Foundations of Psychology

Science
 Latin word “Scientia”
 Knowledge based on demonstrable and reproducible data
 Theories are foundations for furthering scientific knowledge and for putting information
gathered to practical use

Understanding scientific theory

 Scientific theory is an explanation of an aspect
 Can be repeatedly tested
 Verified in accordance with scientific method
 Using accepted protocols of observation measurement and evaluation of results.
 Theories are tested under controlled conditions in an experiment

 Theory is based on a hypothesis that is backed by evidence

 In science, theory is not merely a guess

 A theory is a fact-based framework for describing a phenomenon

 A theory presents a concept on idea that is testable.

 Scientists can test the theory through empirical research and gather evidence that supports
or refutes it.

 The scientific status of any evidence is determined by its method of investigation

 Not what it studies

 Or when the research was done

 Certainly not by who did the investigation

 All sciences use the emphirical method

 Emphiricism emphasizes objective and precise measurement

Psychology and science

 Psychology is a science that follows emphirical method.
  Scientific theory presents an explanation about some aspect of human behavior or the
natural world which is supported through repeated testing and experiment.
 Psychology and the other behavioral or social sciences (Sociology / anthropology /
Economics / Political science) are not as precise in their measurements as biology, chemistry
or physics.
 But to the extent that psychologists use emphirical evidence, their findings may be referred
to as scientific.
 Psychologist is a scientist who studies behavior using the emphirical method

Propose of psychological theory

 In psychology, theories are used to provide a model for understanding human thoughts,
emotions and behaviors
 Theory has 2 components
 It must describe a behavior
 Must make prediction about future behavior
 Some of these theories have stood the test of time.
 Others have not held up under close scientific scrutiny and may have been rejected or only
partially accepted by researchers today.
 Each theory has helped contribute to our knowledge base of human mind and behavior
 An academic subject originating in mental philosophy it gradually evolved in 19th century
 Mentalism was rejected as being unscientific and the behaviorist school focused instead on
measuring changes in stimuli and corresponding changes in responses.
 This approach was also seen to be quite limited, as it ignored both the experimental aspects
of mind (Feelings, attitudes, emotions aspirations) and the psychological co relates of mental
experiences and overt behaviors.

Basic issues in psychology

 Psychology has very brief history
 Many divergent system and theories exist from beginning
 Subject matter of psychology has always been in controversy.
 Psychology inherited most of these issues or problems from philosophy and physiology.

“That’s why it is said that philosophy is the mother of

psychology and physiology is the father of psychology”
Issues:
 Mind vs Body
 Nativism vs emphiricism
 Functionalism vs Structuralism
 Mechanism vs vitalism
 Reason vs non-reason
 Objectivity vs subjectivity

MIND VS BODY
 Oldest issues in psychology
 Also known as mind body problem
 In animal as well as human there exists a mind and a body
 How are they related
 Does mind exist
 Some system in psychology accepts both mind and body “Dualistic system”
 Structuralism accepts dual system – mind and body are parallel
 Titchener named it “Doctrine of psychophysical parallelism”
 According to doctrine physical process (body ) and mental process (mind ) run side by side
parallel
 There is no interaction between them neither one causes the other
 Change in any one is always accompanied by change in other

Critiques of this system: Behaviorism

Supporters of this system: Psychoanalytic

 Freud accepted existence of mind and body.

 Developed a similar concept known as “mental apparatus”

Nativism Vs Emphiricism

 Also known as nature nurture issue

 Or heredity versus environment
 How much human behavior is due to hereditary factor and how much is due to environment
 Nativism definition?
 Nature is what we thick of as pre-wiring and is influenced by genetic inheritance and other
biological factors.
 Nurture is the influence of external factor after conception.
 E.g. The product of exposure, life experiences and learning on an individual.
 Flynn effect?
 Nature nurture debate is concerned with relative contribution that both influences to make
to human behavior such as personality, cognitive traits, temperament and psychopathology
 Physical charertieristics are biologically determined by genetic inheritance
  Color of eyes
 Straight or curly hair pigmentation of skin
 Certain disease (such as Huntington’s chorea (progressive death of brain cells))are all a
function of genes we inherit
 Those who adopt on extreme hereditary position are known as nativists.
 Their basic assumption is that the characteristics of human species as a whole are a product of
evolution and that individual differences are due to each person’s unique genetic code.
 At the other end of spectrum are the environmentalists also known as Empiricists.
 Nativists?
 Descartes had opined that some ideas are inherited or inborn
 Kant has also stressed the importance of inborn perceptions of our world.
 Gestalt also supported the importance of nativistic-they said that certain ways of perceiving
world came to us without any prior training or learning.
 Behaviorist – Watson laid emphasis upon environment view
 Today it’s more of interactionist position
 Human behavior is viewed as a result of interaction of heredity and environment.

