Captain Psychology

by

Wundt Report

Wundt
The Wundt Report

by Ken Tangen

Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920) may be the underachiever’s patron saint. He didn’t get along with other students, was ridiculed and punished by his teachers, and flunked a year of high school. To say he was shy and lacked initiative is to understate the matter. Wilhelm was afraid of the other village children, and dreaded public events. Even his town’s annual Easter-egg hunt was painful for him because the other children pushed him aside (Hilgard, 1987). Yet from the slow start of a daydreaming child, he became an elected politician, and one of the most prolific and productive scientists of the 19th century. Although Freud and Ribot were hard workers and insightful theoratians, neither can match the systematic precision or sheer volume of work produced by Wundt.

Wilhelm Wundt represents a dramatic turning point in the study of psychology. He championed both experimental and non-experimental psychology. And, more than anyone else, Wundt was responsible for changing psychology from a hobby of philosophy into its own independent science.

CULTURE

Psychology’s quest for independence mirrors that of the society in which it developed. While psychology was moving away from being a footnote to philosophy, Europe was moving away from its feudal past and becoming more clearly defined into independent nations. Until the late 1700’s Germany was still composed of several hundred feudal states. When Napoleon conquered the German states, he simplified its governmental structure to make its administration less cumbersome. After the defeat of Napoleon (1806), the Congress of Vienna (1814-15) simplified Germany’s structure even further, ultimately leaving only two or three dozen principalities.

In feudalism, the land belonged to a sovereign lord, who was solely responsibility for a given geographic area. A duchy (the area governed by a duke) was internally structured according to the whim of its sovereign lord. Some were conservative and strict; others (like the principality of Baden) were quite liberal. Located along the Rhine in southwest Germany, and extending as far south as the Black Forest, Baden was a grand duchy of Napoleon’s Confederation of the Rhine. It included Neckarau (where Wundt was born), Leutershausen and Heidelsheim (where he was raised) and Heidelberg (where he attended university).

Baden encouraged intellectual freedom but suffered from post-Reformation religious rivalries. Although it had been 300 years since Martin Luther tacked his treatise to a cathedral door, the interplay between science, religion and politics continued to play a major role in German life. Baden was caught between the French revolution’s push toward national independence and the industrial revolution’s practical application of scientific discovery. Society was moving from a rural, theologically-based political system (God-appointed monarchy) to an industrialized urban existence which emphasized individual and intellectual freedom.

The political, religious and economic changes of the time are crucial to understanding Wundt. Like society in general, Wundt personally was caught in the transition from theological to scientific explanations of human behavior. He grew up in rural Germany where his father was a minister but emerged as an intellectual leader of a great university and founder of a new science. This transition required a reassessment of his philosophical assumptions concerning God, society, and what it means to be human.

Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt was born at 2 pm on August 16, 1832 in Neckarau, a village suburb of Mannheim, Germany. Known for its inland port and the transportation of lumber, grain and wine, the marshy Rhine-Neckar river valley was also known as its malaria. When Wilhelm contracted a severe case of malaria, the family moved to higher ground, settling in the small town of Leutershausen, near Heidelberg.

Wundt’s father, Maximilan Wundt (1787-1846), was a minister of the United Evangelical Church. He had a practical preaching style that emphasized common sense over theological dogma. Although his denominational superiors worried about his theological liberalism, his congregations loved him. The son of a history professor at the University of Heidelberg, Maximilian came from a well established family of economists and Calvistic theologians. He had many social contacts, encouraged his sons to apply themselves academically, but died at the age of 59 (Wilhelm was 14). Wundt remembered him as a gentle, loving man who tried to teach him geography at night.

Wundt’s mother, Marie Friederike nee Arnold (1797-1868), was strong-willed, and embarrassed her wealthier relatives by haggling with merchants and looking for good deals. She and Maximilian had four sons, but only Ludwig (1824-1902) and Wilhelm survived infancy. Although 10 years younger than her husband, she was the primary disciplinarian of the family, effecting corporal punishment as needed.

Like her husband, Marie’s ancestors had been Protestant refugees who generations earlier had fled Austria and France during the Counter Reformation and settled in southwest Germany. Her family was filled with physicians, scientists, and government administrators. Her brother, Friedrich Arnold (1803-1890), was a professor of anatomy at Tubingen University. Her father, Zacharias Arnold (1767-1840), worked for Heidelberg University, administrating a portion of its extensive land holdings.

Retired by the time Maximailian and Marie moved to Leutershausen, Zacharias Arnold turned his attention to growing flowers, playing Mozart, and taking young daydreaming Wilhelm on walking tours of Heildelberg. Zacharias loved order and insisted that others adapt to his life and schedule; Wilhelm had an active, unruly fantasy life. Together they watched the building of Heidelberg’s train station, and the arrival of first train from Mannheim. Zacharias felt challenged by the young boy’s undisciplined mind; Wilhelm felt sorry for the people who had been uprooted to make way for the train.

Political change and uprooting also occurred as German nationalism increased. In 1834, when Wundt was 2, Prussia joined 18 feudal states into a consortium called the Zollverein. Although not a single, unified nation, this common market shared tariffs among its member states. Each state had its own customs administration but the receipts were combined into a general pool which was distributed on the basis of population.

The quasi-national changes did not dispel local discord. In Heidelsheim, a large village in central Baden, religious, political and social tension prospered. When Wundt’s father was chosen over 11 candidates to pastor the church in Heidelsheim in the summer of 1836, the honor must have seemed great. It was the largest church Maximilian had ever pastored but the 200 member church, like the town, was filled with strained relations. The town was unruly and badly managed. The teachers spent more time frequenting the town bars than in school. Although a small community, 40 children under the age of 14 were certified as being illegitimate.

Things weren’t much better in the church. Although the Protestant congregation shared the building with a much smaller Catholic church, neither showed the other much Christian charity. About the only thing they agreed on was their opposition to the Jewish synagogue located three doors down the street from Wundt’s parsonage. Maximilian Wundt’s ministry must have been quite a contrast to the rigidness and moralistic teaching of the previous pastor. He worked toward reconciliation but the town was already well on its way to self-destruction.

Wilhelm was 6 when the town behaved so badly that martial law was imposed. The riot was based on just cause or was a total disregard for law and order, depending on which view is taken. According to those revolting, the right to free election was the issue at hand. In the village election, the old mayor (receiving only 10% of the vote) did not accept being soundly defeated by his opponent with grace. He contacted his friend the district commissioner from Bruchsal who, not surprisingly, declared the election void and reinstated the old mayor.

