History of Psychology, Research Paper Example

Abstract

The paper is devoted to the discussion of history of psychology. The paper delineates the distinction between philosophy and science in psychology. Friedrich Nietzsche is included into the list of the most prominent philosophers in psychology. William James’s impact on psychology as a science is evaluated. The paper creates the general vision of historical development in psychology, from being dominated by the logic and analysis (philosophy) to becoming an object of scientific experimentation (science).

Introduction

History of psychology dates back to the times when the first ancient philosophers were trying to look deeper into the meaning of the human consciousness and to define the roots of the human actions. With time, psychology has turned into a coherent, well-organized discipline about human behaviors. Throughout its history, the link between philosophy and science in psychology has been extremely blurred. Simultaneously, the process of evolution in psychology can be roughly divided into the two distinct periods – the earlier period dominated by philosophy and the later period being devoted to predominantly scientific methods and discoveries. This paper will lay the foundation for the subsequent historical analysis of psychology and its most prominent figures. This paper is an attempt to look back into the history of psychology and to analyze the contribution made to psychology by famous philosophers and scientists. Although the number of such figures in psychology is virtually unlimited and constantly increases, this discussion will be limited to Friedrich Nietzsche and William James as the two major sources of philosophic and scientific thought in psychology. The aim of the current paper is to see how philosophy and science influenced the development of psychology as a discipline which reasonably combines the best features of philosophy and science.

Psychology, Philosophy, and Friedrich Nietzsche

Needless to say, since the ancient times and up to the middle of the 19^th century, psychology could hardly be called science. Rather, dozens of philosophers were trying to understand the meaning and the sources of human actions, as well as to define the border between the rational and the irrational part of human thinking. Beginning with Plato and Aristotle, whose philosophic works are fairly regarded as the first major contribution to the development of psychology as a discipline, psychology gradually evolved to turn into a rich compilation of philosophic knowledge and philosophic discoveries. These, although were distanced from scientific experimentation, nevertheless influenced the development of psychology and were later used by behavioral professionals in the development of their scientific theories.

The 19^th century in Europe was marked with the rapid development of the new scientific and philosophic thinking. The 19^th century for psychology became the turning point in its scientific evolution. However, even in the 19^th century, with its emphasis on science and experimentation, philosophy continued to be the source of psychological analysis and logic. Friedrich Nietzsche became the source of the revolutionary philosophic knowledge which covered but was not limited to human psychology; and because his ideas were later used by other philosophers and professional scientists the figure of Nietzsche and his role in the history of psychology deserves attention.

Whether Nietzsche was the founder of the new psychological thinking in which a human looked like a unique combination of rational and irrational behavioral stimuli is difficult to define – dozens of philosophers before Nietzsche assumed and even confirmed the existence of the two behavioral poles in the human cognition (Roubiczek, 1964). However, that Nietzsche believed in the existence of the so-called the Apollonian and Dionysian aspects of human nature is a well-known fact (Hergenhahn, 2008). These aspects of human nature were the essential elements of Nietzsche’s philosophy and were the critical components of his psychological thinking. For Nietzsche, “the Apollonian aspect of human nature represents our rational side, our desire for tranquility, predictability, and orderliness. The Dionysian aspect of human nature represents our irrational side, our attraction to creative chaos and to passionate, dynamic experiences” (Hergenhahn 2008, p. 222). Nietzsche was confident that the best works of art and literature were the products of a successful fusion between the two aspects of human nature, while the best lives were driven by one’s being able to control his passions and to redirect them into reasonable behavioral channels (Hergenhahn, 2008). In the context psychology, Nietzsche considered one of his primary goals to help individuals to gain control over their passions and irrational behavioral impulses to make their lives healthier and creative (Hergenhahn, 2008).

The core of Nietzsche’s psychology is in the evaluation of controversies between the Dionysian and the Apollonian part of the human mind. The irrational Dionysian element of the human thinking, according to Nietzsche, is barbarian and requires using Apollonian rationality to modify it (Roubiczek, 1964). Art, dreams, cultural achievements are all the results of humans’ being able to re-channel their Dionysian stimuli and behavioral patterns through a more rational and thus, a socially acceptable behavioral forms (Hergenhahn, 2008). Despite its irrationality and barbarism, Nietzsche had but to recognize that without the Dionysian element, humans would lose their emotional content and without the Apollonian element, individuals would lack capacity to shape their barbarian instincts and modify them (Hergenhahn, 2008).

Nietzsche’s philosophy was later used by Freud, Schopenhauer and Kierkegaard; and although much of his knowledge remains very much controversial and even radical, Nietzsche is considered as one of the best psychologists and philosophers in the history of psychology. First of all, Nietzsche turned psychology into the central approach to all human problems (Roubiczek, 1964). Second, Nietzsche made it possible to reveal the hidden and the most distant human instincts that are covered by the noblest reasons and strivings (Roubiczek, 1964). In distinction from other philosophers, Nietzsche was confident that irrational urges in humans had to be expressed but not repressed (Hergenhahn, 2008), and in this sense his philosophy heavily influenced the psychological and scientific thinking in the professionals and philosophers that came after him, including Freud, Adler, Schopenhauer and Jung.