Objectivity vs subjectivity

 Closely related with mind and body issues

 Objectivism refers to consideration of whatever can be seen or measured directly, accurately
and precisely
 Most of human being and animals response are like that
 Being objective is not being experimental
 Maslow’s need hierarchy theory?
 Cattle 16 PF?
 Motiquiz?
 Objectivity is defined as interpersonal argument in observation
 Subjectivism has been emphasized by structuralism, gestalt psychology, existential and
humanistic psychology
 Human behavior is understood in terms of private or inner experience of person
 Gestalt – Founder?
 Psyche – soul?
 Though structuralism is not in picture recent movement of humanistic psychology and existential
psychology is still felt because their subject matter still reports thought ideas feelings wishes and
motives.
 In psychology the essence of both will remain.
 “Placebo effect”?

Functionalism Vs Structuralism

 Structuralism : the first school of thought in the field of psychology

 Breaking down the mind into its fundamental parts or structure
 Wilhelm Wundt, who created the first psychology lab back in 1879
 However his student Edward Titchener who first came up with the term “Structuralism” and
popularized the school of thought
 Titchener felt that psychology should focus on studying both the mind and consciousness.
 He viewed consciousness as the combination of all of our mental experience at any one point in
time.
 The mind then, was the accumulation of all of our experiences throughout our lives
 Titchener believed that by breaking the mind down into its basic parts we could discover how
mental processes are structures and learn about higher thinking
 The conscious mind was made up of three components or structures

 Sensations – which are produced by sensory information

 Images-
 Affection-

 Titchener used a process called introspection to break down the human consciousness into
these basic components.
 Introspection refers to having people look inside themselves in order to gain a better
understanding of their current emotions or thoughts,
 However introspection was viewed as too subjective by some psychologist
 One of the biggest critics of structuralism was William James……?
 William James (1842 – 1910) was the 1st American psychologist who exposure a different
perspective on how psychology should operate.
 Sticked to Charles Darwin Theory “Adaptation Evolutionary theory”
 Key to that theory is the idea that natural selection leads to organisms that are adapted to
their environment including their behavior.
 Adaptation means that a trait of an organism has a function for the survival and
reproduction of individual because it has been naturally selected.
 As James saw it psychology’s purpose was to study the “function of behavior in the world”
and as such his perspective was known as functionalism.
 Functionalism focused on how mental activities helped an organism fit into its environment.
 Functionalists were more interested in the “Operation of the whole mind” rather than
individual parts, which were focus of structuralism
 Like Wundt, James believed that introspection could serve as one means by which someone
might study mental activities.
 But James also relied on more objective measures, including use of various recording devices
and examinations of concrete products of mental activities and of anatomy and physiology.
 Functional psychology was analogous to physiology in that its purpose was to study how the
mind serves to adapt the individual to the environment.
 Some of the major contributions that functionalism American psychology has made to
contemporary psychology are
 John Dewey’s reflex arc,
 James Rowland Angell’s developmental and abnormal psychology.
 Harvey car’s maze leering
 Thorndike’s dynamic psychology and trial and error learning
  Woodworth’s “Columbia bible”, which institutionalized the distinctions between
experimental and correlational research.

In comparing the two schools of thought

 Structuralism examined basic elements of mind (thoughts) while functionalism looked at
behavior
 While structuralism was never widely accepted in America, may important psychology
theories have resulted from the theory of functionalism.
 Still structuralism has had a considerable impact upon contemporary American Psychology.
 As one historian put it, Structuralism was responsible for…
 Titchener structuralism served the valuable purpose of giving movement…
 For the human brain that means that cognitive structure (the anatomy of brain) and
cognitive function (thoughts, cognitive ability) and interdependent and irrelated.

