Who is wundt

Wundt became famous at Leipzig. Enrollment in his courses doubled about every 15 years, reaching a peak of students in the summer of Wundt ended up sponsoring Ph. Quote—including reference to Tinker—from Hearst b: Nevertheless, his drive and unflagging intellectual advocacy will arouse admiration in some: even at age 80, he remained involved in academic controversy.

Early nineteenth-century German psychology labored under the looming shadow of Kant and his arguments that a science of psychology is in principle impossible.

This fact by itself illustrates the oddity of the situation, from our point of view: why would a psychologist care what a philosopher thought about his practice? Psychologists were philosophers on the defensive cf. L III: In the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science , he argued that empirical psychology cannot be an exact science because the phenomena it seeks to explain are not mathematically expressible Kitcher Thus psychologists found their object declared beyond the limit of possible investigation and their methods vain.

On the other hand, the efforts of J. Herbart to devise a mathematical mental mechanics suggested a possible way forward although in the end it proved equally fruitless. Thus, for those mid-nineteenth-century enthusiasts of mental phenomena, the future of a genuine psychology seemed blocked. At the same time, however, progress was being made in human physiology, especially of the sensory systems.

In , the physiologist, E. Weber, published a startling discovery in his De tactu. His experiments on the sensation of weight had led him to find that there obtains a constant ratio between, on the one hand, a given stimulus and, on the other hand, a second stimulus sufficiently larger for the difference between the two stimuli to be just noticeable, no matter the magnitude of the first stimulus. Sections 3 and 4 are devoted to a description of its definition, method, and doctrine, while Section 5 concerns its theoretical underpinnings.

Hearst b: Let us focus on the first assumption, since it is one Wundt addresses. L III: , ff , i. Nevertheless, Wundt repeatedly addresses the objections raised against the very possibility of psychological, as opposed to physiological or psychophysical, experimentation. How are we to subject the mind-body complex to physiological stimulation such that the reactions may be given a purely psychological interpretation?

From the physiological point of view, experimentation with stimulus and response are not experiments of sensation, but of externally observable excitations and reactions of nerve and muscle tissue. For example, a nerve fiber or a skin surface may be given an electric shock or brought into contact with acid, and twitches of muscle fiber are observed to follow.

Now Wundt is well aware of the common criticism that self-observation seems inescapably to involve the paradoxical identity described in the previous section of the observing subject and observed object. Since in this case the observing subject coincides with the observed object, it is obvious that the direction of attention upon these phenomena alters them.

Now since our consciousness has less room for many simultaneous activities the more intense these activities are, the alteration in question as a rule consists in this: the phenomena that one wishes to observe are altogether suppressed [i. L III: [ 19 ]. In other words, it is in the controlled conditions of a laboratory that one can, by means of experimenter, experimental subject, and various apparatus, arbitrarily and repeatedly call forth precisely predetermined phenomena of consciousness.

Only in this way is. L III: [ 20 ]. A detailed account of these experiments themselves, however, lies far beyond the scope of this article. Wundt, like most early experimental psychologists, [ 22 ] concentrated his investigations upon sensation and perception; of all psychic phenomena, sensation is the most obviously connected to the body and the physical world Hearst b: Sensations Empfindungen , as the medium between the physical and psychic, are uniquely susceptible to a double-sided inquiry, [ 23 ] viz.

According to Wundt, the representations Vorstellungen that constitute the contents Inhalt of consciousness all have their elemental basis in sensations Empfindungen PP I: Yet, the manifestly composite nature of our representations forces us to abstract such elementary components PP I: cf.

PP II: His treatment of quality and intensity are especially important for getting a clearer notion of his notion of psychological experimentation. The outer sensory stimuli may be measured by physical methods, whereas psychology is given the corresponding. PP I: —3. Sensation can thus be measured with respect to changes in intensity corresponding to changes in strength of stimuli PP I: —6.

Wundt writes:. Or: If in our apprehension [ Auffassung ] the intensity of the sensation is to increase by equal amounts, then the relative stimulus-increase must remain constant. This latter statement may also be expressed as follows: The strength of a stimulus must increase geometrically if the strength of the apperceived sensation is to increase arithmetically. PP I: Now these various formulations [ 27 ] of WL admit, as Wundt says, of three different, and indeed incompatible interpretations; that is, there are three different conceptions of what WL is a law of.

