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Foundations of Guidance Counseling Jeel Christine C. de Egurrola

Structuralism and Functionalism

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Page 1: Structuralism  and Functionalism

Foundationsof

Guidance Counseling

Jeel Christine C. de Egurrola

Page 2: Structuralism  and Functionalism

Structuralism

Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920)

German physiologist who was trained in medicine.

Specialized in the scientific study of human consciousness.

Established the first psychological laboratory at the University of Leipzig in Germany in 1879.

Invented his own laboratory equipments

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Structuralism

Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920)

Tachistoscopes, chronoscopes, electrical stimulators, pendulums, timers and sensory mapping devices.

In 1879 he began experiments that were not part of his teaching – he marks this as the beginning of his lab

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Structuralism

Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920)

Often identified as “the world’s first true psychologist” and the “Founder of Psychology.”

Also identified as the “Father of Experimental Psychology”

Wundt with his lab research assistants

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Wundt's aim was to record thoughts and sensations, and to analyze them into their constituent elements

Wundt founded voluntarism, the processing of organizing the mind

Structuralism

During his academic career Wundt trained 186 graduate students (116 in psychology).

Edward Titchener, who described his system as Structuralism, or the analysis of the basic elements that constitute the mind.

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Structuralism had its roots in earlier work in physiology.

Scientists there (e.g. Gustav Fechner) had found success in studying sensory perception by manipulating stimuli and having subjects report back their experience.

Wundt adopted this general approach for his new science

Structuralism

Page 7: Structuralism  and Functionalism

Wundt defined psychology as the study of the structure of conscious experience.

The goal was to find the 'atoms' of conscious experience, and from there to build a knowledge of how the atoms combine to create our experience.

Wundt hoped to thus emulate the success of the natural sciences

Structuralism

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As psychology was defined as the study of experience, and as an outside observer cannot gather information on subjective experience,

Wundt turned to introspection (experimental self-

observation) as the tool for gathering data.

Researchers were trained with specific criteria for becoming skilled introspectors.

Structuralism

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Structuralism

Structuralism was the study of the most basic elements, that make up our conscious mental processes.

Elements of the Mind:

Sensations

Perceptions

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Structuralism

Sensations are relatively meaningless bits of information that result when the brain processes electrical signals that come from the sense organs

Perceptions are meaningful sensory expreriencesthat results after the brain combines hundreds of sensations.

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William James (1842-1910)

Functionalism

American pragmatist and Psychologist

Went to Germany and met Wundt and Helmholtz

Brought Functionalism in the US

First American psychologist

Father of American Psychology

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Functionalism

William James (1842-1910)

Wrote the first general text book on psychology, The Principles of Psychology (1890)

He moved from psychology to philosophy.

He took a strong individualistic perspective rooted in individual experience.

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Functionalism

William James (1842-1910)

He argued forcibly against the structuralist position that conscious can be broken into constituent parts.

Coining the phrase 'stream of consciousness', James proposed that mental life is a unity that flows and changes.

Consciousness is a continuum

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Functionalism

William James (1842-1910)

In Principles of Psychology he presented illuminating ideas concerning consciousness, attention, memory, habits, and emotions.

Emotions are caused by physiological changes

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Functionalism

Psychology is the study of mental activity (e.g. perception, memory, imagination, feeling, judgment).

Mental activity is to be evaluated in terms of how it serves the organism in adapting to its environment.

Focuses on the functions of the mind

Study of how a mental process operates.

Study of how the mental process functions in the evolution of the species, what adaptive property it provides that would cause it to be selected through evolution.

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Functionalism

Mental acts can be studied through introspection, the use of instruments to record and measure

Objective manifestations of mind, through the study of its creations and products

And through the study of anatomy and physiology.

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Functionalism

Functionalism was the study of the function rather than the structure of consciousness, was interested in how the minds adapt to our changing environment

Attention, Memory, and Emotion

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Book

Macapagal, M.E.J. (2007). General Psychology for Filipino College Students. Manila, Ph: Ateneo University Press.

Mangal, S.K. (2013). General Psychology. Sterling Publishers Pvt. Ltd.

Plotnik, R. & Kouyoumdjian, H. (2011). Introduction to Psychology. (9th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.

Internet

University of Utah Department of Psychology. (n.d.). Wilhelm Wundt and Structuralism. In: A Brief History of Psychology. Retrieved from: http://www.psych.utah.edu/gordon/Classes/Psy4905Docs/PsychHistory/Cards/Wundt.html

University of Utah Department of Psychology. (n.d.). William James and Functionalism. In: A Brief History of Psychology. Retrieved from: http://www.psych.utah.edu/gordon/Classes/Psy4905Docs/PsychHistory/Cards/James.html

References

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Guidance CounselingPsychological Foundations of