The Classical Schools of Psychology: Five Great Thinkers and Their Ideas

It has been said that psychology has a long past and a short history. This statement should be taken to mean that although psychology has its roots in philosophy, as a scientific discipline psychology is only a little over 120 years old. As noted earlier, the roots of psychology can be easily traced back about 2,400 years to ancient Greek philosophers. However, the beginning of scientific psychology is usually associated with the date 1879, the year that a German scientist named Wilhelm Wundt founded the first psychological laboratory at the University of Leipzig in Germany. Modern psychology arose in the context of what are known as schools of psychology.

From a historical perspective, the first school of psychology to be established was structuralism. Its founding personality was Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1920). He became interested in studying not so much the physiology of the sense organs such as the eyes and ears, but in how simple sensations associated with the sense organs combined to form what we call human consciousness.

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First, there is hue, or color. Second, there is brightness. Third, there is saturation. This refers to the ―richness‖ or ―fullness‖ of a color. No matter what visual stimulus Wundt‘s subjects looked at, there were no other kinds of sensations experienced than the three identified above. Consequently, Wundt concluded that all visual experiences are structured out of these same three types of elemental experiences. Similar statements can be made about the other senses such as hearing, taste, and touch. According to Wundt, the primary purpose of psychology is to study the structure of consciousness. By the structure of consciousness, Wundt meant the relationship of a group of sensations, a relationship that produces the complex experiences we think of as our conscious mental life. This approach to psychology has been called mental chemistry. William James (1842–1910), teaching at Harvard in the 1870s, was followingWundt‘s research with interest. James had an interest not only in psychology, but also in physiology and eventually in philosophy. James founded a psychological laboratory at Harvard; he also authored The Principles of Psychology, the first psychology textbook published in the United States. The book was published in 1890, and this can also be taken as the date when the school of psychology known as functionalism was born. The principal personality associated with it is James, and he is said to be the dean of American psychologists.

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The German psychologist Max Wertheimer (1880–1943), like James, was also dissatisfied with Wundt‘s structuralism. Wertheimer believed that Wundt‘s emphasis on the importance of simple sensations as the building blocks of perceptions was misguided. The general pattern that induces a complex perception is described with the German word Gestalt. Gestalt is usually translated as a pattern, a configuration,or an organized whole. In 1910 Wertheimer published an article setting forth the basic assumptions of Gestalt psychology, and this is usually taken to be the starting date of the school. The article reported a series of experiments using two of his friends, Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang Kohler, as subjects. These two men went on to also become well-known Gestalt psychologists.

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Returning to the United States, behaviorism is a fourth classical school of psychology. Its founding personality is John B. Watson (1878–1958). A wave of enthusiasm for Watson‘s ideas swept him to the presidency of the American Psychological Association (APA) in 1915, and this can be taken as the starting date for behaviorism. Doing research first at the University of Chicago and then at Johns Hopkins University, Watson came to the conclusion that psychology was placing too much emphasis on consciousness. In fact, he asserted that psychology is not a mental science at all. The mind is a mushy, difficult-to-define concept. It can‘t be studied by science because it can‘t be observed. Only you can know what‘s going on in your mind. If I say I‘m studying your mind, according to Watson, it‘s only guesswork.

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In order to identify a fifth classical school of psychology, it is necessary to return to the European continent, specifically to Austria; the school is psychoanalysis. The father of psychoanalysis is Sigmund Freud (1856–1939). Freud was a medical doctor with a specialty in neurology. His findings and conclusions are based primarily on his work with patients. Freud‘s original work was done with a colleague named Josef Breuer (1842–1925). Breuer and Freud collaborated on the book Studies on Hysteria. Published in 1895, it is the first book written on psychoanalysis. This can also be taken to be thestarting date for the school. After the publication of this first book, Freud went on alone without Breuer; it was a number of years before he worked again with colleagues. In order to explain chronic emotional suffering, Freud asserted that human beings have an unconscious mental life. This is the principal assumption of psychoanalysis. No other assumption or assertion that it makes is nearly as important. The unconscious mental level is created by a defense mechanism called repression.

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Psychoanalysis is not only a school of psychology, but also a method of therapy. Freud believed that by helping a patient explore the contents of the unconscious mental level, he or she could obtain a measure of freedom from emotional suffering. It is important to note that of the five classical schools of psychology, psychoanalysis is the only one that made it an aim to improve the individual‘s mental health.

(adopted from “Psychology: A Self-Teaching Guide‖ Frank J. Bruno).

A

According to James, psychology should be more interested in how the mind functions, or works, than how it is structured. Consequently, James stressed the importance of studying such processes as thinking, memory, and attention. You will recall that James defined psychology as the science of mental life. In brief, functionalism as a school of psychology asserts that the primary purpose of psychology should be to study the functions of human consciousness, not its structures.

B

The principal aim is to provide a work environment that will facilitate production, reduce accidents, and maintain employee morale. A theme that guides industrial psychology is the human use of human beings.

C

Wundt trained assistants in the art of introspection, a skill characterized by paying attention not to the whole pattern of a stimulus, but to an elemental part of a stimulus. Wundt‘s studies of vision suggested that there are only three basic kinds of visual sensations.

D

Consequently, Watson asserted that the purpose of psychology should be to study behavior itself, not the mind or consciousness. Some critics of Watson say that he denied the very existence of consciousness. Others assert Watson was primarily saying that references to the consciousness, or mental life, of a subject don‘t provide solid explanations of behavior. In either event, Watson‘s view is today thought to be somewhat extreme and is referred to as radical behaviorism, a psychology thatdoesn‘t employ consciousness as an important concept.

E

Its aim is to protect the ego against psychological threats, information that willdisturb its integrity. The kind of mental information repressed tends to fall into three primary categories: (1) painful childhood memories, (2) forbidden sexual wishes, and (3) forbidden aggressive wishes.

F

In the experiments, Wertheimer demonstrated that the perception of motion can take place if stationary stimuli are presented as a series of events separated by an optimal interval of time. This sounds complicated.