History of Psychology

from Introduction to Human Behavior at the University of Tokyo History of Psychology

• Wundt (founder of psychology in Germany)
  • Wanted to understand consciousness
  • Approach: Elementism (Structuralism) and Introspection
  • Elementism:
    • Basically, breaking consciousness down into parts and revealing their combinations
      • I also had this image, but on the other hand, what else is there? (blu3mo)
    • Is consciousness a complex of the five senses and simple emotions (pleasure/displeasure, excitement/calmness, tension/relaxation)?
      • Well, this model seems too simple from a modern perspective
  • Introspection
    • Introspection: Subjects reporting their thoughts
    • Tried to conduct experiments and be scientific
      • However, there were inherent limitations to objective observation, so introspection (listening to what subjects had to say) became more common
        • But that’s not really ideal, right? (blu3mo)
• Psychology developed by criticizing Wundt
  • Similar to what we often see in philosophy (blu3mo)(blu3mo)
  • Gestalt psychology
    • Criticized elementism

    • The whole is not the sum of its parts

      • Huh? (blu3mo)
      • The most important thing is not the individual elements, but the whole (consciousness) that emerges from their combination
        • The claim is that we should focus on the overall phenomena (consciousness) that arise from the combination of elements, rather than understanding each element individually
        • A warning against reducing everything to simple elements (Reductionism)
        • I see~ (blu3mo)(blu3mo)
      • However, well, Germany was heavily affected by WW1/WW2, so it didn’t gain much momentum
        • Instead, the center of psychology (or rather, science) shifted to the United States
  • Behaviorism in the United States
    • Criticized introspection
    • J.B. Watson

    • Psychology must be a science!

      • Science is based on objective data
      • But introspection is not at all objective
    • Emphasized the relationship between stimulus and response
      • Something that Wundt also wanted to do but couldn’t
    • However, this is an incomplete view of science from a modern perspective
      • It’s not just about objectivity (directly observable things), and science doesn’t require it to be present or absent
        • Science has evolved through various efforts~ (blu3mo)
  • Modern times
    • Neo-behaviorism
      • Classical behaviorism: Stimulus -> Response
      • Neo-behaviorism: Stimulus -> Organism -> Response
        • By considering the mechanisms of organisms, we can understand more things by doing behaviorism, right? (blu3mo)