Wundt rejects both of these in favor of a third, the psychological interpretation; his arguments are instructive. Against the physiological interpretation Wundt raises the following main point, viz. PP I: —2. In other words, WL. PP I: ; cf. WL is therefore not a law of sensation so much as of apperception. His interpretation of WL nicely illustrates how, on his view, physiological experiments can yield mathematically expressible results, not about the physical, somatic processes involved in sensation, but about the relationships among these sensations as apperceived , i.

Psychology finds consciousness to be constituted of three major act-categories: representation, willing, and feeling; our discussion is limited to the first two.

Now while Wundt is forced to speak of representations and representational acts as distinct, he is nevertheless clear that they are merely different aspects of a single flowing process. As discussed in the previous section, all consciousness originates in sensations. PP II: but merely thought, then it is a so-called reproduced representation.

Although consciousness consists in the formation of representations, on the one hand, and of the coming and going of such representations, on the other hand—i. We are also aware within our consciousness of another activity operating upon our representations, namely of paying them attention PP II: Wundt appeals to an analogy:. This feature of consciousness can be clarified by that common image we use in calling consciousness an inner vision.

Thus consciousness is a function of the scope of attention, which may be broader as perception or narrower as apperception [ 34 ]. Apperception, in turn, may either actively select and focus upon a perceived representation, or it may passively find certain representations suddenly thrusting themselves into the center of attention PP II: ; PP II: to the extent that it gives the impression of two separable forms of attention able in principle to subsist together simultaneously that is, apperception focusing upon a point in the perceptual field while that field continues to be perceived.

No: perceptive attention becomes apperceptive attention just as it focuses more strenuously, constricting the perceptive field. Passive apperception may be characterized simply by saying that here the associative form of representational connection is predominant cf. He does not consider the types of association to be genuine psychological laws, i. We see here the important role played by his so-called voluntarism: [ 36 ] associationist psychologists, according to Wundt, cannot give an account of the subjective activity that immediately characterizes consciousness cf.

Wundt b: , ff. L I: Yet this is not to deny association of sensations altogether. The second requirement was the use of repeatable stimuli that always produced the same experience in the subject and allowed the subject to expect and thus be fully attentive to the inner reaction. This attempt to understand the structure or characteristics of the mind was known as structuralism.

Wundt established his psychology laboratory at the University at Leipzig in In this laboratory, Wundt and his students conducted experiments on, for example, reaction times. A subject, sometimes in a room isolated from the scientist, would receive a stimulus such as a light, image, or sound. He created the first laboratory for psychological research. However, despite his efforts to train individuals in the process of introspection, this process remained highly subjective, and there was very little agreement between individuals.

William James — was the first American psychologist who espoused a different perspective on how psychology should operate. Key to that theory is the idea that natural selection leads to organisms that are adapted to their environment, including their behavior. Adaptation means that a trait of an organism has a function for the survival and reproduction of the individual, because it has been naturally selected. Functionalism focused on how mental activities helped an organism fit into its environment.

Functionalism has a second, more subtle meaning in that functionalists were more interested in the operation of the whole mind rather than of its individual parts, which were the focus of structuralism. Like Wundt, James believed that introspection could serve as one means by which someone might study mental activities, but James also relied on more objective measures, including the use of various recording devices, and examinations of concrete products of mental activities and of anatomy and physiology Gordon, William James, shown here in a self-portrait, was the first American psychologist.

Hysteria was an ancient diagnosis for disorders, primarily of women with a wide variety of symptoms, including physical symptoms and emotional disturbances, none of which had an apparent physical cause. The method of psychoanalysis, which involves the patient talking about their experiences and selves, while not invented by Freud, was certainly popularized by him and is still used today. Westen also argues that critics fail to consider the success of the broad ideas that Freud introduced or developed, such as the importance of childhood experiences in adult motivations, the role of unconscious versus conscious motivations in driving our behavior, the fact that motivations can cause conflicts that affect behavior, the effects of mental representations of ourselves and others in guiding our interactions, and the development of personality over time.

Westen identifies subsequent research support for all of these ideas. Some current practices in psychotherapy involve examining unconscious aspects of the self and relationships, often through the relationship between the therapist and the client. These men are credited with introducing psychologists in the United States to various Gestalt principles. For example, a song may be made up of individual notes played by different instruments, but the real nature of the song is perceived in the combinations of these notes as they form the melody, rhythm, and harmony.

