiev believed that our "activity" is everything we do in the world around us. He suggested that we can understand human actions by looking at three different levels:

• The highest level is activity itself. This is driven by our motives, which are the big reasons why we do something.
• The middle level involves actions. These are specific things we do to reach our goals.
• The lowest level is made up of operations. These are the simple ways or means we use to carry out our actions and achieve our goals.

For example, if your motive (highest level) is to learn about history, your activity is studying. An action (middle level) might be reading a history book, and your goal is to understand a specific chapter. The operations (lowest level) would be the small things you do, like moving your eyes across the page or turning pages.

See also

In Spanish: Alekséi Leóntiev para niños