The history of psychology is studying the laws of development of views on the human psyche. The subject of the history of psychology is significantly different from the subject of this science. For this reason, they must be distinguished. The subject of psychology is the mechanisms, laws, and facts of human mental activity. For a long time this science was one of the branches of philosophy. And even after its separation in a separate branch, she retained a connection with philosophy. In addition, the following disciplines influenced it: ethnography, natural science, medicine, cultural theory, sociology, mathematics, linguistics, logic, and art history.
Methods of the history of psychology
The main methods of psychology are testing, observation and experiment. In the history of psychology, this is historical-functional, historical-genetic, autobiographical and biographical, as well as interviewing methods and analysis of psychological statements. Recently, the method of categorical analysis is gaining more and more popularity.
The main stages of the history of this science
The history of psychology has several stages of development.
1. Psychology is the science of the spirit and soul of man. This definition was given about 2 thousand years ago. It was the presence of a person’s soul that explained all incomprehensible phenomena. She was with everything that exists in the world. The soul was understood as a special entity that was independent of the body and controlled all inanimate and living objects. Prominent philosophers of that time: Socrates, Democritus, Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, Lucretius. They believed that the soul is a special kind of matter, which consisted of small spherical formations - atoms.
2. Psychology is the science of human consciousness. This definition appeared in the 17th century. The ability to feel, to want something, to think was called awareness. The main method began to be considered a description of the facts and observation of a person for himself. A prominent philosopher of that time is Descartes. He shared the concept of soul and body and laid the foundations of a causal (deterministic) concept of behavior. Again connect the soul and body tried philosopher Spinoza. He believed that such an approach in psychology makes it possible to consider the phenomena of the psyche with exactly the same objectivity and accuracy as the study of surfaces and lines in geometry. The history of psychology has many great names: G. Leibniz (invented the concept of the psyche of the unconscious), Wolf, J. Locke.
3. Psychology is the science of human behavior. It appeared in the twentieth century. Her task was to experiment and observe what can be seen (behavior, reaction, actions). In this case, the motives that caused certain actions were not taken into account. There is a separation of psychology into a separate independent science. It was at this time that the psychology of consciousness ceased to exist, since the idea of decomposing the human psyche into individual elements was false. W. James is developing a functional approach. He uses methods of self-observation, introspection and fixing the time for solving any problems. Watson, an American psychologist and scientist, has created a behavioral approach that employs experimental teaching methods . Watson believed that only human behavior that occurs in a given situation can be studied as objectively as possible.
The development of psychology in Russia. Highlights
The history of psychology has been developed in Russia. In pre-revolutionary and pre-war times, Chelpanov, Bekhterev, Pavlov, Sechenov, Chelpanov, Blonsky, Rubinstein, Basov, Kornilov and Kostyuk contributed to the process. During the Second World War, the Department of Psychology was founded at Moscow University, the psychology sector was created at the Philosophical Institute. In the post-war period, Halperin, Smirnov, Leontiev and Lomova had a great influence on the history of psychology.