Imageless thought controversy in psychology

Unit 5B: Chapter 10 Notes

Adapted from History of Psychology: The Making of a Science (Edward P. Kardas, 2014)

Susanne Nishino, Ph.D. 2013

Chapter 10: Introspective Psychology

The Scientific Laboratory

• “Cattell (1928) names the founding of the chemistry laboratory at the University of Giessen in

1824 as the first of any of its kind in science. Other laboratories sprang up to study physics and

biology. The founding of Wundt’s psychology laboratory in 1879 marks the beginning of

psychology as a discipline and science . . . One of the most important aspects of the new

psychology laboratory was “the community of scholars who conducted collaborative research in

pursuit of scientific explanation of mind.” In other words, the psychology laboratory was the

place where psychology was born, nurtured, and brought to maturity. Soon after, students from

Wundt’s laboratory quickly founded other laboratories around the world” (p. 213)

• By 1900, 25 in United States, 10 in Germany, 12 more other countries

• In U.S. laboratory & at least one laboratory course became standard for undergraduate

psychology training

• Psychology laboratory key to founding of psychology & status as new scientific academic

discipline

Development of a Science: Voluntarism, Act Psychology &Structuralism

• Psychology made its appearance as scientific discipline primarily through work of Wilhelm

Wundt, saw need for new experimental methodology to study human mind, emphasized

empirical results derived from laboratory experiments

• Wundt’s definition of psychology centered on how humans chose to attend to particular stimuli,

called his approach Voluntarism

• Edward B. Titchener one of Wundt’s early students, modified Wundt’s approach, catalogued

elements of human mind, called his approach to psychology, Structuralism, avoided attempts to

make psychology applied or include animal research, Structuralism disappeared after his death

• Europe Geog E. Muller inspired by Wundt, laboratory emphasized psychophysics, vision, &

memory

• Franz Brentano searched for crucial experiments, called his approach “act psychology”

• Other European psychologists embraced experimental method, put to use

• Carl Stumpf , brought interest in music to the psychology laboratory, two students Wolfgang

Kohler & Kurt Koffka later would cofound Gestalt Psychology

• Hermann Ebbinghaus, inspired to study memory with new experimental methods

• Oswald Kulpe, 2nd assistant to Wundt, broke with him over issue of imageless thoughts &

cognitive sets, Kulpe showed that human participants reliably gave similar answers to mental

problems, could not introspect on why

• All early names were using introspection experimentally

Introspection: 1st Crisis of Psychology

• Introspection = examination of immediate consciousness, old as philosophy itself, ancient

technique

• 1st psychologists relied on introspection technique in different ways

• Some discovered that they and research subjects could make consistent responses, but without

being able to introspect about how or why they made those responses, led to psychologies 1st

major crisis, eventually doomed introspection as viable research technique

William Wundt (1832 – 1920): 1st Psychology Laboratory

• Credited with being 1st psychologist

• Used introspection as one of data collection tools

• Also used precisely measured reaction times under variety of conditions, as well as more

qualitative methods

• Main contribution in creating the psychology laboratory

• 1862 published textbook, took 1st steps to become spokesman for new discipline psychology

• Psychology discipline eventually combined number of related subfields into one new academic

area: sensory psychophysics, personal equation, brain localization

• Combined experimental prowess with theoretical interests to create 1st laboratory devoted to

studying psychology for its own sake

Wundt: Folk Psychology (Volkerpsychologie)

• Considered psychology part of philosophy

• Psychology perspective on consciousness that could be tested through experimentation

• His folk psychology addressed language, myth, customs, objects

• Most seized on his experimental methods, ignored Folk Psychology

• Defined psychology in two parts

– Experimental, nearer to biology & psychophysics, could be studied in laboratories

– Folk psychology, could not be studied in lab, nearer to social science disciplines of

history & anthropology, had to be studied by examining how individuals and their

conscious experiences developed in social context, therefore psychologists also had to

examine developmental & social processes that led to creation of individual

consciousness, maintained could not be studied by experimental methods

Wundt: Border with Biology

• Wundt wished to answer distinctly psychological questions, to do so with apparatus & methods

developed by Helmholtz & others

• Believed consciousness of individual human beings could be studied experimentally

• Seized on reaction times under variety of complications (experimental conditions), discovered

that reaction times slower when subjects required to make discrimination between two stimuli

before making response compared to when responses followed presentation of only one

stimulus, reaction times slowed consistently compared to original simple stimulus

• 1879, personal collection of psychological apparatus, began to perform purely psychological

experiments

• “The reaction time studies conducted during the first few years of Wundt’s laboratory constitute

the first historical example of a coherent research program, explicitly directed toward

psychological issues and involving a number of interlocking studies” (Danziger, 1980 quoted p.

