History of Psych Exam 2

Wilhelm Wundt

founder of psychology/experimental psych (1832-1920)

• University of Leipzig

• combined 2 disciplines: philosophy and physiology which produces psychology

• about 50% of his lab was for introspection (1879 gets his lab in Leipzig)

backstory of Willium Wundt

• born in Germany, youngest of 4 (lonely child)

• has lots of family who were scholars and father is a Lutheran pastor

• raised by his grandfather who is very strict

• goes to a gymnasium (private boarding school) and transfers to a new gym and graduates

• his dad died

• his uncle is a teacher of anatomy at a university, goes to University of Heidelberg and studies haptic sense (touch) on people with Schizophrenia and gets PhD

• studies with Robert Bunsen (early founders of field of chemistry)

• becomes private lecturer at University of Berlin (becomes assistant professor for Hemholtz/becomes chair of psych) *didn’t get payed/got tips from students

important terms, most people before psychology was a degree were called these terms

philosophy and physiology or biology

James McKeen Kattell

the first American student of psychology, studies as Freuds student

• founds University of Pennsylvania (UPenn)

• works at Columbia University

brass instruments

helmholtz resonator (sound waves) and hipp chronoscope (reaction times)

topic areas in psychology

1. sensation and perception

2. color images

3. after images and illusions

4. reaction times

5. feelings→paired associatiosn/comparisons

6. selective attention

Why is Wundt a founder of psych

1. had a large lab (50% of his studies were sensation/perception)

2. lots of students (186 PhD’s)

3. writer

4. created a journal

transformed the branch of philosophy and biology into it’s own separate study

Important students of Wundt

Emil Kreptin- came up with diagnosis, the ststem of diagnosing people

Tichner- British, goes to Cornell (has famous student Margaret Washburn)

Hugo Echner- pioneer in aviation/first person to circumnavigate the globe in a blimp

Victor Hanri- French, works with Binet and come up with the first IQ test

Charles Sperman- British, invents statistics

G. Stanley Hall- goes to Clark University

Ana Berliner- first female PhD

Hugo Munsterberg- Harvard, WIlliam James hired him to be in the lab

William James

went to Harvard and didn’t study with Wundt, finds him boring

quote: “he is the classic example of what a mere education can do for a man” (he’s a nerd/not well rounded)

Edward Titchener

• devoted follower of Wundt

• born in Sussex England (in a regular family)

• attends Malvern public school (gets scholarship to go here)

• then goes to Brasenose College in Oxford University

• placed double first in school, had one exam in latin

• went back and got minor in biology

• translates Wundts writing into English

• then goes to Liepzig to study with Wundt (introspection studies)

• goes back to Oxford to teach for one year (wants to teach psych there but not allowed, has to teach biology)

• goes to Cornell and starts psych program “Wundt in America”

• has 216 publications, writes “Experiemntal Psychology”

more of Titchner

• his system was called structuralsim (break down the conscious experience through experiemnet introspection)

• had Margaret Washburn, Edwin Boring (writes first History of Psych text book), and Karl Dallenbach as students (uses his own money to keep journal alive)

• was a founding member of the APA

• editor of the American Journal of Psychology which Dallenbach had purchased from Stanley Hall

Catell and Terman

goes to UPenn and start doing psychological testing and assesments

• Tichner says that there work is second rate and cheap

• Catell studied under Wundt at Liepzig and was even his assistant in the lab but disagreed on importance of introspections studies and instead focused on individual differences

Meuman

creates the field of educational psychology

• Tichner says it should be called educational technology

Munsterberg

studies mental illness (no mentally ill, no children, no animals)

• goes to work at Harvard with James but doesn’t speak much English

• interested in applied psych

• did word associations and suggestions

• wrote a book on psychotherapy- “there is none” doesn’t believe in unconscious

• automatic studies/writing

• invents field of forensic psychology (eyewitness report- memories are unreliable and false confessions) and industrial psychology (cable car simulation/switchboard for call center)

• real life interviews and efficiency studies

• has red cap at gymnasium and studies with Wundt/doesn't agree with introspection

• case of Harry Orchard (man who assassinated the a govener/do you believe the testimony of a convicted murderer)

• gets involved in jury studies

• during WW1, so many people want him fired because he was German (picture was posted)

Critic- knight dunlap

critical of introspection

1. always retrospections (saying that immediate reactions are impossible because your going to be thinking/trying to get it right or wrong

2. dull and pointless

3. conscious process interferes with conscious process (idea from Kant/the mind can study everything but itself)

James Braid

arranges a demonstration of introspection at APA conference

James Lange theory of emotions

bottom up, your body feels it first and then your mind processes it

Gustav Fechner

• get MD from Univeristy of Liepsig and spends his career there (predates Wundt)

• becomes a professor of physics (psychophysics/how human beings perceive things)

• color vision/after images

• has a vision that tells him to eat a spiced ham and he will be healed

• joins the German Piety Movement (personal spiritual transformation

• intresting facts:

• (Dr. Mises Dayview/Nightwiew, develope a fake name so he can publish articles on religious ideas since people at the Univeristy are anti religion)

• panpsychism (everything has a soul)

• two points thresholds/just noticable differences

• absolute thresholds (signal detection theory)

• wrote elements of psychophysics

William James quote about Fechner and Ebbinghaus

about Fechner: “all very interesting but in the end it will come to nothing”

Fechner response: “the tower of bable fell because the workers could not reach an understanding, my work will not fall because the workers will not agree on how to tear it down”

about Ebbinghuas: “one of Europe’s best men”

Ebinghaus

• invented the memory and forgetting curve (how people memorize things/how long)

• non sense syllabyls (would read aloud untill he mastered a list of 16, more repetition the more learned)

Carl Stumpf

• musican and psychologist

• studied under Brentano (Unviersity of Vienna)

• becomes head of psychology at University of Berlin

• wrote book called tone psychology

• studies aesthetics (golden triangle)

• famous for Clever Hans-the horse that can do math

• Oskar Pfungst is a research student under Carl (Carl tells him to figure out the horse doing math because he doesn’t believe it)

What was Wundt’s Subject Matter, Methods and philosophical basis as expounded in this main work? Give the title of his main textbook. Comment on Wundt’s writing output.

Subject matter- Immediate experience

Method- Introspection

Philosophical basis-volunterism

textbook- principles of physiological psychology, has Vol 1 and Vol 2

wrote every day, would take 2 ½ years to read it all

Why we study Darwin in psych class

• Theory of evolution

• Comparative psychology (based on evolution/our closeness to animal behavior)

• Individual differences- (variations that lead to evolution) leads to testing

What were some of the ideas and their originators which Tichener rejected?

• functionalism (he was only concerned with "the is" (the structural components of consciousness), dismissing questions of utility ("what is it for?")

• volunterism (wanted to simplify psychology to just sensationalism)

• unconscious mind (psychology must limit itslef to immediate experiences