Biology as Context

Each of us has inherited a distinctive and unique biological basis from which to experience the world and everything that happens to us. Therefore, how we experience and respond to the world is influenced to a large extent by this genetic, biological, basis. What may be pleasure producing for one of us, is an allergen to another!

Our biology is the primary context from which life takes shape. This perspective differs from dichotomous perspectives on “mind” and “body” in that the study of biology serves to synthesize these constructs together. We cannot have an experience of the mind without the body, and the body cannot exist independent of the outside world and the things that it experiences.

When we stub our toe, it resonates throughout our entire physiology. Not only do we feel the painful impact through the activity of our nervous system, it also influences us at an emotional level (anger) and our behavior (hopping around). Later, our biological apparatus can actually “learn” from the experience and accommodate to a familiar environment, allowing us to avoid the same experience through navigating around the doorframe even in the dark. Our experiences in the world are taken in through our physiology, and in turn allow us to operate relative to the physical environment. We have muscle memory that occurs in our body, carrying out influence of previous physical experiences.

The same can be said about our experience in a social environment. Through lived-experience, our biology comes to anticipate certain occurrences in our social encounters, and it develops strategies to navigate these. Our environment then comes to set the functioning of our basic biology.

Our biology is also a driving force in mitigating experience as well. Changes in our biology stemming from hormones, hunger, diet, medications, substances, or other biochemical variables change how we actually experience both the physical as well as the social world around us. Growth and aging are two changes that occur to our biology that greatly alter our reality in the process.

In these ways, although we tend to think of biology as what allows us to experience things, it also shapes and alters how and what we experience. In this way, our biology is a context that we are inextricably linked to, and that we need to care for, understand, and take responsibility for.

Biological changes within us change our experience, and biodiversity between individuals serve as distinctive contexts through which our world is viewed.

The Biological Adaption and Growth

Human growth and development is facilitated by processes that begin in the brain and that occur throughout the body and over the course of time. The environment serves an important role in this process, through guiding growth and development. Just as a plant requires the right conditions in the soil and atmosphere to grow, our brains rely on opportunities provided to us in our physical and social environment.

Under the right environmental conditions, the brain and body develop along a somewhat predictable course, exchanging biochemical signals in the promotion and later retardation of cell growth in certain areas. At different stages of development, hormone creation and secretion is instrumental in augmenting or transforming aspects of this development. Although the mysteries of this process are still being uncovered, full understanding of this biological unfolding may best be considered through an evolutionary lens.

At a brain level, certain axioms can be identified that speak to basic rules of order in braid and body development. One of these is the “use it or loose it” rule. As the brain communicates with the rest of the body and receives direction from the environment, certain under-developed propensities can be effectively extinguished. One ways this occurs is when neural networks are “pruned away” by the developing brain or when neurochemical signals start becoming reabsorbed by the body due to lack of use.

On the other hand, the brain also demonstrates a certain degree of functional resilience. One example of this in the concept of neuroplasticity in which the use of brain cells can be coopted for a different purpose after damage to a nearby region of the brain has impacted upon certain functioning.

Through interactions with the environment over time, certain capacities and functionality are utilized enough to set a precedent that gets reinforced over time. Our brain growth and development then becomes a function of the genetic processes that underly our biology and operating environment that allows these propensities to blossom into fruition.

What is Body Talking?

Although the brain plays a rather crucial role in our growth and development, it is the entirety of our biological apparatus that Individual Psychology has been concerned with since its inception.

The brain sends and receives signals to different areas of the body, and bodily experiences occur in tandem with brain experiences.

Early in his writings, Adler became interested in organ deficits, and how these could be seen factoring in to an individual’s psychological development and behavior. Adler introduced the concepts of compensation and overcompensation in describing our psychological adaptation to physical deficits that impede upon our social standing or autonomy. Some of these “adaptive” responses can prove to be quite maladaptive in the long wrong (as in the case with overcompensation), whereas other adaptations serve to propel us on in the direction of growth and contribution (compensation).

Adler also coined the term organ jargon which might be better referred to now as “body talking”. This has been interpreted to refer to somatic complaints and expressions that are purposive in nature, that convey hidden goals and purposes of the individual’s overall actions. An upset stomach, bloody nose, or literal headache may all be expressions of body talking.