The villagers demonstrated. Some did so for purely moralistic purposes. Others, such as those who had recently been drafted into the army and were not ready to leave home, revolted for their own reasons. In the town square, in full view of the parsonage, the revolutionaries built a freedom tree. Inspired by their symbol of freedom, and aided by excessive drinking, the crowd soon became quite disorderly. The police closed the pubs, arrested several people, and dispersed the crowd.

Angered by the disruption of their demonstration, and emboldened by more excessive drinking, some villagers attacked the jail, assaulted the police, and released the prisoners. In response, the district administrator declared martial law, and ordered mounted troops from Bruschsal to recapture the town. The revolt was quickly controlled that evening but not totally squashed. In spite of the severity of the situation, things did not settle down. Someone set fire to the old mayor’s barn in the middle of the night, and although a large crowd gathered, no one helped put out the blaze.

Believing that firm steps needed to be taken, the district administrator ordered 60 men, including the mayoral challenger, to be carried off in peasant carts, their arms tied behind their backs, to a maximum security prison. Pastor Wundt wrote letters and petitions pleading for mercy and clemency but two years passed before the prisoners were tried for their crimes.

Although quite young, Wilhelm was touched by the village revolt. The frightening and exciting night of the revolt, the district administrator had come to the parsonage to await the mounted troops. Not nearly as exciting for Wundt was the event which followed the riot: he began the first grade. Wundt did not have many friends but spent a great deal of time daydreaming; going to school didn’t help the matter. Wilhelm felt clumsy, was afraid of other children, and thought them too rough. Although the town square in front of his house was a gathering place and play field for children, he rarely participated in their games.

Instead of playing, Wundt liked to visit his friends, most of whom were older, all of whom were equally isolated. His favorite friend was a young bookbinder who was lame. Together they told adventure stories and put on plays. The only friend near Wundt’s age was a retarded child who could barely speak.

School was not a good experience for Wilhelm. His daydreaming got worse, and seemed inversely related to the tolerance of the adults. Even his father, who served as a school inspector, was frustrated and embarrassed by Wilhelm’s inattentiveness slapped him publicly (Wundt, 1920, pp2-3.).

In 1840, when Wundt was 8, his brother was away at school, his grandfather (mother’s side) died, and his father (at the age of 53) had a stroke. As a result of the stroke, Rev. Wundt was unable to do some of his duties, and was forced to hire an assistant. Four years later, during the Christmas holidays of 1844, Wundt’s father suffered another stroke, forcing his retirement. The family moved to a small Heildelberg apartment in late spring, 1846; three months later, his father died.

EDUCATION, MENTORS, ETC.

If Freud can be described by the women in his life, Wundt can be best understand by the impact of five men, excluding his father.

Rev. Muller

When Wilhelm was entering the second grade, Friedrich Muller (1814-1871) was hired as Rev. Wundt’s assistant. In addition to his ministerial duties, Friedrich became responsible for Wilhelm’s education.

They became quite a team. For his part, Friedrich would plan assignments, get Wundt started on them, and then be off to his ministerial duties. For his part, Wundt would start working, wait until Friedrich had gone. and spend the rest of the time daydreaming.

Wundt’s daydreaming was not directionless; they were more like fantasy games. These mental adventures had multiple characters, reoccurring themes, and often lasted for several days. At times, Wundt wanted Friedrich to hurry up and leave, so he could get back to his mental filmmaking.

Ultimately, Friedrich was a better friend than tutor. But for Wundt, having a friend was a major accomplishment. His only living brother was away at school. His parents were generally occupied by the business of ministry, and specifically preoccupied his Rev. Wundt’s stroke.

For the father, the stroke meant loss of a job, of purpose, and of income. For the son, the stroke couldn’t have left him more isolated if it had occurred to him. His father suffered memory loss, could not write, and had great difficulty speaking. Whatever closeness had existed between them faded away. It’s not surprising, then, that Wilhelm created a mental world of fun and adventure. Nor is it surprising that he grew attached to the Friedrich, and felt closer to him than even to his parents (Schultz, 1981).

Early in 1844, Friedrich was given his own church in Munzesheim, and Wundt convinced his parents–apparently, by raising a great fuss–that he, too, should move. So in the fall of that year, Wundt went to live with Friedrich and to attend the Grand-Ducal Gymnesium in Bruchsal.

Unfortunately Gymnasium (the equivalent of high school) was highly structured, more academically advanced and very intolerant of Wilhelm’s daydreaming. Wundt failed his courses, and was forced to return home and start over. He did better on the second trial but never enjoyed school.

Wundt himself

After high school, Wundt continued he undistinguished academic career at the University of Tubingen. His choice of a university may have been more influenced by family pressure than internal motivation. Wundt didn’t know what he wanted to do with his life; he simply was sure that he didn’t want to become a minister. Perhaps he chose Tubingen because his uncle, Friedrich Arnold (1803-1890), was a professor of anatomy there. He stayed there one year.

Somewhere during the year of 1852, Wundt decided to change his life. Perhaps he did it for his family honor or because his self image changed (Hilgard, 1987). Perhaps at the age of 20 he simply hit his stride.

It’s not that he suddenly began to enjoy school, or that he believed his teachers to be any less incompetent. The change was internal. He apparently willed himself to change.

Whatever the reasons, the change was remarkable. Instead of eliminating his unruly imagination, Wundt continued his mental excursions by substituting reading for daydreaming. He wrote poems, studied music, and read widely. He took private math lessons for a local school teacher, and transferred to the University of Heidelberg. Wundt finished medical school in three years, graduated suma com laude in 1855, and placed first on the medical board exams (Hergenhahn, 1992).

Bunsen

At the University of Heidelberg, Wundt met the second teacher to strongly influence him. Already famous for emphasizing experimental chemistry, Robert Wilhelm Bunsen (1811-1899) not only taught Wundt chemistry but also how to be a scientist. Bunsen was distant and paid little attention to his students, yet served as a role model of an experimental scientist.

When Wundt had him as a teacher, Bunsen was experimenting with new approaches to lab science, and Wundt used the opportunity to complete first his research project. Under Bunsen direction, Wundt, using himself as the subject, reduced his salt intake, and measured the amount of salt in his urine.

In terms of Wundt’s future success, the findings were less important than the methodology. This simple manipulation of one variable under controlled conditions became the basis for Wundt’s experimental approach to psychology.

In 1855, the year Wundt graduated from medical school, Bunsen invented the Bunsen burner. Later, he developed spectroscopy (1859) which he used to discover cesium and rubidium (in 1860 and 1861, respectively). Bunsen moved chemistry from theoretical to practical. In much the same way, Wundt moved psychology from theoretical conjecture to practical, controlled experiments. Bunsen had great accomplishments within his science; Wundt created a new science.

