Approaches

Question 1

What is Wundt known as?

Answer 1

The father of psychology

Question 2

How did Wundt change psychology?

Answer 2

He believed that the human mind could be studied scientifically so he moved psychology from its philosophical roots to controlled, objective research.

Question 3

What was the first psychology laboratory called?

Answer 3

Institute of Experimental Psychology

Question 4

When and where was the first psychology laboratory set up?

Answer 4

Leipzig, Germany in the 1870s.

Question 5

What is structuralism?

Answer 5

Structuralism - breaking down behaviours (such as perception and sensation) into their basic elements. The aim was to be objective and controlled.

Question 6

What is the definition of introspection?

Answer 6

A systematic analysis of our own conscious experience of a stimulus

Question 7

How would Wundt study introspection structurally?

Answer 7

he would ask people to focus on an everyday object (e.g. a metronome) and look inwards to analyse it in terms of its component parts e.g. noticing sensations and feelings and images. Therefore, they would break down their thoughts about an object into separate elements and report it in a systematic way (in the order that the thoughts occurred). This information would then be used to gain insight into the nature of the mental processes involved in perception, reaction time etc.

Question 8

What were the 5 steps of the emergence of psychology as a science?

Answer 8

Introspection -> Watson’s observable behaviour -> Empiricism -> Scientific approach -> Scientific method

Question 9

What is the definition of empiricism?

Answer 9

A more scientific approach of studying psychology as it argued that the cause of behaviour was experience/observation and therefore we could predict peoples behaviour in different situations.

Question 10

What is the definition of scientific method?

Answer 10

A way that is objective, systematic and reliable.

Question 11

What is the definition of systematic?

Answer 11

Methods are systematic when observations and experiments are carried out in an orderly way.

Question 12

What is the definition of reliable?

Answer 12

The results are reliable if they are replicable. It is replicable when observations can be repeated by other researchers to determine whether the same results are obtained. If the results are not replicable, then they are not reliable and cannot be accepted as being universally true.

Question 13

What is a strengths of Wundt’s introspection (controlled)?

Answer 13

· Controlled methods – all the introspections were recorded under strictly controlled conditions using the same stimulus every time. The same standardised instructions were issued to participants to make it as objective as possible. This enabled the methods to be more internally valid so that Wundt could be more certain that the mental processes/perceptions were due to the stimulus he had presented participants with.

Question 14

What is a strength of Wundt’s introspection (replicable)?

Answer 14

The controlled method allowed procedures to be repeated (replicated) every single time. This was significant as it marked the separation of the modern scientific psychology from its broader philosophical roots.

Question 15

What is a strength of Wundt’s introspection (real world applications)?

Answer 15

It is still used today to gain access to cognitive processes e.g. Griffiths (1994) used introspection to study the cognitive processes of fruit machine gamblers. He asked them to ‘think aloud’ whilst playing a fruit machine into a microphone on their lapel. They found that gamblers used more irrational verbalisations. This has led important theories and treatments for gambling addictions. This demonstrates introspection’s value as one way that mental processes can be investigated (supports its external validity).

Question 16

What is a weakness of Wundt’s introspection (causes)?

Answer 16

We have very little knowledge of the causes of, and processes underlying our behaviour and attitudes. For example, research has found that participants were remarkably unaware of the factors that had been influential in their choice of a consumer item. This is a particular problem for the study of implicit attitudes e.g. a person may be implicitly racist, which influences the way they react to members of a different ethnic group, yet because such attitudes exist outside of their conscious awareness, self-reports through introspection would not uncover them. Therefore it is not an entirely valid way of determining every internal mental process.

Question 17

What is a weakness of Wundt’s introspection (subjective)?

Answer 17

The data was subjective in that it varied from person to person, so it was difficult to establish general principles. Introspective results were not reliably reproducible by other researchers in other laboratories. This may be because although participants can report on their conscious experiences, the processes themselves (e.g. memory, perception) were unobservable. Therefore introspection isn’t an entirely valid way of measuring mental processes.

Question 18

What is a weakness of Wundt’s introspection (observed)?

Answer 18

Watson was highly critical of introspection’s focus on ‘private’ mental processes, arguing that such processes couldn’t be objectively measured. He argued that Psychology is only truly scientific when it restricts itself only to studying phenomena that can be directly observed and measured. This led to the behaviourist approach and the emergence of Psychology as a science.

Question 19

How did Wundt’s introspection lead the way for psychological research?

mental processes

Answer 19

Wundt himself later recognised that higher mental processes (e.g. Language, learning, emotions) were difficult to study using introspection. This encouraged others to look for more appropriate methods and techniques, paving the way for new methods such as brain scans whilst people are carrying out these mental processes. Therefore whilst Wundt’s method may not be entirely valid for measuring all mental processes, it led to more valid ways of doing so, progressing psychology as a scientific discipline.