A similar concept now would be emerging research on psychophysiology, the study into how our physiology expresses psychological distress, and psychoneuroimmunology, the study of how the mind influences health and resistance to disease.

“Mind” experiences and emotions ultimately need to be experienced in some way in our bodies and bodily structures. Sometimes these bodily experiences and their significance are not that clear to the individual and serve as the impetus for the individual to seek out assistance in the form therapy, medical intervention, or psychotropic medication to deal with. When we hear somebody state “I’ve got a feeling” it is a reasonable assumption that body talking is at play.

The Biological Basis of Social Interest/Community Feeling

Adler introduced the concept of gemeinschaftsgefühl, which was a german expression that has been translated to mean something in the ballpark of social interest or community feeling. Therefore, social interest and community feeling have often been replaced in english translations with the more nuanced german term.

In the last few decades, research has abounded on the brain, which has allowed us to identify neural mechanisms for empathy, perspective taking, and awareness of self and others. In particular, the identification of mirror neurons have allowed scientists to better understand how we it is that we can identify with the emotional experience of others. Research on the Theory of Mind (ToM) construct, has allowed us to understand “take perspective” and understand the mental states and experiences of oneself and others. The identification of neural mechanisms allows us to engage in a more robust scientific discourse around the social interest and community feeling, including consideration for organicity involved in the process.

For the field of biology as well as Individual Psychology, though, the final “proof” of social interest and community feeling lies not in its identification in the brain, but in identification of examples of their occurrence in the behavior or the individual or in the social interactions between others. The evolutionary benefit of social interest and community feeling serves as the final reinforcer for this behavior, which we can now more readily recognize as occurring at a brain level, also.

The Biological Context and Life Style

Individual Psychology has long considered how the individual’s early and ongoing physical self shapes the development of Life Style. The “Napoleon Complex” is a term that has been used to describe how an individual’s physical size and stature may factor into the development or a “larger than life” personality or a need to prove one’s self. This concept is rooted in Adlerian concepts of inferiority and is just one example of how biology and our physical self contributes to Life Style.

Physical illness, body type, and appearance all influence how we experience ourselves and how others may receive us. Additionally, the health states and outcomes of persons close to us in early life may also make us aware of our own physical threats and vulnerabilities. The early death of a family member may have a long lasting impact upon us, including some underlying uncertainty in life and our own security. As we strive to overcome such losses, we adopt strategies that drive us forward past these uncertainties or we may take greater precaution because of it.

Phenotype pertains to the outward appearance of an individual as influenced by genetic variables. These too can play out in our social experience and ultimately our Life Style. For instance, social factors such as racism shape our experience of our phenotypic features such as skin complexion. Each of us comes to anticipate the reception we receive from others, based on variables that we have very little control of. Since we cannot alter phenotype or how we are treated and received by others, this repeated reception comes to shape how we think and feel about ourselves. This also shapes the strategies we come to devise for “making it” in the world and finding a place amongst others.

Genotype refers to underlying genetic variability that attributes to phenotype and differences between individuals. Genotype is not always outwardly observable but contributes to variances in how we experience things, “under the surface”. Genotype includes latent genetic information (that which is not expressed) as well as genetic information that influences factors such as metabolism, neurological processing, and health risks. These things can impact directly and indirectly upon how we experience things, and therefor influence patterns of social engagement that develop over life and Life Style.

Biological Growth and Development

What is it that our body is telling us at any given time? What might it be conveying to us regarding this particular situation or circumstance, and how can we get better at understanding these signals? What wisdom lies in the body, and how do our bodily experiences relate to our past and early social experiences and encounters? When do we want to “listen” to our body, and when might our past experiences be holding us hostage and limiting our ability to grow and develop?

These are some of the questions we hope to find answers to over the course of life. One thing is certain, is that our physical selves require our attention and care. We need to take care of our bodies and make decisions that are good for the longevity or our physical health and wellness.

Biological growth, like all other growth, occurs overtime and is best considered relative to developmental stages. What our bodies require in early childhood is quite different from what is required later in life. Our stage of life also shapes the nature and role that social relations play for us at different stages. As we seek to grow and develop in a healthy trajectory over the course of our life it requires us to harmonize our experiences in the world with the needs and experiences of our bodies. MASL is committed to promoting perspective and dialogue regarding biological growth and development as it is experienced by each of us distinctly and throughout life’s stages.