217)

Wundt: Introspection

• Unlike modern psychological experiments, focus not on subject’s behavior, focus on self-

observation, inner observation, inner experiences = introspection

• Required participants to play three roles: subject, experimenter, & observer

• Goal of research to hold all external conditions constant but one, one variable systematically

manipulated with the data being verbal report of subject’s mental experiences as the variable of

interest

• By 1890s world’s preeminent psychologist, attracting students from all corners

• Wundt saw psychology as a new science, certain that human mind was open to scientific study,

convinced consciousness real, natural, & approachable

• Many psychologists wished to provide materialistic explanations for psychological phenomena,

Wundt resisted explanations because believed consciousness not a thing, saw as ever-flowing,

historical, & developmental process

Wundt: Voluntarism

• By end of 19th century, Wundt’s new psychological methods & technique spread widely, his

theories focused on central role of consciousness & person’s ability to choose to attend to

selective parts of consciousness, called his theoretical system Voluntarism because people chose

which parts of their own consciousness they would attend to

• Voluntarism = system of psychology developed by Wundt that emphasized the role of

unconscious and conscious choice of certain parts of consciousness based upon personal

feelings, history, & motivations

• Rejected more mechanical theories of British empiricists & prominent role assigned to

associationism, rejected materialist position held by physiologists, succeeded in making

psychology new independent academic disciple

Wundt’s Theory of Psychology: Consciousness, Drives, & Instincts

• Key to understanding Wundt’s theory of psychology is to see that he was looking at

consciousness, not behavior

• Psychology’s marriage to behavior as definitional component comes later in history

• Wundt – much of psychology was scientific study of consciousness

• Assumed consciousness was accessible and trained observers could reliably repot on content of

own consciousness = principle of actuality, held that consciousness was a process not a thing,

ever-changing continuous flow

• Sources of consciousness many

– Drives or instincts, built in unconscious motives, fundamental motives were associated

with affective states such as pleasure-displeasure, goal seeking or goal avoidance, could

be predictive of future through learning & memory, drives formed initial raw materials

of consciousness

Wundt: Automaticity

• Some contemporaries saw differently, concentrated on movements, not consciousness, divided

movements of animals and humans into two categories

– Involuntary

– Voluntary

• They saw Darwinian progression from former to latter

• Involuntary movements (drives & reflexes) were evolutionary primitive

• Voluntary movements derived or evolutionary advanced

• Wundt disagreed, reversed order, linked to learned and speeding up choices among variety of

possible movement, when became more proficient, then could make movements automatically

without conscious thought, e.g. driving without thinking much about it

• Wundt’s conclusion survives in modern psychology as concept of automaticity

Wundt: Apperception & Creative Synthesis

• Believed consciousness response to sensation

• Sensations caused perceptions, perceptions were general & vague until observers chose to focus

on particular aspects of perceptions through apperception, a voluntary process, only after

apperception had occurred was movement or verbal response possible

• Creative synthesis = most central theoretical concept, described how disparate mental events

combined to create entirely new & unpredictable cognitions

• Psychology not chemistry, creative synthesis was how brain reacted to environmental stimuli to

produce myriad number of constantly flowing events in consciousness, brain’s reaction to

events that created psychological qualities such as sweet & sour, painful, etc., those qualities

must have living brain, one awake, conscious, & attentive

• Much of Wundt’s theorizing was lost in the process, laboratory experimental methods

developed by Wundt remain part of experimental science

Psychology After Wundt: Structuralism

• Wundt’s long-lasting influence through laboratory methodology, not psychological theory

• Edward Titchener obtained PhD from Wundt in 1892, eventually called his approach to

psychology structuralism

• Structuralism = early approach to psychology that used controlled introspective methods to

infer the elements of mind

• Structuralism’s search for & identification of psychological “elements” was new, different,

decidedly non-Wundtian

• In contrast to Voluntarism, Structuralism took some of what learned from Wundt, mixed with

good amount of British associationism along with positivistic philosophy to create Titchener’s

own version of introspective psychology

Edward Titchener (1867 – 1927): Structuralism

• Titchener developed at Cornell, departure from Wundt’s Voluntarianism, origins in

associationistic philosophical tradition that began with Locke, culminated with John Stuart Mill

• Wundt’s psychology based on German idealistic tradition, viewed mind much more holistically

and devalued associationism as explanatory device

• Titchener put more emphasis on role of introspection as psychological methods

• Disagreed with Wundt over definition of psychology, saw as experimental science only

• Titchener psychology was scientific, experimental study of mind, no place for animal behavior,

child studies, abnormality, or applied areas, wanted to make psychology academic equivalent of

physics

• Saw physics, psychology, & biology as three main sciences

Titchener’s Theory of Psychology: Introspection & Stimulus Error

• Emphasized necessity of reliable methods of introspection, emphasized introspection as method

to study the mind, emphasized highly trained introspectors

• Introduced stimulus error & provided methods for avoiding it while introspecting

