ABSTRACT
S c i e n t i f i c P s y c h o l o g y1. The rise of scientific psychology cannot be understood apart from the development of the biological sciences in the 19th century. Three different fields of biological research exerted an influence: (1) physiology and neurol-ogy, particularly of the sense-organs and brain; (2) natural history, particularly accounts of animal behavior and the mythological part of the doctrine of evolution; (3) medical researches, and particularly the development of general pathology. I shall reserve the third of these until the end.2. The influence of physiology is to be seen in the development of the Wundtian type of experimental psychology and in the development of psycho-physics.a. Wundt, the father of experimental psychology, was influenced by such physiologists as Weber, Muller, Helmholtz, who were primarily concerned with physiology of sense-organs and nervous system.28 (1) But Wundt’s work was a curious mixture of philosophical and scientific psychology. So far as his great works were “systematic,” they were philosophical psychology.29 His basic analysis did not 27 C f. G . Murphy, An Historical Introduction to Modem Psychology, N e w York, 1929; E. G . Boring, A History of Experimental Psychology, N e w York, 1929; G . S. Brett, A History of Psychology, N e w York, 1921. V d . N ote 36b infra. 28 J. Muller, Handbuch der Physiologie des Menschen (1833-40); E. H . W eber, Der Tastsmn und das Gemeingefiihl (1846); H . von Helmholtz, Handbuch der physiologischen Optik (1856-66), Tonempfindungen (1863).29 Physiological Psychology, 6th ed., 1911; Outlines of Psychology (trans. b y Judd) 3rd ed., 1907; System der Philosophic (1889).