Muller

If the Vicar and Bunsen had come into his life by chance, the third influential person in Wundt’s life was one he sought out. In 1856, the year Freud was born, Wundt turned 25, and went to Berlin for a post-medical school study with the great Johannes Muller (1801-1858).

Muller, no relation to the vicar, had forever changed the way people thought about perception. Before Muller, perception was thought to be a process of emanation. According the popular view, the source of a perception was the important aspect of the process. The source of the perception, the actual physical object, emanated (gives off) its essence in the form of small copies of itself.

Seeing a sunset, then, was to capture of portion of that sunset and experience its emanated essence. The eye receives emanated copies of the actual physical objects. It is these tiny copies which are passed through the sensory receptors to the brain. Since the information is inherent in the object being experienced, any sensory nerve that happens to be available can carry the message to the brain.

Muller’s research showed that the critical issues is which nerve is stimulated. It is the specific energy of the nerves which matters. Regardless of how the eye is stimulated (light, pressure, electricity, etc.), it gives off characteristic visual information and causes visual sensations. Ears don’t detect visual information because they are connected to different nerves. It is nerve stimulation which causes sensation, not the emanation of physical objects.

Muller’s influence on physiology was immense. He was the leading experimental physiologist of his time, and founder of the world’s first laboratory dedicated to experimental physiology. He was a prolific researcher, and his students became leaders in their own rights.

While still in medical school, Wundt conducted experiments on respiration by severing the vagus nerves of dogs and rabbits. Without the advantage of a laboratory, Wundt, with his mother as a reluctant assistant, completed his project in the family kitchen. In recognition, the medical school awarded him a medal and small grant. In addition, in 1855, Wundt’s research on neural control of respiration was published by Johannes Muller. In the summer of 1856, Wundt spent a semester in Berlin working in the labs of Johannes Muller and Emil Du-Bois Reymond (1818-1896).

In general, Muller’s influence on Wundt was twofold. First, it focused Wundt on experimental physiology (Hergenhahn, 1992). Second, Muller served as a model of an empirical nativist. Nativism holds that perceptions and ideas are innate, and was the dominant philosophy in Germany. Empiricism was popular in England and emphasized learning from experience. Muller was a nativist in the sense that he believed that the structure of nerves is innate, and thus their predisposition to receive specific sensory information is innate. This allowed him to reconcile his Kantian views with his empirical research.

Naturally, the controversy over innate and learned characteristics is easiest to see at the extremes of the continuum, but most people combine the two views. Although some would say that Muller’s overall orientation was more empiricist that nativist (Chaplin & Krawiec, 1960), the importance of nativism in 19th century Germany is often underestimated.

De-Bois Reymond

After the summer in Berlin, Wundt returned to Heidelberg, hoping to teach and continue to work with De-Bois Reymond. To accomplish the former, Wundt applied to the University of Heidelberg that fall for “habilitation” (the right to teach classes). He was turned down not enough time had elapsed since his graduation to meet the waiting period requirements. But when Wundt threatened to go to another university, the faculty reconsidered the matter in December, and in February granted Wundt the right to offer his own lectures.

The arrangement was an unsalaried position. As was customary then, instructors were paid per student for the classes they taught, and did not receive a salary. Indeed, for the next 17 years, Wundt continued in this unsalaried position while he applied for academic positions. Although he had strong recommendations, he was denied appointments at Marburg, Giesen, Wurzburg, Halle and Vienna. Wundt was brilliant and his interests covered a broad range of topics but they did not fit into the standard job descriptions of the time.

In addition to teaching, Wundt continued his research. Under De-Bois Reymond’s supervision, he completed a year-long project on muscular physiology. Wundt hoped to combine his academic success and his research further. Indeed, he hoped to be Du-Bois Reymond’s assistant. The University of Heidelberg was looking for someone to chair the physiology department, but Du-Bois Reymond was not given the job. Instead, the University hired Herman von Helmholtz.

Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894)

The fifth man to make a difference in Wundt’s life, both positive and negative, was Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894), a former student of Muller. Like Wundt, Helmholtz was born in a small town in Germany, was weak as a child, and in spite of an intellectually stimulating environment had been a mediocre student. His father was a teacher, and his mother was a direct descendant of William Penn. The family did not have enough money to pay for university training, so Helmholtz enrolled in a government training program. In exchange for covering medical school expenses, Helmholtz agreed to serve as an army surgeon for 8 years after his graduation.

At the age of 17, he enrolled in the Royal Friedrich-Wilhelm Institute for Medicine and Surgery in Berlin. During his second year, he also took courses at the University of Berlin, including physiology from Muller. Helmholtz took his dissertation under Muller, and accepted many of Muller’s conclusions but they disagreed on fundamental philosophy.

Muller was a nativist who maintained that life was not reducible to physical processes, and that people are more than electro-chemical processes. Helmholtz was more of an empiricist, or at least an antivitalist. He believed that the same laws applied to living and inanimate objects. As far as Helmholtz was concerned, life might not be fully explained, but there was nothing spiritual or mysterious about its processes.

Helmholtz and a group of scientists, many of them former students of Muller, formed the Berlin Physical Society. Committed to the belief that everything in the universe can be accounted for in physical terms, they signed an oath (legend says in blood): “No other forces than the common physical chemical ones are active within the organism. In those cases which cannot at the time be explained by these forces one has either to find the specific way or form of their action by means of the physical mathematical method, or to assume new forces equal in dignity to the physical-chemical forces inherent in nature, reducible to the force of attraction and repulsion (Bernfeld, 1949, p171; quoted in Hergenhahn, 1992, p 212).”

Fame came early to Helmholtz. In 1842, at 21 years old, he entered the army, and served as a surgeon at his home town of Postdam, Germany. In his spare time, he built a small lab and continued his research on the metabolism of frogs. At the age of 26, while still in the army, he published a mathematical formulation for the conservation of energy. Helmholtz demonstrated that food and oxygen consumption were able to account for the total energy that an organism expended, thus applying the Principle of Conservation of Energy to living organisms. His paper “The Conservation of Force” was so influential that he was released from the remainder of tour of duty in army, and appointed lecturer of anatomy at Academy of Arts in Berlin.

In 1848, after moving to Konigsberg, Helmholtz accomplished the impossible: he measured the speed of the human spirit. According to the nativist view, behavior was under the control of one’s spirit, and nerve impulses were movements of that spirit. It followed that since God’s spirit can instantly be anywhere, the human spirit could move along a nerve equally fast.

