Life and Contribution to Psychology of Edward Titchener - Term Paper Example

Titchener’s Life and Contribution to Psychology on the theories of Structuralism and Introspection Introduction Edward Bradford Titchener an English immigrant in the United States was a psychologist who furthered the idea of structuralism in psychology as had initially been proposed and argued by the American psychologist Wilhelm Wundt though with slight modifications. His work on structuralism in psychology was majorly brought forth by one of his students Edwin Boring who gave almost all his ideas in matters of structuralism and introspection in psychological studies (Boring, 1967). Titchener studied systematic psychology amongst other branches of psychology and was rated the most distinguished psychologist in the United States and experimentalist who focused his psychological studies on scientific procedure. He endeavoured to systemize the points of view of his mentor psychologist Wundt Wilhelm through the use of the laboratory for research by method of introspection and concluded that psychology was the study of experience from the point of view of the experiencing individual. In his study, he also found that mental processes have quality, intensity, duration, extensity and clearness and all elements must exist in the consciousness. Titchener greatly contributed by bringing the new psychology of experimental psychology that was in contrast to the previously practiced mental psychology. Through his work and exploration of psychology that was in-depth, careful and systematic, he found the limitations of the structuralist and introspective positions which has helped in the development of psychology free from the structuralist boundaries while at the same time appreciating the introspective perspectives. Titchener attempted to systemize the views of Wundt through the production of laboratory research using only Wundt’s method of introspection. Wundt’s study of the mind was mainly based on systematic and thorough observation, which was later applied by his student Titchener in modern psychological experimentation and theories to theorize on psychology but the difference largely lay on the issue of introspection. To Titchener, psychology denotes the study of experience from the point of view of the experiencing individual and the mental processes are characterized as having quality, intensity, duration, extensity, and clearness. In his work, he provided the most important context theory of meaning, whereby a new mental procedure known as the core attained its implication from the situation of the other mental procedures within which it arises during the experiencing. This means that in the simplest form, context is just one other mental element and a person does not necessarily have to be aware of the context of something in order to assign it any meaning. Structuralism Structuralism in psychology attempts to understand the human mind as the sum of varying underlying parts through the classification of the structures of the mind and aims at exploring the individual fundamentals of perception and how they are organized into compound capabilities and how they associate with physical measures. According to Titchener, all thoughts can be broken down to the basic elements, sensations, or specifications and therefore to him, psychology is a science that requires that we classify the components of thought. Further, Titchener stated that a sensation had four distinctive properties, which include duration, extent, intensity, and quality, and each is related to the corresponding quality of stimulus though some stimuli may not be enough to provoke their corresponding aspect of sensation. The sensations also came in distinct forms for example the auditory sensations may either be noises or tones while the ideas and perceptions that he considered to be related to the particular sensations were based on the type of sensation on which the idea was based on (Titchener, 2006). Therefore, if thoughts are a collection of elements, sensations, or specifications, then they must be identifiable by all human beings. He focused on sensations, which to him are about forty thousand in number and are thoughts that play a role in seeing and hearing only (Schacter, Gilbert and Wegner 2009). Titchener argued that structuralism focused primarily on the immediate mental experience and concerns itself with the facts and should just be about answering the question ‘is’ and not ‘is for’ as to do so would amount to speculation. The structuralist approach defines consciousness as the total of mental experience at any given time as well as that of the mind as the accumulated experience of a lifetime and if these basic components of the mind could be defined and categorized, then it would be easy to determine the structure of the mental process and higher thinking. It is a question of what the element and how it reacts with each other as well as the reasons why they react in the specified manner in order to know the structure of the mind. The structuralism as put forward by Titchener became a significant theory in psychology, as it was the first major school of thought in psychology and influenced experimental psychology. It can therefore be authoritatively stated that Titchener made serious contributions to experimental psychology which stressed that the psychology theories be examinable and the outcomes assessable and this relied on introspection which can be defined as the procedure of observing one’s own thoughts as a device for assessing the outcomes (Titchener, 2006). This means that introspection requires that a person looks inward or undergoes a process of self-examination of his own thoughts and feelings as well as the cognition, which the mind has of its own state or acts. However, structuralism has been criticized, as conscious experience is not easily studied through controlled experimentation and the fact that the reliance on introspection lacks reliability. This is due to the difficulty that one is likely to meet in a quest at self-analysis and the fact that introspection may lead to distinct results depending on the subject matter, and the fact there can be a possibility of retrospection. In addition, the experimental methods used in the study of the structures of the mind were too subjective in nature due to the adoption of the unreliable introspection method that had differing results when the sample or the time of experiment was changed. Structuralism was also concerned with the internal behaviour of human beings, which was difficult to discern, or accurately measure in order to have an accurate result or conclusion. This criticism of structuralism on the scrutiny of the viability of its scientific methods led to the theory of functionalism, which was not built on the structuralism concern for the anatomy of the mind but on the functions of the mind, and later to some extent behaviourism. This theory considers the mental life and behaviour in terms of how a person adapts to the environment or changing situations and not the composition of the mind. Behaviourism also focuses