• Stimulus Error = reporting anything other than a quality of a sensation, image, or affect while

introspecting, especially reporting things already known through experience, e.g. “I say ‘This is

an eraser’

• Identified over 44,000 elements

• Believed affect could be broken down into 3 parts, pleasant-unpleasant, excitation-depression,

tension-relaxation

• Founded “Experimental Psychologists” group, only men allowed, today Society of Experimental

Psychologists, female members

• Structuralism all but disappeared from American psychology

Women in Psychology

• Today, more than 70% PhD & PsyD students women

• 1892, Titchener’s 1st graduate student woman, Margaret Floy Washburn

• Females salary & other discrepancies

Georg Muller (1850 – 1934)

• Wundt student, disagreed with Wundt,

• 1st psychologist to establish laboratory truly free from philosophy, conducted research in

psychophysics, vision, & memory

• Dissertation on sensory attention, career in experimental psychology, laboratory facilities

superior to Wundt’s in terms of quality of equipment, conducted research himself, Wundt

ceased to be active researcher himself,

• Pursuit of experimentalist attempts to create rigorous, precise, physicalistic psychology

• Active in three main areas of research

– Psychophysics

– Vision

– Memory

• Criticized Ebbinghaus for using himself as research subject

• Contributions in psychophysics & memory became large part of American psychology

• Direct influence on experimental psychology has largely vanished

• “Brass Instrument Psychology”

• Period between founding of Wundt’s lab & beginning of World War I in 1914 called heyday of

“brass instrument psychology”

• Instruments made of steel, wood, & brass used in labs in Europe, later brought to the United

States

Franz Brentano (1838 – 1917): Descriptive Psychology

• Wundt student, Franz Brentano believed Wundt too focused on analysis of sensations

• During his time Roman Catholic Church debating question of papal infallibility, belief that Pope

after prayer & meditation, may formally and without question reveal god’s intentions to the

Church, Brentano opposed, wrote argument against it, 1870 became church doctrine

• Argued psychology empirical science, basis for philosophy of logic, ethics, & aesthetics

• By empirical did not mean experimentation, agreed with experimental work but felt did not

describe psychology fully enough

• Called his version Descriptive Psychology, characterized it introspectively

• Introspection strictly person, intimately linked with act of self-observation to the thing being

observed, also called Act Psychology

• Perceiver & percept could not be separated, in vision act of seeing that was most important, not

the object being perceived itself

• In favor of “crucial experiments” designed to answer a question once & for all,

• Systematic experimentation became model for research in all sciences, including psychology

Phenomenalism

• Brentano effect on early development of psychology

• In writings of student, Edward Husserl, descriptive psychology became phenomenalism,

pronounced effect on development of 20th century philosophy

• Phenomenalism = the philosophical system that examines conscious experience directly,

intentionally, and from one’s own point of view

• Brentano’s students von Ehrenfels, Sigmund Freud, Carl Stumpf

Carl Stumpf (1848 – 1936): Phenomenology

• Stumpf brought study of phenomenology into psychology, Combined love of music & training in

philosophy to study the psychology of music & sound, Helped popularize role of phenomenology

in European psychology

• Eventually through his students Wolfgang Kohler & Kurt Koffka Gestalt psychology popular in

Europe, less influential in United States

• Viewed psychology broadly, instrumental in setting up institute in Berlin to study child

psychology

• Contributed to progress in animal psychology, arranged for Kohler to do research at Tenerife

island, where Kohler discovered famous experiments on chimpanzees, discovered insight

learning

• Stumpf also involved in famous case of Clever Hans, noticed that owner von Osten giving horse

nearly imperceptible cues, Hans intelligent enough to pair signs to behaviors

• Stumpf recognized that elements (notes) were not stimuli, it was how those notes hung

together phenomenologically that led to recognition of familiar tune

• Stumpf instrumental in giving German psychology new direction and alternate to Wundt, helped

propagate Brentano’s ideas, created new sub-field, the study of memory, research on memory

opened door to experiment study of higher mental processes

The German Window Closes

• One result of worldwide success of early psychology of Wundt lab at Leipzig, because of head

start & attractiveness to American students early on, became model for American psychology in

terms of methodology

• By 1890, American students tended to get training at home

Hermann Ebbinghaus (1850-1909)