Helmholtz didn’t believe in human spirits, so he investigated the issue in two ways. First, he stimulated the nerve of a frog’s leg both close to and far from the muscle. According to the nativists view, the animal spirit should travel down the nerve instantly, so the response times, if measurable at all, should be equal. Helmholtz however found that there was a difference between the responses; The closer to the muscle, the faster response time. By subtracting one reaction time from the other, Helmholtz established that the average speed of the nerve impulse was 90 feet per second.

Second, Helmholtz instructed human subjects to push a button when they felt a stimulus on their leg. Again the location of the stimulation should not matter if the nerve carried the human spirit. Stimulating at the toe and at the thigh, Helmholtz subtracted the response times and calculated that in humans nerve impulses travel between 165-330 feet per second.

It was a remarkable finding. Helmholtz showed that nerve impulses were measurable, and remarkably slow. Far from being instaneous spiritual phenomena, nerve impulses appeared to be physical-chemical processes found in humans and animals.

Although a great researcher, Helmholtz was less gifted as a teacher. He taught small groups of students, but left the large scale lectures to his assistants. The custom of the day was for lectures to be as much theater as science. Using elaborate sets, backdrops might rise from the floor while diagrams and displays fell from the ceiling. Live animals were used in demonstrations, or might be sacrificed and dissected on the spot. In general, a lecture was a gory, fast paced, complicated presentation.

Helmholtz preferred long walks alone with his thoughts. Uncomfortable on stage, he hired assistants to handle the teaching duties. In 1858, moving to the University of Heidelberg, Helmholtz’s first assistant was Wilhelm Wundt.

Responsible for teaching Helmholtz’s experimental physiology classes. Wundt got off to a slow start. During one of his early lectures, between 8-9 AM, he began to bleed excessively and nearly died. Apparently suffering from tuberculosis, Wundt used an oxygen mask he designed himself, and took an extended leave of absence. During his convalescence in the Swiss Alps, instead of complete rest, Wundt wrote his first book, “Contributions Toward a Theory of Sense Perception.” Published in 1862, it unfortunately was never very successful or influential.

In contrast, Wundt’s Grundzuge der physiologischen Psychologie (Principles of Physiological Psychology) was highly successful. Published in two parts (1873 and 1874), and appearing in six editions over 37 years, Wundt’s Principles book established psychology as a separate, experimental, laboratory science. It has been called the most important book in the history of psychology (Schultz, 1981).

Between these two books, Wundt served as teaching and lab assistant for Helmholtz. He viewed himself not a follower or disciple but as an employee, and kept to himself as much as possible. Keeping to himself was not easy for Wundt because he shared a room with four other assistants to Helmholtz. Two of these assistants were German (like Wundt), and two were Russian. According to one of the Russians, I.M. Schenov (who became a teacher of Ivan Pavlov), There’s a rumor that Wundt never even spoke to his roommates.

During the time he was with Helmholtz,Wundt also taught he own classes, including the first formal course in psychology as a natural science. In addition be maintained an incredible level of productivity. In fact, during the six years he was associated with Helmholtz (1858 to 1864), Wundt wrote 63 articles and books.

Politically Active

It’s hard to find a specific mentor for Wundt’s political activity. It reached its peak during Wundt’s time with Helmholtz but his inspiration was more likely taken from his father or mother. For a while, it seemed that Wundt would choose political life in favor of an academic career. In any event, he remains the only major psychological figure to have held elected office.

War impacts lives for many years, and Wundt was greatly influenced by the Revolution of 1848, which occurred when he was a teenager. In 1848, when Wundt was 16, nationalism brought a series of revolutions across Europe. In Germany, this push toward political unification ultimately led to an unsuccessful attempt to create a united German nation. Wundt followed the process with great interest. In March, he was an observer at the initial conference where 51 German and Austrian politicians drew up the Frankfurt Parliament. Held in the auditorium of the Heidelberg Museum, the conference was a major step toward forming Germany into a nation. Later that year, Wundt attended a speech by Robert Blum (1907-1848), vice president of the Frankfurt Parliament and a prime advocate of German nationality. A few months later, Blum faced a firing squad in Vienna but the German revolution continued in full swing. The following year, 1849, the revolutionary forces brought the war to and around Heidelberg. Like many people that summer, Wundt watched the Battle of Waghausel from the hills surrounding the town.

The German revolution almost succeed. It failed for want of a leader. William I, the Emperor of Germany, was a natural choice as leader of the new country but he declined. After the failing to create a nation, the feudal states again became the primary form of government.

A liberal, Wundt supported and was associated with the Workers’ Education League. Using his talent for speaking and writing, he gave lectures and published articles proclaiming his views (Wundt, 1862), and, in 1863, was elected president of the WEL. In April 26, 1866, Wundt was elected by a landslide as Heidelberg’s representative to the Baden parliament (Diamond, 1980, in Hilgard, 1987).

Wundt supported the secularization of public schools, fought for workers rights, and took the unpopular stand that Baden should remain neutral in the Austro-Prussian War. His political activism and liberal ideas brought him in contact with early socialists such as Friedrich Albert Lange (1828-1875) and August Bebel (1840-1913). Lange was a philosopher/economist at Zurich University and Bebel was the co-founder of the German Social Democratic Party. Wundt’s decision to leave politics seems to have been influenced by three factors: the death of his mother in 1868, the increased pressure of his academic load, and the shift of his fellow idealists from progressive to radical.

Hering, Ewald

Ewald Hering (1834-1918) was two years younger than Wundt but they were friends and colleagues for over 20 years. They met in their later years, after each had achieved fame on their own. Hering had studied with the renown physiologists Ernest Weber (1795-1878) and Gustav Fechner (1801-1887) at the University of Leipzig, receiving his medical degree there in 1858. Hering then moved to the Vienna Military Medical Academy, where he worked with Josef Breuer (1842-1925), Freud’s friend. Working together, Hering and Breuer showed that receptors in the lungs help cause respiration, a discovery still known as the Hering-Breuer reflex.

Like Muller, Hering was a modified nativist. While Kant believed that the mind contained a priori categories of ideas, Muller and Hering restricted their nativist ideas to physiological structure. Hering, for example, believed that the retina receptors provided 3 pieces of information: height, depth, and left-right position.

Like Wundt, Hering never received the recognition he deserved. In Wundt’s case, the problem was that Wundt’s ideas were misinterpreted. Although he started the first experimental laboratory of psychology, he was firmly planted in the rationalist tradition. His students however, particularly the Americans and English, ascribed to an empiricist-positivistic approach and tended to rewrite Wundt in their own image. They took his laboratory work but ignored his philosophy. Blumenthal notes: “For all the American students who went abroad to attend Wundt’s lectures, very little of Wundt’s psychological system survived the return passage (Blumenthal, 1980, p 130 quoted in Hergenhahn, 1992, p 245).”