Mechanism

 According to mechanism all human behavior can be explained

 Vitalism – criticized mechanism
 Human behavior can never be reduced to material thongs and mechanical
 For vitalists says : soul and spirit and its departure
 Rigid and deterministic
 These are untolerable thoughts.

What is the origin of human knowledge?

 The study of human knowledge is called epistemology.

 The Greek word “episteme” that is to know or understand
 Epistemology asks questions like

What can we know

What are the limits of knowledge
How knowledge is obtained

 Epistemology refers to how we humans know things

 A “theory of knowledge” would explain

What knowledge was

How humans could come to know things

What truly existed in the world?

The complicated relationship between the two

 1756 – humans don’t know how to retain and store knowledge

  Question: How beliefs are formed?
Answer: Three prominent approaches

 Foundationalism: attempts to articulate foundationally true beliefs from which other

conclusions can be derived.
 Coherentism: knowledge consists of systems must be evaluated on the degree to which the
system has logical coherence that correspondence to external facts.
 Reliablism: there are good and bad ways to develop beliefs and that justified beliefs and that
justified beliefs are those belief that are formed based on good and reliable methods.
 One of the oldest and most vulnerable traditions in the philosophy of knowledge
characterizes knowledge as “justified true belief”.
 Although not all philosophers agree that “justified true belief” does in fact adequately
characterize the nature of knowledge, it remains the most dominant conception of
knowledge.
 Philosophers can determine it into 3 domains : Personal, Procedural and Propositional
 Personal knowledge relates to first and experience, idiosyncratic preferences and auto
biographical facts.
 Procedural knowledge refers to knowledge how to do something
 Propositional knowledge refers to general truth claims about the world and how we know it.

Difference between philosophy and psychology

 Whereas philosophers have generally been concerned with general propositional knowledge
 Psychologists are concerned with how people acquire personal and procedural knowledge

 Question: How do we acquire knowledge?

Answer: Empirical and Rational

 Rational: The rationalist argue that we utilize reason to arrive at deductive conclusions about
the most justifiable claims. Rationalists tend to think more in terms of propositions, driving
truths from argument and building systems of logic that correspond to the order in nature
[Rene’ Descartes and Immanuel Kant are some of the most famous rationalists]
 Empirical: Empiricists tend to argue that the most basic knowledge we achieve about the
world comes from your senses, the direct observations that we make about the world. John
Locke and David Hume, who are famous empiricists.
 The distinction between the rationalists and empiricists is parallels the modern distinction
parallels the modern distinction between philosophy and science.
 As the scientific method emerged and became increasingly distinct from the discipline of
philosophy.

The Empiricist

 In answering the epistemological question they postulated the term “passive mind”.
 Passive mind records physical experience and mental images, recollection and association.
 Physical experience occurs in a particular pattern and it is recollected in that pattern.

The rationalist
  They gave the concept of active mind that interacts with the data from experience and
transforms it.
 The active mind is a mechanism through which the physical reality is organized, ponders,
understand or valued

The problem of self

 The self is surely one of the most heavily researched areas in psychology.
 The debate continues as to whether a self truly exists.
 There is little doubt that the many phenomena of which the self is a predicate – self –
knowledge, self-awareness, self-esteem, self enhancement, self-regulation, self-deception,
self-presentation.

