History of Psychology
Dr. Paul Dockree, History of Psychology: PS1203, 2009
Course Information
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Location:
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Mondays: Arts 2037; Thursdays: Arts 2043
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Lecture Notes:
• All lecture notes will be provided before each lecture and will go on Psychology web pages after the
lecture:
• Go to http://www.tcd.ie/Psychology/lecturer_notes/index.html
•
Reading:
• Core text: B. M Thorne & T. B. Henley, Connections in the History and Systems of Psychology (3rd ed.,
Houghton Mifflin, 2005)
• Optional reading of interest:
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Fancher, R.E. (1996). Pioneers of Psychology. (3rd Ed.). London: Norton.
Fuller, R. (1995). Seven Pioneers of Psychology. London: Routledge.
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Examinations:
• One end-of-year essay examination – details of its content and when and where will follow.
• Please contact me if you are a visiting student who will not be here for the end-of-year exams in May.
•
Contact:
• dockreep@tcd.ie
• Room 1.04, School of Psychology.
Course Timetable
Lecture 1: Introduction to the
History of Psychology
Why Study History?
Given the current level of research
sophistication, what can be learned
by studying a discipline’s history?
To have a knowledge base – to know what has already been investigated and
understood. “Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it”
(George Santayana).
To understand how theoretical developments have evolved in psychology
through competition and opposition of ideas.
Why Study History?
• To make connections in an incredibly diverse field of study.
• To discover interesting personalities or ‘characters’ in history.
• To be able to critique our current thinking about psychology today.
• Is the current “mindset” the most appropriate that will be refined
and augmented in the years to come or will it be replaced?
• To understand the ethical issues pertaining to psychological questions.
• Emotional distress for the participants of certain studies
• Theoretical understanding vs. real-world application
• To change behaviour or leave unadulterated
Being Aware of Bias in History
• Idiosyncrasies of the historian – overemphasis of certain
events and de-emphasis of others.
• Dominant theories can dominate the textbooks and hence
the history books giving the impression that past theories
were stepping stones to the modern correct way of
thinking.
• Imposing present sensitivities (e.g., cultural, sexual, ethical)
on the past.
• Great person (personalistic) vs. zeitgeist (naturalistic) view
• “You get the personalistic view when you ignore the antecedents
of the great man, and you get the naturalistic view back again
when you asked what made the great man great” (Boring, 1950)
What is it about Psychology that is
Scientific?
• What psychology aspires to be is a good starting point in
its history – psychology aspires to be a science.
• What is it about psychology that is or could ever hope to
be a science? When is something scientific? When it
employs the scientific method?
• We expect science to explain how things work, how
mechanisms operate.
• What is it that makes a explanation a scientific
explanation? (Carl Hempel, 1950)
• Nomological deductive model – an event or phenomenon is an
instance of a universal law known to be true.
• An explanation sketch – a very reliable statistical law (e.g., supply
and demand in economics).
What is it about Psychology that is
Scientific?
• How does psychology stand up to Carl Hempel’s analysis?
• In some areas of psychology (sensation and perception, aspects of
learning and memory) there are reliable statistical laws that allow
one to make accurate predictions about behaviour.
• In other areas of psychology (interpersonal behaviour,
psychoanalytic theory, personality theory, emotion, motivation
etc.) the relationships prove less reliable with less predictive
power.
• Scientific and Humanistic approaches: two opposing views
• What makes an event psychological in the first instance?
What is it about Psychology that is
Scientific?
• Two different psychologies
• A scientific psychology or a psychology aspiring to scientific status. A
process based approach, not concerned with individuals but group
norms
• e.g., visual processing, RT as a function of stimulus intensity, how often
you should rehearse a list of items in order to remember them, the
effects of brain lesions on speech, the effects of brain lesion on
emotion etc.
• Deterministic view: behaviour can be explained in terms of biological,
electrical and chemical changes in the brain. In other words all
behaviour is determined by brain states.
• A humanistic psychology argues that we can predict behaviour, not
through deterministic laws, but based on common culture, values,
language, development and attitudes.
What do we want from psychological
theories and explanations?
• Reduction & replacement
• Scientists try to reduce larger theories to more
elementary or basic theories
• Physical reduction in psychology is the theory that all
mental states will ultimately be explained as brain
states; psychology will become an outpost of biology.
• The non-reductive perspective
• Psychological phenomena cannot be reduced or
replaced by simpler theories – cultural, social,
interpersonal factors are a different level of explanation
from the biological
How do levels of explanation differ
among peers and predecessors?
Will psychology ever develop a cohesive,
widely accepted theory and should it try?
What counts as progress in science
and psychology?
• Does science develop in a series of
progressive steps leading up to our current
state of enlightenment? No.
What counts as progress in science
and psychology?
• In reality, the history of science has a
repeating cycle of stages
Pre-paradigm
period
• contending
schools
• random factgathering
• no science
Normal Science
Anomaly
Crisis
Revolution
• science begins
• important
insoluble problem
• insecurity
• younger scientists
adhere to new
paradigm
• one paradigm, no
schools
• puzzle solving
research
• loosening of
paradigm
restrictions
• contending
theories
• emergence of
• some older
scientists switch
allegiance
What have been psychology’s biggest
blunders and greatest hits?
• Falsification – Karl Popper (1902-1994)
• How do you tell real science from fake science?
• A real scientific theory risks falsification from data
accumulation over time (ie., the theory could ultimately be
proven wrong)
• A fake scientific theory can never be proven wrong usually
because of ‘escape clauses’
– Eg, astrology, psychanalysis
• But scientific vs non-scientific is not sufficient criteria
to determine psychology’s highpoints and lowpoints.
How did Psychology evolve as a
discipline?
• The founders of psychology were
philosophers – the ancient Greeks
were important antecedents to
modern Western ideals.
• Roman pragmatism and scepticism
towards science and philosophy
• The renaissance (‘rebirth’) of science
14th – 16th century in Europe.
How did Psychology evolve as a
discipline?
• 17th century – Psychological idea emerges as an
outgrowth of empirical and rational philosophy
• Science displaces religion as an authority on understanding
• 18th century – Psychology began to emerge as a science in
conjunction with studies of the nervous system
• Founder of Experimental Psychology: Wilhelm Wundt
(1832-1920).
• Established the first laboratory for the study of psychology in Leipzig in
1879;
• Campaigned to make psychology an independent discipline;
• Defined psychology as the scientific study of conscious experience;
• Trained psychologists who spread throughout Europe and North
America.
On Thursday:
Origins Of Modern Psychology
Within Philosophy