María Mercedes Gómez DABOIN and Ana Rita Silva ALMEIDA
Nuances: Estudos sobre Educação, Presidente Prudente, v. 34, n. 00, e023024, 2023. e-ISSN: 2236-0441
DOI: https://doi.org/10.32930/nuances.v34i00.10051 5
However, it remains to be seen, what is the link between the Self and the Other, considering the
total inexperience of an individual at birth? What could mediate the relationship of a newborn
with the OTHER, that is, with the social world, the world of people, to the extent of initiating
its individual construction process?
In Wallon's psychogenetics, the functional domains work together in an integrated
manner, with affectivity being the most primitive domain due to the neurophysiological
condition of humans at birth. The maturation of certain nervous centers allows the individual
to experience, in the first days of contact with the world, both physical and sociocultural,
gradually, a triad of sensitivities called interoceptive, proprioceptive, and exteroceptive.
To begin with, there is, therefore, a dissociation between the different
functional domains: the interoceptive domain, which is that of visceral
sensitivity; the proprioceptive domain, which encompasses sensations related
to balance, attitudes, and movements; and the exteroceptive domain, or
sensitivity directed towards excitations of external origin. Among the
manifestations of these domains, there is a considerable chronological
distance. Interoceptive functions are the earliest; exteroceptive functions are
the latest (WALLON, 1993, p. 186-187, our translation).
These sensitivities, or domains, as identified by Wallon in his book “Origens do caráter
na criança”, are a set of tonic reactions related to conditions of well-being or discomfort, whose
origin may stem not only from the body itself or the external (physical) world, but also from
the social world through Others. Among interoceptive activities, we highlight reflexes (for
example, breathing reflexes) and spasms (such as the cry of the newborn); in proprioceptive
activities, cervical and labyrinthine reflexes, while exteroceptive activities manifest as
increased pulse rate, motor agitation, etc. Here, we have affectivity in its most elementary form,
translating into manifestations of affective connotation, preceding the emergence of emotions
proper, whose progression will occur in the successive stages of the subject's development.
From the Wallonian perspective, human development is understood as a process of
progressive, discontinuous construction, driven by the conflict of different and complementary
functional domains. This process occurs in stages, called stages, where each is predominantly
characterized by a set of activities directed towards a specific functional domain. Each stage
has its distinct characteristics, but the integration of all constitutes the complete person. In the
words of Mahoney (2004), "Each stage is considered a complete system in itself, that is, its
configuration and functioning reveal the presence of all its components, the type of relationship