WUNDT AND INTROSPECTION

Who is Wilhelm Wundt?

• The ‘Father’ of psychology

What method did Wundt use on his patients?

Introspection

What is introspection?

• systematic analysis of one’s own conscious experience, thought processes, feelings, emotions and sensations

How is introspection carried out?

• patients are trained to analyse and report in detail their inner thoughts and then break them down into separate parts

Where was introspection carried out?

• Used in carefully controlled lab conditions with researchers being presented standardised tasks/stimuli (e.g. drawing, smell, noise)

• Wundt claimed that with sufficient training introspection could be used to systematically observe mental processes (e.g. memory, perception)

Explain Wundt’s method of introspection

• conscious thoughts were recorded with aim of breaking them down into separate parts

• Researchers presented with carefully controlled stimuli (e.g. visual images, auditory tones)

• Asked to give details of inner thoughts and then processes they were experiencing - report what was experienced, give analysis of it

• Recorded under strictly controlled conditions with standardised stimulus and instructions. This allowed procedures to be repeated each time.