Historical perspective

 Drawing on caves suggest that sometime during the dawn of history, human beings began to
give serious thought to their non – physical , psychological selves.
 Writers would describe this awareness of self in terms of spirit, psyche or soul.
 Greek philosophers such as Socrates, Plato and Aristotle defined self in terms of the soul as
immaterial and spiritual
 Their conception of an individual’s sense of self as a spiritual entity of self as a spiritual entity
separate from the physical formed the foundation or subsequent conceptions of mind and
body duality.
 During the Middles ages the concept was further developed by theologians such as Thomas
Aquinas, who stressed the immortality and superiority of the soul to the body in which it
dwelled.
 A turning point in the thinking about this no physical being came in 1659, when Rene
Descartes wrote his principles of philosophy.
 Descartes proposed that doubt was a principal tool of disciplined inquiry, yet he could not
doubt that he doubted.
 He reasoned that if he doubted, he was thinking and therefore he must exist.
 Although the emphasis on mind and body duality that Cartesian rationalism came to
represent has largely been discarded in recent times, its emphasis on inner processes of self-
awareness on metacognitive process – remains a powerful force in philosophical and
physiological thought.
 Other philosophers of this period, among them Spinoza and Leibnitz, added their ideas
about the mystery of the nonphysical aspect of individuals.
 Terms such as mind, soul, psyche and self were often used interchangeably with scant
regard for invariant vocabulary or scientific experimentation.
 For the most part, a general state, a general state metaphysical disorganization regarding
the concept of self-existed well into the present century (and to some extent continues). As
for belief, it was typically relegated to the realm of religion.

American Psychology

 At the turn of the present century, when American psychology began to take its place
among the other academic disciplines, there was a great deal of interest both in the self and
in the role that self-beliefs play in human conduct.
 William James (1891a, 1891b) wrote principles of psychology, his chapter on “The
consciousness of self” was longest in two volumes.
  James suggested that “the total self of me, being as it were duplex” is composed of “partly
object and partly subject ”
 He referred to the I as pure ego and suggested that this component of self is consciousness
itself.
 The me, on the other hand is one of the many things that the I may be conscious of and it
consists of 3 components.
 One physical or material
 One social
 One spiritual
 It is not difficult to become captivated by James seductive conception of self as knower and
self as known.
 After all, the distinction of self in terms of I and me is in almost intuitive (“I talk to myself”; “I
want people to like me”) on other levels it is also charming and amusing.
 James (1869-19 ) was also one of the first writers to use the term “self-esteem”, which he
described as a self-feeling that “in this world depends entirely on what we back ourselves to
be and do”
 James even provided a mathematical formula for self-esteem that suggests that is essence,
how we feel about ourselves depends on the success with which we accomplish those things
which we wish to accomplish.

Summary

 Our physical experiences are highly diverse and yet we experience unity among them
 Every time, every new stimulus gives us new experience yet there is community of
experience.
 We perceive our self as the same person from moment to moment day by day even though
little about us remain the same.
 What accounts for this unity and continuity in our experience?
 The self has been viewed as having a separate experience of its own.
 Besides organizing one’s experience and providing sense of continuity over time.
 The self has been endowed with other attribute such as being the instigator and evaluator of
actions.

Questions:

3marks

1. Describe problem of self

5marks

2. Define psychology and science 5m

3. Define Functionalism 5 m
4. What is a scientific theory 5m
5. Explain Empiricism vs Nativism 5 m
6. What is a scientific theory? Explain factors that makes theory Scientific? 5m
7. Discuss the issues of mind vs body in psychology. 5m
8. Discuss the issue Mechanism vs vitalism as view of psychology. 5m
9. Explain the origin of human knowledge 5m
15 marks

10. Explain in detail history and philosophy 15 m

11. Origin of human knowledge and problem of self 15m

Common questions

12. What are the issues of psychology

13. Support system
14. What is the other name for nativism and empiricism
15. Who was the propondent of structuralism
16. Method of introspection
17. Introspection definition
18. Biggest critique of structuralism
19. Scientist influence of James
20. Method followed by James
21. Contributors of American Psychology
22. American psychologist – named the distinction between correlational research
23. Explain mechanistic view of behavior
24. Explain view of vitalism
25. Study of human knowledge
26. Greek word of epistemology
27. How beliefs are formed

Module 2

Beginnings of psychology and as discipline

What is Pagan/Paganism

From a Christian viewpoint, pagans was generally characterized as those who are caught up in any
religious ceremony, act or practice that is not distinctly Christian

Correspondingly, Jews and Muslims also use the term pagans to describe those outside their
religion.

Others define the two paganism as any religion outside Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity
where as some argue that a pagan is anyone with no

Pagan comes from Latin word paganus, which means “country dweller”; paganism can refer to
polytheism or the worship of more than one god, such as in ancient Rome.

A pagan is also considered to be one who, for the mmost part, has no religion and induldges in
worldly delights and material possessions.

