Instinctive Behaviour: An Alternative Model

I am altogether doubtful whether any decisive pointers for the differentiation and classification of the instincts can be arrived at on the basis of working over the psychological material. This working over seems rather itself to call for the application to the material of definite assumptions concerning instinctual life, and it would be a desirable thing if these assumptions could be taken from some other branch of knowledge and carried over to psychology.

There is no more urgent need in psychology than for a securely founded theory of the instincts on which it might then be possible to build further. Nothing of the sort exists, however….

During the half-century since Freud sought a well-based theory of instinct and lamented his inability to find one, striking progress has been made. To this progress many disciplines have contributed. A long-awaited theoretical breakthrough has been achieved by analytical biology and control theory, which together have elucidated the basic principles that underlie adaptive, goal-directed behaviour. Exploiting the breakthrough have been three empirically based sciences: ethology (the study of animal behaviour by zoologists), experimental psychology, and neurophysiology—Freud's own first love. Each of these three disciplines has its own distinctive origins and also its own distinctive fields of interest, methods, and concepts; and it is, therefore, no wonder that for some years there was little exchange between them and some misunderstanding. In recent times, however, a greater familiarity with the control systems approach and with each other's work has shown how each has its own unique contribution to make and how effectively the