Wundt and origins of psychology (approaches)

• Wundt 


  the first person to call himself a psychologist believed that all aspects of the human mind could be studied scientifically
• father of psychology 


  he only studied aspects of behaviour that could be studied in strictly controlled experimental conditions
• structuralism

  behaviour/consciousness could be broken down to its basic elements to see how they interact and examine them
• first ever lab 


  Wundt set up first ever lab in Leipzig Germany 1879, utilised scientific methods to study the human mind and behaviour.
• its own science

  wanted to separate psychology from philosophy and biology make it unique and it's own scientific discipline
• introspection 


  • conscious examination of conscious experience
  • self-observation of your own thoughts and feelings
  • highly controlled, systematic and standardised
• features of introspection 


  • in the present moment not a reflection of the past
  • presented with stimulus
  • inspect own thoughts
  • conclusion
• example of introspection 


  • metronome/light ('looking into light')
  • report back emotions and sensations
  • compare all responses to see similarities and differences
  • to standardise e.g same colour, brightness of light
• controlled and standardised procedures 


  • always able to repeat the experiment using the same conditions to check reliability, and compare results
  • able to present as legitimate science
• advancements

  without his study of internal mental processes there would be no advancement in cognitive psychology
• reductionism to structuralism 


  Wundt believed in reductionism

  • theoretical perspective involves describing the structures that compose the mind
• limitation 


  responses can be biased due to self-report, pps will sensor or change demand characteristics to come off better
• influenced investigative methods

  • FALSIFIABILITY - possibility a statement can be proved wrong
  • OBJECTIVITY - measurement is not affected by researched bias
  • REPLICABILITY - ability to reproduce procedure
  • EMPIRICAL METHODS - using observation/testing to gain knowledge
• experimental reductionism 


  when a complex behaviour is reduced to a single (isolated) variable for the purpose of testing
• Introspection


  Study of conscious experience through subjective reports
• emergence behaviourists early 1900s


  early rejection of introspection

  • Watson said introspection is subjective ad influenced by personal perspective
  • according to them we should only study phenomena that can be observed
• 1930s behaviourist dominated


  • skinner brought the language and the rigour of natural science into psychology
  • focus on learning and the use of carefully controlled labs
• 1950s cognitive approach 


  • studied mental processes scientifically
  • likened the mind to a computer
  • tested their predictions about memory and attention using experiments
• 1980s biological approach

  • introduced technical advancements
  • took advantage of recent advances in technology
  • including recording brain activity using scanning techniques and advanced genetic research
• evaluation: scientific methods

  • recorded introspections within a controlled lab environment
  • standardised his procedures so all pps received the same info and tested in the same way
  • therefore, Wundts research can be considered a forerunner to the later scientific approaches
• evaluation: pioneering

  • Wundts work was pioneering in influencing the future course of psychology
  • he produced the first academic journal for research and wrote the first textbook. as well as changing the direction away from philosophy
  • therefore it can be claimed that Wundt has made a significant contribution to the subject of psychology and paved the way for future areas
• evaluation: subjective

  • potential issue, some responses could be potentially bias due to a self report, pps may use demand characteristics
  • due to this, may be difficult to construct 'laws of behaviour' which can be widely applied due to bias data
  • therefore, his work falls short of modern scientific principles and cannot be the only theory to explain the approaches