With Hering, the problem was not his students but his colleagues. It should come as no surprise, but often does, that scientists do not stop being human. Even famous scientists do not suspend ego and pettiness. Indeed, people who study human relations seem to be no better at doing human relations than those they study. Marriage counselors get divorced, child psychologists yell at their children, and researchers — even great ones like Hering and Helmholtz — abandon logic and argue about who is “right.”

The dispute occurred after mid-career for Hering. After studied space perception for nearly 10 years, he turned his attention to color vision. The dominant theory of color vision was the one Helmholtz proposed, and it was widely accepted. Hering, however, found that the Young-Helmholtz theory provided a useful way of explaining normal vision but didn’t account well for color blindness or certain paired colors. For example, when red and green are mixed, they appear gray. Gray also occurs when blue and yellow are equally mixed, and when black and white are combined.

Another unexplained phenomena is afterimages of opposite colors. Staring at red before looking away produces a green afterimage. And although black doesn’t give white, blue does produce a yellow afterimage. Also, people are not color blind to a single color. Those who can’t see green, also can’t detect red, yet they can see yellow.

Hering proposed the presence of three types of receptors on the retina. He maintained that color vision uses these receptors, and two processes (catabolic and anabolic). Catabolic process (breaking down) is caused by red, yellow, and white; green, blue and black cause an anabolic process (building up) in receptors. If both colors to which receptor is sensitive are present, the resultant sensation is gray.

Hering’s explanation was reasonable and unsettling. His approach was thoughtful, and his research careful, but Helmholtz’s prestige made acceptance of his ideas difficult. Worse, the controversy led to the neglect of Herring’s other research by his colleagues. His work on dark-adapted spectral luminosity, total color blindness, and the independence of white and color sensitivity were virtually ignored (Hilgard, 1987). The discussion of vision receptors became a battle of who was right and who wrong.

The current thought is that both were right. The retinal receptors appear to function like the Young-Helmholtz theory suggests, and the neural processes beyond the retina may be the source of Herring’s opponent-process findings, yet the issue is still unresolved.

There is a second instance of Herring’s being right but not accepted. Herring’s research on sensory magnitudes caused him to question the psychophysical law proposed by his teacher, Gust Fechner (1801-1887). In his paper (Hering, 1876), Hering criticized Fechner’s law and proposed an alternative. Although his work had the support of Johannes Muller, Fechner’s prestige gave his rebuttal (Fechner, 1877) more weight than it should have received. Although Herring’s argument was the same generalization proposed by Stevens (1961), it’s of little comfort being right 85 years later.

Carl Stumpf (1848-1936)

Wundt’s major rival was Carl Stumpf (1848-1936). Although best known for his work on the psychology of music and hearing, Stumpf’s laboratory at the University of Berlin was a serious competitor to Wundt’s Leipzig lab (Hergenhahn, 1992). Stumpf’s lab restricted itself to space perception and audition, and it wasn’t the first lab established, but it nonetheless developed into a prestigious and important institute.

Stumpf grew up acquiring an interest in medicine and music. An accomplished violist, Carl began composing music as a youngster. As a student at the University of Wurzburg, Stumpf, like Freud a few years later, was impressed by Brentano. It was Brentano who inspired Stumpf to pursue science, and it was Brentano who suggested that Stumpf attend the University of Gottingen, which he did, receiving his doctorate in 1868.

Like Wundt, Stumpf used introspection as his primary method of investigation. Unlike Wundt, Stumpf didn’t require his assistants to be trained introspectionists. When researching the psychology of music, for example, Stumpf preferred trained musicians over trained introspectionists.

Wundt maintained that only trained introspection would lead to the truth. In a series of articles, Stumpf and Wundt argued the matter. Although it began on a theoretical level, it soon deteriorated into a personal, bitter dispute. The dispute may have been replaying of a previous conflict when Stumpf and Wundt were up for the same job. In 1894, when Stumpf gained his appointment at the University of Berlin, it was the premiere faculty position, and the prize should have gone to Wundt. Apparently, Helmholtz opposed Wundt’s appointment, so it was given to Stumpf instead.

Aside from the name calling and emotional rhetoric, the issue between Stumpf and Wundt has served as a way to contrast empirical approaches. Stumpf is presented as being concerned with the phenomena of music, while Wundt is used to represent an interest in finding elements of sensation.

Although Wundt wasn’t as reductionistic as is often presumed, his insistence on trained, controlled studies of vitalism was reinterpreted by the associationists to be the hallmark of the empirical-positivism approach. Fictionalized versions of Wundt and Stumpf, then, represent a comparison of elements versus phenomena, respectively. The generalization of Gestalt and the elementalism of behaviorism represent the same issue revisited. Like the influence of heredity versus environment debate, it is an issue which still is unresolved, and will remain so as long as the extremes are emphasized.

WUNT’s MODEL

Unlike Freud, Wundt’s major contribution was practical, as opposed to theoretical. Building on the work of other scientists, Wundt began the first experimental laboratory exclusively dedicated to the study of psychology.

It was the first coherent research program of the new science. Others had conducted psychological experiment, but Wundt’s program was composed of interlocking studies, held together by the conceptual cement of his theory of volition (Danzing, 1980b).

Antecedents

Ernest H Weber (1795-1878)

A contemporary of Muller, Ernest Weber (1795-1878) played a major role in the advancement of experiment science. Although there can scarcely be found an area of physiology to which Weber did not contribute, he is best known for two discoveries: 2-pin perception and just noticeable difference.

First, Weber showed that two pin points, if presented simultaneously and close enough together, are perceived as one point. This interesting, if not trivial, fact is less important than the experimental method used to discover it. Weber systematically varied the stimulus (the independent variable) and carefully measured the response (the dependent variable). His use of controlled, methodical research method outlasts its findings.

Second, Weber produced the first quantitative law of physiology. He showed that people’s estimation of weights is not absolute but it is predictable. The brain doesn’t continuous track every piece of available but notices when an event changes.

Weber called the amount of increased weight necessary to notice a change, the just noticeable difference (jnd), and showed that the relationship between stimulus and sensation can be expressed as a ratio. If the jnd for five pounds of weight is one pound, the jnd for 20 pounds is 4 pounds.

