The author describes principal stages in the establishment and development of Russian differential psychophysiology founded by B.M.Teplov. Complex psychological and psychophysiological research has revealed two types of ability - communicative and cognitive - with different sets of psychological and physiological components. Applied research of language learning, for instance, has revealed a number of stable naturally determined individual strategies - communicative, cognitive and mixed. On the example of the triad "teacher - method - student" the author illustrates variability of each of the three types as well as relation of inborn characteristics to acquired skills.