• No one before him attempted experiment on memory, previously that topic firmly in grasp of

philosophy

• New technique for experimentally manipulating items to remember, new ways of measuring

memory, nonsense syllable

• To measure own memory, measured time it took to learn particular list the first time, after

predetermined interval measured time to relearn

• Savings score = discovered it took less time to learn list the 2nd trial, saving time when he

learned the list the 2nd time, constructed graph showing that the interval between 1st & 2nd trial

was most important feature

• Graph known as Ebbinghaus’s Curve of Forgetting has stood the test of time

• Discovered other facts about memory including savings score improved with number of

repetition

• The High Road to Memory, importance of previous experience becomes paramount

• Schacter (2001) list of pioneer work from Ebbinghaus labs

– Repetition effects

– Curve of forgetting

– Stimulus attributes & presentation modality

– Individual differences

– Interference & inhibition

– Methods of learning

– Recognition & affect

• Also wrote two influential textbooks

• Quote “Psychology has a long past, but only a short history”

• Early work in development of psychological tests for children

Oswald Kulpe (1862 – 1915): 1st Major Crisis in Psychology

• Student of Ebbinghaus, presided over group of researchers at University of Wurzberg, research

led to 1st major crisis in young science of psychology

• 2nd assistant to Wundt after James Cattell

• Unlike Wundt, adherent of positivism

• Began to wonder if thinking might be accessible to introspective research

• Wundt believed thinking & memory beyond reach of experimental psychology, topics only

accessible through Folk Psychology

• Kulpe called to Wurzberg shortly after, began to investigate the psychology of thought

Kulpe & Ach: 1st Major Crisis in Psychology

• Interested in what happened between presentation of stimulus & formation of introspectable

mental content

• Surprising answer

• Discovered that subjects could introspect reliably, but could not say how or why they did

• 1st experiments times word associations with stimulus word, fire.

• Wurzberg researchers believed they had discovered that introspectively unknowable thoughts

existed, eventually called “imageless thoughts”, later research by Nazis Ach provided stronger

support for imageless thinking

• Ach discovered einstellung or determining tendency

• In modern psychology concept known as cognitive set

• Ach called his technique, “systematic self-observation, claimed it demonstrate imageless

thought

1st Major Crisis in Psychology: “Imageless Thought” & Introspection

• Wundt & Titchener profoundly opposed to idea of imageless thought

– Wundt saw as poorly conducted experimentation

– Titchener saw as classic example of stimulus error

• Main issue not imageless thought or introspection itself

• Premise of new science of psychology had been contents of mind analyzable through

introspection

• Imageless thought brought assumption into question

• If psychology was to be science it must have method that all practitioners could agree upon,

imageless thought controversy caused doubt about each other’s data

1st Major Crisis in Psychology

• “The irresolvable dispute contributed significantly to a growing sense of intellectual crisis within

psychology, leading to a deep loss of confidence in the scientific value of introspection”

(Thomas, 2010, quoted p. 233)

• It took some time before psychologists completely dispensed with introspection

Ideas

• Wundt’s psychology characterized by advent of psychology laboratory & equipment

• Earliest psychologists concentrated on scientific study of mind & consciousness

• Wundt’s research emphasis on Voluntarism, apperception, reaction time studies, creative

synthesis

• Titchener promoted Structuralism, introspection & stimulus error

• Ebbinghaus & Muller focus on memory

• Ebbinghaus pioneer work on memory impressive because new methods, nonsense syllabus &

saving score,

• Brentano’s Act Psychology (Descriptive Psychology) linked perceivers to act of perceiving,

argued against systematic experimentation, looked to design & conduct crucial experiments

• Stumpf’s focus on Phenomenology, anticipated Gestalt Psychology’s later anti-elementalistic

stance, debunking of Clever Hans cognitive powers huge step in early psychology, wide

attention

• Wurzberg School Imageless Thought & Cognitive Set demonstrated problems with introspection

as reliable research method

Summary

• Psychology finally becomes academic disciple

• Wundt influence enormous, experimental psychologist, Voluntarism system puts person’s

conscious choice front & center

• Titchener significantly altered Wundt’s system & creates Structuralism, dedicated to uncovering

elements of the mind, after dies little further influence on psychology

• In Europe & U.S. psychology prospers & grows

• Laboratory tradition begun by Wundt develops most

• Brentano’s Act Psychology emphasizes importance of person in process of perception, inspired

later progress in phenomenology & Gestalt psychology

• Stumpf widened scope of psychology by examining perception of music & melody, instrumental

in later Gestalt Psychology

• Ebbinghaus widened psychology’s scope when experimentally investigated human memory,

developed techniques, discovered data still in use today, showed how psychology could be

applied to areas previously thought not for experimental investigation

• Kulpe expanded psychology’s reach into thinking & cognition

• Research from Kulpe laboratory helped doom introspection as research too

• Psychology 1st Crisis:” How to collect data without using introspection?” (p. 234)

• One answer from biology, another discipline on border with psychology