Fechner, Gust Theodore (1801-1887)

Although Weber proposed the first quantitative law of physiology, it was Gust Fechner who provided the mathematical formulation to substantiate it. Fechner not only put Weber’s idea into a formula, he revised it and showed it to be logarithmic.

Fechner’s accomplishments, though, are not limited to expanded on Weber’s insights. Born in 1801 at Gross-Sarchen, in southeast Germany, Fechner came from a family of ministers. The closest he came to preaching was a series of essays he wrote criticizing medicine and science.

Using the pseudonym, Dr. Mises, Fechner published 14 essays between 1821 and 1876. In “Proof That The Moon Is Made of Iodine,” he attacked the medical fad of using iodine as a panacea. In “The Comparative Anatomy of Angels,” he argued that angels have no legs and, indeed, are round. He proposed that the further up the developmental ladder the less legs there are. Ants and beetles have six, mammals four, birds (who are the most heavenly) have two. Every step up drops a pair of legs. Consequently, stepping up to angels means they have no legs. Besides, a circle is the perfect shape, angels are perfect, so they must be round. And, finally, angels are round, planets are round, so angels must be planets.

In 1834, Fechner was appointed to the faculty of the University of Leipzig. Interested in afterimages, he published several articles on the topic and on color vision. Apparently, as a result of his research, Fechner severely injured his eyes by looking at the sun through colored glasses.

About 1840, Fechner suffered a major nervous breakdown (Ellenberger, 1970). He had difficulty sleeping, felt no hunger, was sensitive to light, and was extremely depressed. Because of his collapse, he was unable to work for 3 years. He spent most of his time in a darkened room, while his mother read to him (Schultz, 1981). His bizarre illness ended in an equally bizarre manner. He dreamed of the number 77, indicating to him that he would be healed in 77 days. Students of suggestion will not be surprised to find that 77 days later he was cured.

Not only was Fechner’s illness gone, but, in what may have been a manic state, he believed that God given him a purpose in life: to solve all of the riddles of the world. Fechner may have overestimated the matter, but he did quite well at the task. Fechner’s description of the “pleasure principle” influenced Freud years later. Fechner interest in philosophy led to founding psychophysics. And it was Fechner who discovered a solution for the mind-body problem, making psychology possible.

On October 22, 1850, Fechner lay in bed for his morning meditation and experienced a sudden revelation. He concluded that there is a quantitative relationship between stimulus (mind) and sensation (body). The difference is that a stimulus is on a geometric scale, and sensation is on an arithmetic scale. Adding the ringing of one bell to 10 ringing bells does not increase sensation as much as adding one bell to one other ringing bell. Fechner showed that since sensation depends on stimulation, the mental and materials worlds can be related quantitatively. His aim was to discover a general metaphysical rule from which all principles of science could be deduced.

Fritsch & Hitzig

In 1870, two German physicians, G. Fritsch and E. Hitzig, using a home kitchen as a makeshift lab, discovered that applying electrical stimulation to the cortex of a dog resulted in a motor response. Stimulating a narrow strip immediately in front of the central fissure resulted in specific motor movements.

At the back of the frontal lobe, which runs across the top of the head from ear to ear, Fritsch & Hitzig mapped a crescent-shaped region of the brain which came to be called the motor cortex. They showed that motor control of the body has a specific location in the brain.

In addition, stimulating the motor cortex of the right hemisphere resulted in motor movements on the left side of the body. They concluded that motor muscle control occurs in the brain, and that it triggers responses on the opposite side of the body.

Assumptions

  1. Wundt assumed that psychology should study the conscious experience.
  2. Psychology should be a natural science, looking for deterministic principles but allowing for purposive behavior.
  3. The mind has an active role of synthesizing perceptions and causing purposive behavior.
  4. Research should be replicable. In addition to his original research, Wundt replicated much of the work of both physiologists and psychophysicists of his day.
  5. Psychology should be both experimental and philosophical.

Components

Experimental Lab

On April 26, 1875, Wundt received an unexpected but pleasant surprise. The University of Leipzig offered him a faculty position as chair of philosophy. Wundt had been teaching at the University of Zurich for only 1 year, but Leipzig was the largest university in Germany (nearly 3000 students) and second only to Berlin in prestige. Wundt was so excited by the offer that he answered their letter that same day.

Wundt arrived in Leipzig at about 6pm on June 17, 1875. He began a walking tour of the town, partly to orient himself to the setting and partly to recover from the 12 hr train trip from Mannheim. It was a town he would for the next 35 years.

Wundt’s arrival was both more and less than he anticipated. He was given room to store his personal experimental apparatus, but was not allocated lab for teaching. Without the lab space, Wundt was forced to teach courses in logic and anthropology, instead of experimental psychology.

After a year of successful teaching, Wundt was given lab space in the summer of 1876. It was a large room in a student diving hall, but it took three years to convert it into a fully functional laboratory. By 1879, however, Wundt had his lab and two students: G. Stanley Hall and Max Friedrich. Hall was an American with a Ph.D. from Harvard; Friedrich became the first student to complete a dissertation from Wundt’s lab (Hilgard, 1987). Although Wundt has established a laboratory at Heildelberg, his lab at Leipzig was the first university lab dedicated solely to psychological research.

Wundt’s political skill was not wasted at the university. In 1879, when offered a position at the University of Breslau, Wundt negotiated with Leipzig for a better salary and more lab space.

Wundt’s initial income was somewhat lower than his colleagues at Leipzig, but his renegotiations allowed them a comfortable life. The Wundts, and their daughter Eleonore, lived in a spacious 4-th floor apartment across the street from the Geuandhaus Concert Hall. Unlike his family of origin, Wundt was more likely to be found at the theater, opera, and concert hall than at church. They lived quietly, enjoyed long walks together, and often stopped for hot chocolate (her) and beer (him).

In addition to more money, Wundt’s original lab room was expanded to include 2 large classrooms, 2 labs, a conference room, a darkroom, and a waiting room. Wundt called it the Institute for Experimental Psychology. Two years later, Wundt founded a new journal to publish the results of his new Institute. The first study was by Max Freidrich on the duration of apperception.

It wasn’t until 1883 that Wundt’s experimental psychology course was listed in the university catalog, but it very popular, with over 250 students (Bringmann, Bringmann, & Ungerer, 1980, p147), and, at one point, as many as 600 students attending his lectures (Schultz, 1981).

In Wundt’s Institute, each student was assigned to a particular piece of equipment, and expected to use it to gather data or adapt it to new uses (Hilgard, 1987). Consequently, his students received hands-on experience in testing theories as they learned them.

When Wundt went to Leipzig, it was with the intent of establishing an experimental psychology, followed by the development of a non-experimental psychology. Eventually he accomplished both tasks but was never able to integrate the two branches into a complete science.