on what are observable and the relationship between the external events and the behaviour and this leads to a greater understanding in learning and development and where specific behaviours originate. The behaviourism methods are also quantifiable, practical, can be measured, and classified thus giving a credible answer as opposed to the structuralism that focuses too much on the internal and that which cannot be observed. Introspection This experimental technique was pioneered by Wilhelm Wundt, which loosely refers to the formal and informal reflection process, and more formalized experimental approaches and may include informally examining our own internal feelings and thoughts. This means that when human beings reflect on their emotions, thoughts, and memories and incisively examine their meaning to them, they are engaged in an act known as introspection. In making a further discussion on emotion, he disagreed with the notion that humans experience emotions based on how the body behaves but argued that physical changes in the body may look the same for different emotions (Chung and Hyland, 2012). Therefore, bodily sensations were too simple of an explanation for emotions that in most cases are difficult to identify and are majorly complicated in the first place. The experimental technique also refers to a research technique developed by psychologist Wundt referred to as experimental self-observation that aims at training people to carefully and objectively analyse the contents of their thoughts and what they mean to them. According to him, there were two key components that make up the content of the human mind and these include sensations and feelings an in order to understand the mind, researchers needed to do more than simply identifying the structure or elements of the mind. Wundt therefore proposed that it was important to look at the activities and the accompanying processes that happen as people experience the world that surrounds them during introspection. It is important to note that Titchener differed slightly with Wundt in that, while Wundt looked at conscious experience as a whole, Titchener was more concerned with the breaking down of the mental experiences into individual components. Wundt and Titchener both believed in introspection to make a discovery of the mental elements of the human experience as well as the need to identify and classify the sensations and feelings in understanding the experience. Their point of departure came through the fact that Wundt felt that psychology should be studied through historical analyses and naturalistic observation (Chung and Hyland, 2012) while the methods used to study psychology could come in handy in describing the social customs, religions and language amongst other psychological discussions. Titchener used introspection to determine the different components of consciousness by using strict guidelines for reporting the introspective analysis whereby the subject would be presented with an object and then report on the characteristics of the object but not the name of the object. To him, therefore, valid psychological experiments could only be achieved within introspection or a series of introspections that are made under standard conditions (Hothersall 2004). In achieving the desired results using introspection, Titchener put great detail on having a scientific approach to psychology through the use of systematically measured data that all researchers have agreed upon. Introspection as an experimental theory has been criticized especially by functionalists and behaviourism school of thought on claims that it lacks objectivity and therefore scientific reliability. This has been shown by research and experiments which have shown that different subjects provided different introspective reports about the same stimuli while even subjects well trained in introspection had different responses to the same stimuli from trial to trial (Hergenhahn, 2009). Additionally, complex topics such as development, learning, disorders of the mind and personality could not be investigated and conclusive remarks made on the basis of introspection (Hockenbury and Hockenbury, 2006). Conclusion As already discussed, Titchener established the psychological school of thought known as structuralism whereby he assumed that by methodically outlining and classifying the fundamentals of the mind, psychologists could comprehend the structure of the mental procedures. The ideas of Titchener differed from Wundt in that he used the method of introspection in his experimental psychology as initially proposed by Wundt but under stringent guidelines that was only interested in those that existed in the consciousness and not on instincts or unconscious matters. In his theory of introspection, he relied on self-observation whereby trained observers were presented with different objects and events and they described the mental processes they experienced concluding that the basic elements of conscious experiences were feelings, sensations, and images. However, as much as Titchener is credited with the introduction and furtherance of the structuralism in psychological thought as earlier argued by Wundt, they have been proven to have been partly distinct. Despite this, Titchener is still credited for playing a role in establishing the experimental aspect of psychology and expanding the debate on introspection in the study and theorization of psychology. While the structuralism theory by Titchener has been said to be rigid, it is imperative that it shaped the current psychological thoughts and was important in making psychology be classified as an empirically based science with acceptable scientific methods used currently in the study of psychology. For a very long time, psychologist will continue to comprehend the human mind as the amount of changing fundamental parts through the classification of the structures of the mind with an aim of exploring the individual elements of consciousness, and how they are organized into complex experiences and how they correlate with physical events. This shows that the experimental psychology as proposed and ably argued by Titchener in line with the teachings of Wundt are likely to continue influencing psychological thoughts both at home, institutions of learning and even medical facilities depending on where the discussion is and the circumstances. References Boring, E. G. (October 01, 1967). Titcheners Experimentalists. Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences, 3, 4, 315-325. Chung, M. C., & Hyland, M. (2012). History and philosophy of psychology. Chichester: Wiley- Blackwell. Hergenhahn, B. R. (2009). An introduction to the history of psychology. Belmont, Calif: Wadsworth Cengage Learning. Hockenbury, D. H. & Hockenbury, S. E. (2006). Psychology. New York: Worth Publishers Hothersall, D. (2004). History of psychology. New York, NY: Mcgraw-Hill. Schacter, D. L., Gilbert, D. T., & Wegner, D. M. (2009). Psychology. New York: Worth Publishers. Titchener, E. B. (2006). Experimental psychology: A manual of laboratory practice. Montana: Kessinger Publishing. Read More