Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Chapter 12 – Functionalism A History of Psychology: Ideas and Context (4 th edition) D. Brett King, Wayne Viney, and William Douglas Woody This multimedia product and its contents are protected under copyright law. The following are prohibited by law: any public performance or display, including transmission of any image over a network; preparation of any derivative work, including the extraction, in whole or in part, of any images; any rental, lease, or lending of the program

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Functionalism Embraced a process orientation –rooted in becoming. –Other psychologies accepted static elements of experience and a being approach. Functionalism is difficult to define. Functionalists emphasize the importance of how questions in addition to what questions.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 William James William James brought psychology to the US. James’s work was extremely broad –He moved from psychology to philosophy. General characteristics of James’s thought: –He took a strong individualistic perspective rooted in individual experience. –He advocated multiple levels of analysis, There is not one correct level of analysis. –Jamesian pluralism had several implications for his psychology. He denied that there is a primary or foundational content area in psychology.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 William James General characteristics of James’s thought: –Free will as found in experience. –Moralistic psychology and philosophy. He was willing to tell the reader what to do. –Radical empiricism. Philosophical discussion should be limited to and include all things found in experience. Monism should be regarded as a hypothesis. –Pragmatism was a method, a theory of truth, and a way of thinking about the world. Theories should be judged by the work they do in the world. Words, theories, concepts, and such are “instruments, not answers to enigmas”

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 William James James defined psychology as “the science of mental life, both of its phenomena and of their conditions.” –James defined habit as essential to the individual and to civilization. –James saw experience and thought as a stream. –James described the self as the totality of all those things that belong to us. The material self is comprised of what we physically own. The social self is a plurality of selves for different social situations. The spiritual self is a personal, subjective, and intimate self that sits in judgment of the other selves. Self-esteem is the ratio of our success to our pretension.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 William James James promoted the James-Lange theory of emotion. –Experience of emotion is the experience of the activity of the body. James accepted instincts in humans and other animals. James separated primary memory from secondary memory. James’s legacy continues through the present. Under his leadership, the methodological, conceptual, and substantive boundaries of psychology greatly expanded.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Hugo Münsterberg Hugo Münsterberg presented a psychology tuned to the daily lives of humans. He greatly broadened the scope of applied psychology. –Psychology and law –Psychotherapy –Industrial psychology

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 G. Stanley Hall G. Stanley Hall founded the APA –Founded several journals –Directed the Ph.D. of Francis Sumner, the first Black psychologist –Authored numerous books and scholarly articles. Hall’s psychology was centered in development across the lifespan including: –Childhood –Adolescence –Senescence. He advocated a biological approach to psychology. He argued for a wide range of approaches to the study of childhood.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 The University of Chicago The University of Chicago was a center of Functionalism. John Dewey criticized reductionistic approaches to psychology. –He argued that experience must be understood in a naturalistic context. –His areas of interest included democracy, economics, schools, art, and the nature of learning. James Rowland Angell defined functional psychology as “the identification and description of mental operations rather than the mere stuff of mental experience.” –He argued that a functional approach must include social and biological contexts –He advocated the study of the contributions of mental events to our adjustment to the world. Harvey A. Carr argued that psychology is primarily concerned with mental activity, including both experience and behavior. –Carr employed a variety of methods. –He viewed psychology as broad in scope.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Columbia University Psychology at Columbia University was also functional. James McKeen Cattell initially developed mental tests. –Unfortunately, his tests were not correlated with anything –Cattell’s career as an editor was more fruitful. He edited Science as well as numerous other prestigious journals. He helped to bring psychology into mainstream science. Robert Sessions Woodworth expanded experimental psychology. –Functional Autonomy refers to the idea that a means for satisfying a motive may acquire drive properties. –Dynamic psychology emphasized the importance of understanding the causes of behavior. –Woodworth also influenced psychology through his textbooks. In his texts, he clarified the notion of the experiment and separated it from correlational work.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Mary Whiton Calkins Mary Whiton Calkins completed an informal doctoral program at Harvard. –She was denied her doctoral degree because of her gender. –Calkins defined psychology as the science of the conscious self. Her emphasis on the self continued the tradition of personalism. –Calkins developed the paired-associate method to study memory. –She conducted one of the first formal studies of dreaming.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Leta Stetter Hollingworth The growth of applied psychology continued in functionalism. Leta Stetter Hollingworth empirically challenged the variability hypothesis, the belief that men are in all ways more variable than women. –Hollingworth also demonstrated that the abilities of women are not affected by the menstrual cycle.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Helen Wooley Helen Wooley applied psychology to the study of gender differences. –She studied the consequences of dropping out of school. –Despite inconclusive results, Wooley was a pioneer in the fields of childhood education and welfare.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Alfred Binet Alfred Binet developed the first usable tests of intelligence. –His goal was to identify schoolchildren who may need extra assistance or advanced teaching. –Lewis Terman brought Binet’s intelligence tests to the United States. He published the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale. –To place army recruits during World War I, Robert M. Yerkes developed the Army Alpha and the Army Beta tests of intelligence.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2008 Evaluation An evaluation of functionalism. –Weaknesses The system did not last in any organized fashion. It seems vague. Thinkers are only loosely connected Researchers focused more on applied than basic research questions. The eclecticism makes it difficult to make a clear statement of functionalism. –Current psychology in America may be regarded as functionalist due to Its problem-focused eclecticism, and Its applied nature.