The History of Psychology

The beginning of the history of psychology is hard to pinpoint, mainly because it
is difficult to establish exactly what psychology is.
Since the dawn of civilization and the establishment of the earliest Psychology Psi (Public Domain)
religions and spiritual beliefs, various priests, shamans and spiritual
leaders were responsible for the mental wellbeing of their people. From shamen to Jewish
Qabbalists, curing the mind was a huge part of the spiritual path, even if treatment was
couched in magic and mystery, using rituals to drive out demons.

If we define psychology as a formal study of the mind and a more systematic approach to
understanding and curing mental conditions, then the Ancient Greeks were certainly leading
proponents. As with many scientific studies, Aristotle was at the forefront of developing the
foundations of the history of psychology. Aristotle's psychology, as would be expected, was
intertwined with his philosophy of the mind, reasoning and Nicomachean ethics, but the
psychological method started with his brilliant mind and empirical approach.

Of course, it would be unfair to concentrate fully on Aristotle's psychology without studying

some of the other great thinkers who contributed to the history of psychology, but his work
certainly is the basis of modern methods. Any modern psychologist of note fully understands
the basics of Aristotelian thought and recognizes his contribution to the history of
psychology.

Aristotle's Psychology and the Influence of Plato

To give Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) complete credit for being the first thinker to develop a
theory of proto-psychology is unfair to some of the other philosophers from Greece and
beyond. However, whilst there is little doubt that the Babylonians and Buddhists, amongst
others, developed concepts involving the mind, thought and reasoning, much of their tradition
was passed on orally and is lost. For this reason, the Ancient Greeks provide a useful starting
point as we delve into the history of psychology.

The teacher of Aristotle, Plato (428/427 BC - 348/347 BC), provided some useful insights
into the theoretical structure of the human mind, based largely upon his elegant Theory of
Forms. He used the idea of a psyche, a word used to describe both the mind and the soul, to
develop a rough framework of human behavior, reasoning and impulses.

Plato proposed that the human psyche was the seat of all knowledge and that the human mind
was imprinted with all of the knowledge it needed. As a result, learning was a matter of
unlocking and utilizing this inbuilt knowledge, a process he called anamnesis.
 In his famous work, 'The Republic,' Plato further developed this idea and first proposed the
idea that the mind consisted of three interwoven parts, called the Tripartite Mind.

 The Logistikon: This was the intellect, the seat of reasoning and logic.
 The Thumos: This was the spiritual centre of the mind, and dictated emotions and feelings.
 The Epithumetikon: This part governed desires and appetites.
According to Plato, the healthy mind discovered a balance between the three parts, and an
over reliance upon these parts led to the expression of personality. For example, gluttony and
selfishness could be explained by a dominance of the Epithumetikon, letting desires govern
behavior.

In the Republic, a treatise aimed at theorizing the perfect society, Plato proposed that the
rulers of such a society, those who determined course and policy, should be drawn from men
where the Logistikon held sway. Individuals with a strong Epithumetikon made excellent
merchants and acquirers of wealth whilst the Thumos, which can loosely identified with will
and courage, was the domain of the soldier.

Later, Plato renounced his idea of a tripartite mind and returned to earlier proposals of a
dualistic explanation for the mind, balanced between intellect and desire. However, this three
way split would reemerge in Aristotle's idea of a trinity of souls and, based upon the idea
prevalent in many societies and religions, which gave a reverence to the number three, 20th
Century psychoanalysts maintained the idea of a human mind balanced between three
impulses.

Aristotle's Psychology - Para Psyche

Aristotle, building upon the work of the earlier philosophers and their studies into mind,
reasoning and thought, wrote the first known text in the history of psychology, called Para
Psyche, 'About the Mind.' In this landmark work, he laid out the first tenets of the study of
reasoning that would determine the direction of the history of psychology; many of his
proposals continue to influence modern psychologists.