Unfortunately, in moving to the United States, these men were forced to abandon much of their work and were unable to continue to conduct research on a large scale. Despite these issues, several Gestalt principles are still very influential today. Considering the human individual as a whole rather than as a sum of individually measured parts became an important foundation in humanistic theory late in the century.

The ideas of Gestalt have continued to influence research on sensation and perception. Structuralism, Freud, and the Gestalt psychologists were all concerned in one way or another with describing and understanding inner experience. But other researchers had concerns that inner experience could be a legitimate subject of scientific inquiry and chose instead to exclusively study behavior, the objectively observable outcome of mental processes.

Early work in the field of behavior was conducted by the Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov — Pavlov studied a form of learning behavior called a conditioned reflex, in which an animal or human produced a reflex unconscious response to a stimulus and, over time, was conditioned to produce the response to a different stimulus that the experimenter associated with the original stimulus. The reflex Pavlov worked with was salivation in response to the presence of food.

The salivation reflex could be elicited using a second stimulus, such as a specific sound, that was presented in association with the initial food stimulus several times.

John B. Watson — was an influential American psychologist whose most famous work occurred during the early 20th century at Johns Hopkins University. While Wundt and James were concerned with understanding conscious experience, Watson thought that the study of consciousness was flawed. In addition to making psychology a separate science, Wundt also had a number of students who went on to become influential psychologists themselves. Edward B. Titchener was responsible for establishing the school of thought known as structuralism ,.

Stanley Hall established the first experimental psychology lab in the U. Wilhelm Wundt was a German psychologist who established the very first psychology laboratory in Leipzig, Germany in This event is widely recognized as the formal establishment of psychology as a science distinct from biology and philosophy. Among his many distinctions, Wundt was the very first person to refer to himself as a psychologist.

He is often associated with the school of thought known as structuralism, although it was his student Edward B. Titchener who was truly responsible for the formation of that school of psychology. Wundt also developed a research technique known as introspection , in which highly trained observers would study and report the content of their own thoughts. Wilhelm Wundt graduated from the University of Heidelberg with a degree in medicine.

He went on to study briefly with Johannes Muller and later with the physicist Hermann von Helmholtz. Wundt's work with these two individuals is thought to have heavily influenced his later work in experimental psychology. Wundt later wrote the Principles of Physiological Psychology , which helped establish experimental procedures in psychological research.

After taking a position at the University of Leipzig, Wundt founded the first experimental psychology lab in the world. Although another psychology lab already existed— William James had established a lab at Harvard a few years before—James' lab was focused on offering teaching demonstrations rather than experimentation.

After studying with Wundt, G. Wundt is often associated with the theoretical perspective known as structuralism, which involves describing the structures that compose the mind.

Structuralism is regarded as the very first school of thought in psychology. He believed that psychology was the science of conscious experience and that trained observers could accurately describe thoughts, feelings, and emotions through a process known as introspection. However, Wundt made a clear distinction between everyday self-observation, which he believed was inaccurate, and experimental introspection also called internal perception.

According to Wundt, internal perception involved a properly trained observer who was aware when a stimulus of interest was introduced. Wundt's process required the observer to be keenly aware and attentive of their thoughts and reactions to the stimulus and involved multiple presentations of the stimulus.

Of course, because this process relies on personal interpretation, it is highly subjective. Wundt believed that systematically varying the conditions of the experiment would enhance the generality of the observations.

While Wundt is typically associated with structuralism , it was actually his student Edward B. Titchener who influenced the structuralist school in America. Indeed, Wundt is often regarded as the father of psychology.

Wundt was important because he separated psychology from philosophy by analyzing the workings of the mind in a more structured way, with the emphasis being on objective measurement and control. This laboratory became a focus for those with a serious interest in psychology, first for German philosophers and psychology students, then for American and British students as well.

All subsequent psychological laboratories were closely modeled in their early years on the Wundt model. Wundt's background was in physiology, and this was reflected in the topics with which the Institute was concerned, such as the study of reaction times and sensory processes and attention.

For example, participants would be exposed to a standard stimulus e. Wundt's aim was to record thoughts and sensations, and to analyze them into their constituent elements, in much the same way as a chemist analyses chemical compounds, in order to get at the underlying structure.

The school of psychology founded by Wundt is known as voluntarism, the process of organizing the mind. During his academic career Wundt trained graduate students in psychology.