Research Goals & Methods

For Wundt, the goal of psychology was to understand conscious experience. He differentiated between simple and complex mental processes, and used different methodology to investigate them. The goal of simple, conscious experience was to identify the rudimentary elements of thought. Then, having discovered the basics, Wundt hope to find out how these elements are combined together, and discover the underlying laws governing them.

Wundt used introspection and reaction-time experiments to investigate simple mental processes. For higher mental processes, he preferred historical analysis and naturalistic observation.

Introspection

Wundt’s introspection was a systematic process of self-observation. He used introspection as a scientific methodology, and rejected its more meditational philosophical method as being inappropriate for science.

For Wundt, introspection should be:

  1. objective. Reports should be descriptions of sensations, not personal interpretations.
  2. internally consistent. The same observer should produce the same results across trials.
  3. attentive. The observer must approach the task with “strained attention.”
  4. replicable. As much as possible, different observers should achieve the same results.
  5. used by a trained observer. Wundt was not content to leave introspection uncontrolled. He believed that only observers trained in introspection could provide reliable reports.
  6. used as an experimental control. Introspection should be used to determine whether or not a person is experiencing a specific sensation.
  7. accompanied by experimentation. Introspection was the dependent variable of an experiment. The experimenter varied a stimulus and the observer experienced it.

Reaction Time

If reaction time experiments had been done twenty years earlier, David Kinnerbrook would never have lost his job. Kinnerbrook was an astronomers assistant to Nevil Maskelyne. Kinnerbrook’s job was to set a ship’s clock to start when a given star came into view of his telescope. Maskelyne noticed, however, that his assistant was consistently off by .5 second. Kinnerbrook was admonished to be more careful, but when Maskelyne checked the discrepancy had grown to .8 second. Thinking him careless, Kinnerbrook was fired.

Two decades later, Fredrich Bessel (1784-1846) encountered a similar problem, and studied the issue, performing the first reaction time experiment. He concluded that differences in timing between astronomers was not error but was due to individual differences.

Like Muller and Helmholtz, Wundt used reaction time studies to describe the stages of a perception but realized that the data is subject to individual differences and can be unreliable. Like Muller, Wundt believed that there are three stage in a complex perception: perception (sensory input), apperception (recognition of the situation), and reaction.

In the hope of developing a mental chronometry (how fast each mental process occurs), Wundt adopted the procedures of Francisus Cornelius Donders (1818-1889). Donders, the Dutch physiologist, measured how long it took subjects to respond to a light by pressing a button. To measure more complicated mental processes, Donders subjects were required to respond to only one of several stimuli, forcing them to discriminate among the stimuli before responding. The amount of time this complex task took minus the simple reaction time indicated how long the mental process took. Donders also explored “choice reaction time,” required subjects to differentially respond to different stimuli. One of Wundt’s students, Ludwig Lange, reaction time was 1/10 second slower it the subjects concentrated on the stimulus instead of the response.

Ultimately, Wundt, like Helmholtz, abandoned reaction time as unreliable. Times varied too much from study to study, from subject to subject, and between trials of the same subject.

Word association

Wundt and his students did some of the earliest word association research, measuring the amount of time between word presentation and the first word that came to mind. They differentiated between inner and outer associations. Inner associations, such as snake have an intrinsic connection, while association such as fly:wheel were considered outer associations. Their findings are remarkably similar to the work done by cognitive psychologists 50 years later.

Although Wundt didn’t invent new experimental methods and techniques, his programmatic research has served as a model for generations. By combining the work of others, he helped form psychology into an experimental enterprise requiring sustained effort and teamwork.

Folk Psych

Major work of last his years was Volkerpsychologie (Folk Psychology), 1900-1909 in several vols. Continuation of Wundt’s interest in social anthropology and social psychology.

Mind

Experiment and statistics are convergent operations. Both applied to evolutionary history of mind.

“Mental evolution and development remained central concepts in Wundt’s psychology without Wundt ever becoming a developmental psychologist. The early publications of 1862-63 show much clearer than later writings the extent to which, besides JS Mill and Adolphe Quetelet, Charles Darwin was Wundt’s source. Evolution and development are unitary. Going back from complex to simple forms is synonymous with going back from later to earlier forms on all three analytical levels ofevolution, in today’s terms the mirogenetic, the ontogenetic and the phylogenetic levels. Several years before Herbert Spencer’s influential publications (1870/72), Wundt maintained a principle of continuity for all mental evolution, human or animal. The “uniformity of mental life,” which extends “from butterfly to scientist” (Wundt, 1863, Vol. 1, p.458), permits us to speak only of gradations of intelligence, not of essential differences between man and animal. Hence, animal psychology is a division of general psychology.” p39.

Tridimesional Theory of Feeling

Wundt, like many philosophers before him, held that there are two aspects to every experience: the object and the experience. Concrete objects exist in and of themselves, but we know them through our experience of them. Objects are external to us, experience is internal.

Since experience is an internal representation of an external reality, sensations are objective and feeling are subjective. According to Wundt, these subjective feelings can be described on three dimensions: excitement-calm; pleasure-displeasure; and tension-relaxation.

Sensations and the resultant feelings have two attributes: quality and intensity. Quality is a characteristic aspect of the sensation or feeling. For example, the pitch of a tone is a quality. The intensity of the sensation is the length of time a tone is held.

Sensations and/or feelings can be clustered together, and are called compounds. An idea is a compound which is composed of one sensation and one feeling. Emotions are composed of multiple feelings. When feelings cause action, it is called will.

Elements are connected by association, much as in John Stuart Mill’s mental chemistry. For Wundt, the process was called creative synthesis. and the resulting sum of all the compounds is called the appreciative mass.

Perception

For Wundt, perception is a physiological, passive process. He believed in psychophysical parallelism, but not dualism; a distinction which alludes many of his readers. Basically, he maintained that the mind and body are not the same; they exist in parallel but have no point-by-point correspondence (which is where his logic breaks down). Wundt’s problem was that there are too many automatic, unconscious physiological processes to say each one has a conscious parallel (Dodge, 1911). He wanted to have a logical reason for believing in volition, rather than ascribing it to faith.

Following Kant, who denied the possibility of knowing reality for certain, Wundt sought to reconcile his philosophical tenants. According to Kant, perceptions are organized by time and space because our minds have pre-set categories; we’re made that way. Since there is no certain knowledge of the actual world, our understanding of it comes through our senses. For Kant, the innate organization of sensory input was in the mind. For Wundt, like Muller, sensory organization was more physiological, and still somewhat of a mystery.