In the book, the definition of psyche, as was common at the time, used 'mind' and 'soul'
interchangeably, with the Ancient Greek philosophers feeling no need to make no distinction
between the two. At this period, apart from dalliances with Atheism from Theodorus, Greek
philosophers took the existence of divine influence as given. Only Socrates really questioned
whether human behavior and the need to be a 'good person' was about seeking personal
happiness rather than placating a divine will.
In Para Psyche, Aristotle's psychology proposed that the mind was the 'first entelechy,' or
primary reason for the existence and functioning of the body. This line of thought was
heavily influenced by Aristotle's zoology, where he proposed that there were three types of
souls defining life; the plant soul, the animal soul and the human soul, which gave humanity
the unique ability to reason and create. Interestingly, this human soul was the ultimate link
with the divine and Aristotle believed that mind and reason could exist independently of the
body.

He was one of the first minds to examine the urges and impulse that drove and defined life,
believing that the libido and urge to reproduce was the overriding impulse of all living things,
influenced by the 'plant soul.' Whilst he partially linked this to the process of achieving
immortality and fulfilling the purposes of a divine mind, he proposed this reproductive urge
many centuries before Darwin. This idea is a fine example of one of the great intuitive mental
leaps that define Aristotle's legacy.

Aristotle's Psychology of Impulses and Urges

Continuing this line of thought, Aristotle attempted to address the relationships between
impulses and urges within the human mind, many years before Freud resurrected many of the
basic tenets of Aristotle's psychology with his psychoanalysis theory. Aristotle believed that,
alongside the 'Libido,' were 'Id' and 'Ego,' the idea of desire and reason, two forces that
determined actions.

Aristotle's psychology proposed that allowing desire to dominate reason would lead to an
unhealthy imbalance and the tendency to perform bad actions. Here, Aristotle's thought
created a paradigm that remained unchallenged for centuries and one that still underpins the
work of modern psychology and philosophy, where desire is renamed as emotion and reason
as rationality.

Uniquely, Aristotle also understood the importance of time on the actions driving a person,
with desire concerned with the present and reason more concerned with the future and long-
term consequences. As an aside and a slight divergence into sociology, this short-termism
and quest for immediate results is one of the driving forces behind economic collapses,
environmental degradation and political popularism.

Perhaps more people should study Aristotle and his ideas of what drives human behavior.
Aristotle can, quite legitimately, be called the first behaviorist and the basis of work by B.F.
Skinner and Pavlov, two of the most famous names in the history of psychology.
Aristotle's psychology included a study into the formation of the human mind, as one of the
first salvos in the debate between nature and nurture that influences many academic
disciplines, including psychology, sociology, education, politics and human geography.
Aristotle, unlike Plato, was a believer in nurture, stating that the human mind was blank at
birth and that educating the individual and exposing them to experiences would define the
formation of the mind and build a store of knowledge.

The History of Psychology and Ancient Greek Medicine

Plato and Aristotle adopted a philosophical and abstract approach to defining human behavior
and the structure of the mind, but that was not the only contribution of the Hellenistic
philosophers. The development of Ancient Greek medicine introduced the study of
physiology into the history of psychology, proposing that there were physical reasons
underlying many mental ailments. Chief amongst these was the Father of Medicine,
Hippocrates, who proposed that epilepsy had a physical cause and was not some curse sent by
the fickle Greek Gods.

Unlike Aristotle, who saw the heart as the seat of thought and reason, Hippocrates understood
the importance of the brain. This debate continued, with physicians such as Praxagoras still
maintaining that the heart and arteries linked thought, through a mysterious fluid called
pneuma. In a gruesome experiment, Herophilus and Erasistratus were given permission, by
the ruler of Alexandria, Egypt, to perform vivisection on criminals and they determined that
the nervous system and brain controlled the body and were therefore the seat of reason.

However, they still believed that the heart sent pneuma throughout the body, but that it
controlled unconscious processes, such as metabolism. By contrast, the nerves sent 'psychic'
pneuma throughout the body. These experiments revealed a lot of information but introduced
medical ethics into the history of psychology, a debate that rages today. Whilst their studies
were abhorrent when looked at through the lens of history, the Twentieth Century history of
psychology includes some infamous and unwanted landmarks.

The History of Psychology - Galen and the Four Humours

Following on from Hippocrates was the physician, Galen, who provided the link between
the Greeks and Islamic psychology. Of Greek extraction, this brilliant physician and
researcher earned the respect of successive Roman emperors for his skill and ability, and he
 went on to produce volumes of work covering many aspects of the human condition, from
psychology to eye surgery.

