A Teacher
Wilhelm Wundt
He carried the study of the mind out of the philosopher’s armchair and into the laboratory, making consciousness an object of measurement.
The transmission
Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt (1832–1920) was a German physiologist and philosopher widely regarded as the father of experimental psychology. In 1879 he founded the first laboratory devoted exclusively to psychological research, at the University of Leipzig, marking psychology’s emergence as an independent science.
His method of experimental introspection sought to analyze conscious experience into its elemental sensations and feelings. In later life he developed Völkerpsychologie, a broader study of the collective mental products of human culture.
What they gave
First psychology laboratory: Founded the first laboratory devoted exclusively to psychological research, at Leipzig in 1879, establishing psychology as an independent science.
- Experimental introspection: Developed a method to analyze conscious experience into its elemental sensations and feelings.
- Mind as measurable: Carried the study of mind out of the philosopher’s armchair into the laboratory, making consciousness an object of measurement.
- Völkerpsychologie: In later life mapped the collective mental products of human culture as a broader science of mind.
In their words
Man himself, not as he appears from without, but as he is in his own immediate experience, is the real problem of psychology.
The line they stand in
Taught by / Influenced by: Hermann von Helmholtz’s physiology; Gustav Fechner’s psychophysics; Immanuel Kant.
- Taught / Influenced: William James; Edward Titchener; Sigmund Freud; Emil Kraepelin.
Revelations they taught
Essential Works
- Principles of Physiological Psychology1874
- Völkerpsychologie1900