Apperception

Apperception, a term Wundt borrowed by Herbart, is an active process of the mind. For Herbart, apperception is essentially a readiness for new perceptual experience. For Wundt, it is an act of volition.

After perceptions (sensations) are passively presented, the mind actively selects portions of the perception and gives it meaning. Perception is automatic, but apperception is voluntary. For Wundt the mind is an active participant in the process of experience. He rejected the passive role given to attention by the British empiricists. Instead of John Stuart Mill’s mental chemistry, Wundt proposed the mind arranged elements by creative synthesis. According to Wundt, the appreciative process was critical for normal mental functioning, speculating that a breakdown it could result in schizophrenia. With a loss of ability to apperceive, thoughts would be disorganized and appear meaningless (Hergenhahn, 1992).

Principle of creative resultants

Wundt maintained that when it comes to mental processes, the sum is greater than its parts. According to the principle of creative resultants, combining elements forms interactions which are new and different (Wundt, 1912/1973).

Principle of heterogony of end

Goal-directed activity is not restricted to a single goal but results in wide variety of other effects, according to Wundt’s principle of heterogony of end. Achieving one goal, or even heading toward it, produces unexpected consequences which, in turn, impact other goals and behaviors.

Principle of contrasts

Sensations are influenced by experience, particularly when an immediate contrast is available. The sensation of sour is intensified if the immediate preceding sensation was sweet. According to Wundt’s principle of contrasts, opposites intensify each other.

Principle toward the development of opposites

In a somewhat related matter, after prolonged espouse to one sensation, we seek the opposite. In a volitional sense, we seek out the opposite of a long term experience.

Volition

Volition was important to Wundt, but it’s important to note that he was a determinist. Volitional acts are the active participation of the mind but they governed by mental laws. Volition is dynamic, but it is not the same as free will.

For Wundt, all behavior was voluntary, or had been voluntary at one time. According to Wundt, reflexes available at birth had been voluntary in previous generations, and were passed on to the current generation in a quasi-Lamarckian approach.

Accomplishments

Wundt established the first experimental psychology lab. More, he made psychology into its own science. Instead of being a subpart of philosophy, Wundt believed that psychology should have its own department, and grant its own MA’s and PHDs.

Personal

Wundt is an easy person to fictionize. Although his parents seem to have been sociable (Schultz, 1981), he preferred privacy, had a great tolerance of silence. and was basically reclusive. His autobiography (Wundt 1920) has some obvious inaccuracies, perhaps in an effort to maintain privacy, and little is known of his personal life.

The lack of information makes Wundt no less interesting; it simply makes the contradictions more obvious. Seemingly, Wundt was shy and lacking self-confidence, yet he was the most popular lecturer at Leipzig, and spoke without referring to his notes. He produced a tremendous volume of work–Boring (1950) estimates that Wundt wrote a total of 53, 735 pages–yet he spent his evenings attending the theater, opera or concerts. He ran a major laboratory, yet was not a lab worker, and rarely visited the lab for more than five or ten minutes (Catell, 1928). He was a systematic researcher, but was passionate about politics.

Students

Wundt’s conception of psychology as an independent and experimental science began in Heidelberg, but it found its fulfillment in Leipzig. The new science revolutionized Germany education, and, through Wundt’s students, the rest of the world.

In the four years from 1886 to 1900, 14 Americans graduated with Ph.D. degrees under Wundt. Although Wundt’s first American student was G. Stanley Hall (who later founded the American Psychological Association), the first American to receive a Ph.D. under Wundt was J. McKeen Cattell. When Wundt’s students returned to American, many began labs of their own, and carried the doctrine of experimental psychology to America. They identified with Wundt’s lab science, but showed little or no interest in his writings on logic, ethics or philosophy. In essence, they transplanted the methodology, leaving the nativistic and volitional roots behind.

Publications

In 1862, Wundt’s first book was published, entitled Beitrage zur Theorie der Sinneswahrnehmung (Contributions to the Theory of Sensory Perception). It contained Wundt’s initial proposal of psychology as a science; sections of it had appeared as early as 1858.

Appearing in 1863, Wundt’s book Human and Animal Psychology shows his dual interests.

1873, Wundt published the first section of his most influential book, Grundzuge der physiologische Psychologie (Principles of Physiological Psychology). The second half appeared in 1874. All told, Principles enjoyed six editions over 37 years, and eventually filled 3 volumes.

In 1881, Wundt began the first journal devoted to experimental psychology, Philosophical Studies. He later changed the name to Psychological Studies, a name he thought more appropriate to the subject.

In 1869, Wundt’s Grundriss der Psychologie (Outline of Psychology, 1896/1911),

Beginning 1900-1920, Wundt produced a major work on art, language, myths and other aspects of cultural psychology. The 10 volumes of Volkerpsychologie (Folk Psychology) focused on higher thought process, which Wundt believed could only studied by historical analysis or naturalistic observation.

For more on the founding of psychology, check out:
German Psychology

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Resources

Wundt’s Time Line

1859, Darwin publishes On the Origning
1859, Lazarus and Steinthal publish the first vol of psych professional journal.
1860, Fechner’s Elements of Psychophysics pub
1867, Helmholtz Handbook of Physiological Optics pub
1869, resigned seat.
Wundt’s mother died shortly after?
1868; 36 when mother died
1871, part of the German Empire, a grand duchy
1871, August, given salaried appointment at Heidelberg as extraordinary prof. Taught courses in Anthropology, and in Medical Psychology.
Summer, 1871, temp replacement teach for Helmholtz (gone to Berlin). Paid more for summer course than whole year for regular appointment.
1872, with the money, married Sophi Mau. Fiancee for several years. He age 40.
At Heidelberg functioned as independent scholar.
1874, left Heidelberg.

References

  • Hilgard, 1987
  • Wundt, 1920, pp2-3.)
  • Schultz, 1981).
  • Hilgard, 1987
  • Hergenhahn, 1992)
  • Chaplin & Krawiec, 1960
  • Bernfeld, 1949, p171; quoted in Hergenhahn, 1992, p 212).”
  • (Blumenthal, 1980, p 130 quoted in Hergenhahn, 1992, p 245).”
  • Schultz, 1981).
  • (Hering, 1876),
  • (Fechner, 1877)
  • Danzing, 1980b).
  • Ellenberger, 1970
  • (Bringmann, Bringmann, & Ungerer, 1980, p147

 

© 2011-2023, Kenneth L. Tangen

‘There are two great principles of psychology: people have a tremendous capacity to change, and we usually don’t.”   Ken Tangen