Origins of Psychology

Question 1

Father of Psychology.

Answer 1

Wilhelm Wundt.

Question 2

1st psychological lab.

Answer 2

Opened by Wilhelm Wundt in 1879.

Located in Leipzig, Germany.

Question 3

Why is Wilhelm’s work significant?

Answer 3

Separating it from its philosophical roots.

Question 4

Wundt’s aim.

Answer 4

To analyse the nature of human consciousness.

Representing the first systematic attempt to study the mind under controlled conditions.

Question 5

Structuralism.

Answer 5

A scientific method studying the human consciousness by breaking its structure into smaller components.

Question 6

Wundt’s main objectives.

Answer 6

To try and develop theories about the mental processes.

Question 7

Introspection.

Answer 7

Developed by Wundt.

Process when person examines their inner world by consciously observing their thoughts and emotions.

Question 8

Why was introspection used?

Answer 8

To shed light on processes involved in human consciousness.

Question 9

How did Wundt train his participants?

Answer 9

By using standardised procedures to give detailed observations from introspection, including stimuli and tasks that participants were asked to consider.

Question 10

Strength: Wundt used systematic methods and they were all well-controlled.

Answer 10

All introspections were recorded in a controlled environment - laboratory - ensuring no extraneous variables affected the research. All procedures and instructions were standardised, so all ppts were given the same information and tested in the same way.
There was increased validity and reliability, hence his research was a forerunner to later scientific approaches.

Question 11

Weakness: Some aspects of his research was considered unscientific because most of his research relied on self-report techniques for collecting data about mental processes.

Answer 11

This creates subjective data; demand characteristics may have influenced results and some may have hidden thoughts, thus making it difficult to establish meaningful laws of behaviour.
Therefore, his early efforts to study the mind may be flawed and may not meet the criteria of scientific enquiry.

Question 12

Aim of science.

Answer 12

To discover general laws through systematic and objective measurement.

Question 13

What did Wundt show about empirical methods?

Answer 13

Empirical methods could be applied to mental processes.

Question 14

Why did Watson and Skinner criticise Wundt’s research?

Answer 14

The subjective nature of personal observations, which made it difficult to make generalisations from research.

Question 15

Strength: Modern psychology claims to be scientific.

Answer 15

Psychology shares the same aims as natural sciences. Learning, cognitive and biological approaches all rely on the use of scientific methods.
This supports that throughout the 20th century and beyond was when psychology became an established scientific discipline.

Question 16

Weakness: Not all approaches rely on objective methods.

Answer 16

Humanistic approach rejects scientific approach, prefers to focus on individual and subjective experiences. Psychodynamic approach doesn’t use representative samples. Thus, a scientific approach to study human thought and experience may not always be desirable/possible.

Question 17

Wundt’s approach to psychological experimentation, using the method of introspection, is idiographic in nature.

Answer 17

However, this was heavily criticised by the behaviourists, as universal principles that could be applied to explain human behaviour cannot be generated from introspection. Behaviourists suggest that a nomothetic approach to psychological investigations is more advantageous because it overcomes these limitations.

Question 18

Over the years, psychology as a discipline has become more scientific due to the modernisation of methods used when studying the human brain.

Answer 18

The use of experimental methods in biological psychology, such as brain imaging techniques, demonstrate the scientific and technological advances that psychologists are now utilising.