Wundt and introspection

how did Wilhelm Wundt begin psychology?

• in 1873 Wilhelm Wundt published the first book on psychology 'principles of psychology' and in 1879 opened the first psychology lab in in Leipzig Germany, he's often called the father of psychology

• his approach to psychology was to study the structure of the human mind by breaking down behaviours into their basic elements, this became known as structuralism

what was Wundt’s aim?

to describe the nature of human consciousness in a carefully controlled and scientific environment, a lab

introspection

• involves looking into your own cognitive processes and thoughts and recording them systematically known as structuralism, reporting present experience, empirical method of recording your conscious thoughts and feelings

• Wundt established psychology as a science by using the scientific method, his ideas led to multiple different psychological perspectives

• he used standardised procedures eg giving participants a ticking metronome

what were the major assumptions of Wundt's scientific approach?

-all behaviour is seen as being caused (determined)

-if behaviour is determined, it should be possible to predict how humans would behave in different conditions (predictability)

-technique used to explore these became known as the scientific method

what are the characteristics of investigative methods in the scientific method?

• objective: basing findings on fact not opinion

• systematic: planned out and careful

• replicable: the ability to repeat the study and get the same findings

how did Wundt use controlled procedures?

• the same standardised instructions were given to all participants and stimuli (objectives and sounds) were presented in the same order (standardised procedures)

• eg they were given a ticking metronome and would report and record their thoughts, images and sensations

what is structuralism?

• introspection led to identifying the structure of consciousness by breaking it into the basic structures: thoughts, images and sensations

• marked the beginning of scientific psychology, separating it from its philosophical roots

strength- aspects of Wundt's work are scientific

• eg he recorded the introspections within a controlled lab environment

• he also standardised his procedures so all participants received the same information and were tested in the same way

• therefore, Wundt's research can be considered a forerunner to later scientific approaches in psychology that were to come

limitation- other areas of Wundt's research are subjective

• he relied on participants self reporting their 'private' mental processes, such data is subjective, participants may have hidden some of their thoughts

• makes it difficult to establish meaningful 'laws of behaviour', one of the aims of science

• therefore, his early efforts to study the mind were naive and wouldn't meet the criteria of the scientific enquiry

strength- Wundt's contribution

• he produced the first academic journal for psychological research, wrote the first textbook and is often referred to as the 'father' of modern psychology

• his pioneering research set the foundation for future approaches, particularly behaviourism and cognitive psychology

• shows despite the flaws in his early experimental research, Wundt made a significant contribution to psychology

strength- research in modern psychology can claim to be scientific

• psychology has the same aims as natural sciences: to describe, understand, predict and control behaviour

• learning, cognitive and biological approaches all use scientific methods eg lab studies are controlled and unbiased

• throughout the 20th century and beyond, psychology has established itself as a scientific discipline

limitation- some approaches use subjective data

• humanistic approach doesn't formulate general laws of behaviour, psychodynamic uses case studies with unrepresentative samples

• psychologists study humans who are active participants and therefore respond to demand characteristics

• therefore a scientific approach to the study of human thought and experience isn't desirable or possible

limitation- paradigm

• Kuhn said any science must have a paradigm: a set of principles, assumptions and methods that all people who work within the subject agree on

• psychology doesn't have a paradigm, however most would agree its the study of mind and behaviour

• suggests the question of whether psychology is a science remains unanswered