He proposed the idea of four 'humours' within the human body, each responsible for a
different aspect of the human condition, and believed that an imbalance between the four
would affect physical and mental wellbeing. This holistic approach to medicine inextricably
linked mind and body, a factor only recently readopted by modern medicine, which tends to
treat physical conditions and symptoms without paying much regard to mental health, and
vice-versa.

Galen's Four Humors Were:

 Sanguine: The blood, related to the element of air and the liver, dictated courage, hope and love.
 Choleric: Yellow bile, related to the element of fire and the Gall Bladder, could lead to bad temper and
anger, in excess.
 Melancholic: Black bile, associated with the element of earth and the spleen, would lead to
sleeplessness and irritation, if it dominated the body.
 Phlegmatic: Phlegm, associated with the element of water and the brain, was responsible for rationality,
but would dull the emotions if allowed to become dominant.
Galen believed that the balance of these four humours would be influenced by location,
diet, occupation, geography and a range of other factors. Whilst this idea of humours was
incorrect, it influenced medical and psychological thought for centuries, and it was developed
further by the great Islamic scholar, Ibn-Sina (Avicenna).

This idea of looking at the entire body and mind, rather than blaming witchcraft and spirits,
certainly influenced medicine and the history of psychology for the better although some of
the cures used to alleviate the build-up of a humour, such as blood-letting, were harmful.

Of course, to modern commentators, the idea of the humors seems a little primitive and is
based upon a limited knowledge of psychology. However, the importance of Galen is not the
exact nature of the theory but the fact that his ideas saw the first paradigm shift away from
the idea of mental conditions having a supernatural source and towards finding answers in
physiology.

It is no surprises that his work upon psychology and the mind, as well as other disciplines,
became the backbone of the Islamic rediscovery of the Greeks; his ideas were copied and
added to by Islamic scholars. Certainly, his empirical and pragmatic approach earns him a
place in the history of psychology.
The Coming of the Islamic Golden Age and the Growth of
Psychology

There is little doubt that the Ancient Greeks laid out the course of modern psychology,
although due respect has to be given to the Chinese, Indian and Persian scholars who made
contributions outside the scope of this history of psychology, but which influenced modern
thought in many disparate ways.

The Islamic expansion saw a culmination of this process and an integration of Greek thought
allied to the wisdom of the Middle-Eastern and Eastern scholars as they drew knowledge
from around the known world. The Islamic Golden Age would preserve Aristotle's
psychology, add to it, and pass it on to the Europeans as the Dark Ages ended. The roots of
the history of psychology certainly began here and the beliefs of the Greeks would also
influence sociology, geography and economic theory. Islamic world a naturalistic rather than
religious , factually psychology developed based on Aristotle.

Question of 2nd module

 What is paganism?
 Explain social and intellectual context of psyche and mind
 When did Christianity started? Name the 3 philosophers, psychologist and physiologist of
paganistic view.
 Name the Christian contributors physiologist, psychologist and philosophers in 18th
century in psychology.
 Name the Muslim contributors physiologist, psychologist and philosophers in 18th century
in psychology.
 Name the Egyptian contributors physiologist, psychologist and philosophers in 18th century
in psychology.
 Explain social intellectual context of psyche and mind explained by Islamic philosophers in
medieval times
 Explain social intellectual context of psyche and mind explained by Egyptian philosophers in
medieval times
 Explain social intellectual context of psyche and mind explained by Christianity
philosophers in medieval times
 Write a note on beginning of psychology as a discipline in the medieval period
 Define pagan and paganism
 What is nicometia
 Who wrote the book of Republic? Plato
 What are the three types of mind Plato spoke about?
  What is annamus
 Where was Aristotle born
 Name the 2 work by Aristotle
 What are the 3 types of soul defined by Aristotle
 Who was glean? How is it related to Muslim philosophers
 Name any two Muslim philosophers
 Name two contributions in Ibn Sinha