Psychology as a Science: The Legacy of William James

The 19^th century became the turning point in the development and evolution of psychology not only because it was rich in philosophic achievements, but because the 19^th century finally marked the distinction between psychology as the product of philosophic analysis and psychology as the product of scientific experimentation. In the middle of the 1800s, Wilhelm Wundt was the first to use scientific experimentation in psychology and later on, his book became the first and the major source of connection between the philosophic and the scientific parts of psychology (Sapsford, 1998). Since that time, psychology was no longer limited to logic and analysis but turned into a separate scientifically grounded discipline, with its own experimentation methods and its own scientific achievements. However, it was not before William James who was later recognized as the founder of the American psychology, that psychology was given a true scientific start. In many aspects, James’s scientific achievements were an urgent response to the crisis of the conscious and unconscious in psychology – the crisis, which required scientific approaches and experimental resolution.

In his central work Principles of Psychology, William James established a new vision of the self and the new vision of the conscious. His book became a reflection of James’s phenomenological principles, which established “the self” not as the product of some inner reality but as the result of social interaction (Sapsford, 1998). As a result, through the prism of James’s scientific beliefs, for an individual to grasp the meaning of abstract knowledge, this individual should first try to understand the meaning of social practices that establish this knowledge (Sapsford, 1998). James’s contribution to psychology as a science was significant in a sense that James was able to argue the relevance of retaining the concept of the unconscious in psychology: the talented scientist was confident that the notion of the unconscious in psychology had to be eliminated in order to resolve the crisis of consciousness in psychological thinking in the middle of the 19^th century (James, 1981). His assumptions and his emphasis on the conscious were justified by the growing role of reason and scientific discovery, and James sought to link the gaps in human consciousness to rational, physiological and extra-individual factors, including the social ones (Sapsford, 1998). The experiments with automatic writing led James to think that human reactions in the process of writing were not the results of some unconscious impulses but were only a form of dysfunction in the human attention (Sapsford, 1998). As such, the unconscious did not play any significant role in humans and, as a formerly philosophic concept, had to be discarded.

Although many of James’s revelations and assumptions were later used and modified, and although the concept of the unconscious was retained and even expanded, it is difficult deny that “a history of psychology in America prior to the last fifty years before William James would be as short as a book on snakes in Ireland since the times of St. Patrick” (James, 1981). In America, the legacy of William James is similar to that of Wilhelm Wundt in Europe, for it is due to James that psychology turned into a well-shaped discipline taught in Universities and colleges all over the American continent (Sapsford, 1998). James was the first to challenge the previously dominant spiritualistic vision of psychology and to combat faculty views in college students in America (James, 1981). Under the influence of James’s thought, the separation of psychology departments in universities from the departments of philosophy was as painful as it was also inevitable, giving rise to the new vision of psychology as an experimental science. James was the starting point in the development of the positivist thinking in psychology, which dominated the psychological science over the course of the 19^th century and which put an end to the so-called “armchair” psychology (James, 1981). It is obvious that the so-called armchair psychology could hardly lead to the discovery of the critical knowledge, which we actively use in present day psychology.

Conclusion

Throughout its history, the line between philosophy and science in psychology has been increasingly blurred. Until the middle of the 19^th century, the historical development of psychology had been largely dominated by philosophers, with the emphasis made on the analysis and logic. The 19^th century became the turning point in the historical evolution of psychology and laid the foundation for the development of psychology as a science. Friedrich Nietzsche and William James are fairly regarded as the two critical figures in the history of psychology. The choice of these figures in the current paper is not accidental. In many aspects, Nietzsche became the founder of the modern vision of human thinking as a continuous conflict between the conscious and the unconscious. The figure of William James signifies the beginnings of psychology as a science, with experimentation and complex scientific methodologies as the distinctive features of the modern psychological thinking. The only difference between the two is in that in his philosophy, Nietzsche relied on his logic, while James sought to use experimentation to prove his hypotheses. The two figures actually represent the two different sides of psychology – that of philosophy and that of science. In its current state, psychology stands as the unique combination of philosophic and scientific features, without which it loses its relevance. Despite the controversies and scientific dilemmas in Nietzsche’s and James’s philosophies and experiments, their knowledge and logic still influence the development of the major theories in contemporary psychology.

References

Hergenhahn, B.R. (2008). An introduction to the history of psychology. Cengage Learning.

James, W. (1981). The principles of psychology. Harvard University Press.

Roubiczek, P. (1964). Existentialism for and against. CUP Archive.

Sapsford, R. (1998). Theory and social psychology. SAGE.