Module 3

Psychology as a science

 Wihelm Wundt – unconscious and adaptation

 Born August 16, 1832
 Neckarau, german town
 Outside of Mannheim
 Son of a Lutheran Minister (Titchener)
 Studied Gymansien at Brushsal and Heidelberg and entered Uni of Tubiengen 19, 1851
 After 1 year he transferred to Heildeberg uni where he majored medicine.
 He turned instead to physiology which he studied under Muller.
 Hermann von Helmholtz – 1858 – 1864 as professor
 Wundt replaced helmoltz position
 3yrs later he took chair in inductive philosophy at Uni of Zurich
 At Zurich, only one year, after he receieved appointment at Leipzig in 1875
 Leipzig’s philosophy department dominated by herbartians, provided ideal environment for
his intellectual flowering, the soil having been prepared by Fechner (threshold), Weber
(Mathematician) and Lotze (physicist who talked about Psychology)
 Find about Webner and Fechner
 1879- recognized little room of equipment as bonafide laboratory as first in Worlds devoted
to psychology
 Students flocked to Wundt
 186 phD ended up by Wundt.

Some of the famoes psychologist studied under Wundt

 James Mckeen Cattell

 G Stanley Hall
 Edward Scriptures
 Charles Judd C Spearman
  E. B. Titchner

 Kown as “Fatherof experimental psychology” and the founder of 1st psychology laboratory
hence he exerted enormous influence on the development of psychology as a discipline,
especially in united states.
 Resrved and shy in public . Wunde aggressively dominated his chosen arenas.
 The lecture hall abd the pages of books, with a witty and sardonic persona. His scope was
vast, his output incredible
 …..
 Text an handbooks of wundt
 Medical physics and
 Human psychology: Encylopaedic Tomes on Linguistics, Logic, Ethics and Reeligion
 A” system of Philosophy“ Not to mention his Magna Opera, The Grundzue….
 Although his work spans several disciplines – physiology, psycology and Philosophy – Wundt
would not have considered himself as “interdisciplionary” or “pluralist” thinker.
 He was to the core a foundationalism whose great ambition was establishing a philosophico
– scientific system of knowledge, practice and politics.
 …….Wundts lasting importance for the field of psychology.
 Despite his intentions, however the sheer length of his carrer and the Volume
 On the whole Wundt’s impact on psychology was tremendous
 He made psychology independent of other sciences like physiology, biology, as well as from
philosophy

ANTECEDENT FORCCE:

HERMAN HELMOLTZ

 Wunt has assisted Helmoltz for many years that’s the reason he had developed sharp
interest in physiological explanation of psychological phenomena
 His book “Principles of Physiological psychology” was directly the product of his interest in
physiology ad anatomy.

GUSTAV TEODOR FECHNER

 Fedners psychological methods and held that method were very fruitful in studying element
of consciousness experience such as sensation.

Psycophysics::::::

JOHN LOCKE

 He was much impressed with John Locke’s view that the knowledge came from experience.
 He accepted that psychology as the study of immediate experience.
 Autobiographical memory

JOHN STUART MILL

 Concept of mental chemistry

  Wundt analyzed the immediate experience of conscious experience and its 2 primary
elements 1. Sensation and 2. Feelings

ALEXABDER BAIN AND HERBERT SPENCER

 Association of ideas and they also propounded basic principles of association

 Similarly Wundt also spoke abut synthesis of elements of consciousness and used
association as the basic principle of connecting elements of consciousness.

JOHN HERBART

 Herbert’s doctrine of apperception was also important one which encouraged him to pay
more attention to this phenomenon both experimentally and systematically

DEFINITION AND SUBJECT MATTER PSYCHOLOGY

 Science of experience
 Divided experience into two parts
 1. Immediate experience
 2. Mediate experience
 The immediate – the experience that is present in that particular moment
 The mediate – the experience is defined as the experience used to locate about something
othe than the experience in that moment
 Psychology was efined by Wundt as
 Study of immediate experience and or conscious experience and not of mediate experience.
 He emphasized ont the atomistic structure of consciousness or conscious experience
 Conscious experience can be analyzed on basis of two element 1. Sensation 2. Feelings
 Sensation was regarded as the Objective content of consciousness
 The elements of sensory chiefly comes through functioning of sense organs lke touvhing,
smelling, seeing, tasting and so on
 When sensations are bended together it give rise to IMAGES
 Thus images were not regarded as an indeendnet
 Component of consciousness

STUDY ABOUT WUNDIAN PSYCHOLOGY