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460
Hippocrates
Hippocrates (460-377 B.C.) suggested that such problems are caused by abnormalities in the brain, and not that the gods were punishing people for wrongdoing by causing them confusion and madness. But this idea that biological factors can affect our thoughts, feelings, and behavior influenced thinking about psychology for more than 2000 years. -
John Locke
John Locke was an English philosopher in the mid 1600s, and built on principles of associationism, theorized that knowledge is not inborn but is learned from experience. -
The Birth of Psychology
The scientific approach led to the birth of Modern Psychology. Psychologists argued that ideas about human behavior and mental processes should be supported by evidence. In the 1800s psychological laboratories were established in Erope and the U.S. In the labs psychologists studied behavior and mental processes. -
Wihelm Wundt
Wilthem Hundt and his students founded a field of experimental psychology that came to be known as structuralism. Structuralists were concerned with discovering the basic elements of consciousness. Wundt broke down consciousness into two categories: objective sensations and subjective feelings. -
William James
James William believed conscious experience cannot be broken down as structuralists believed. James maintained that experience is a continous "stream of consciousness". James was one of the founders of functionalism. Functionalists were concerned with how mental processes help organisms adapt to their environment. -
John B. Watson
Although Watson agreed with the functionalist focus on the importance of learning, he believed that it was unscientific to study a construct like consciousness, particularly the consciousness of animals. He saw consciousness is only known to each individual. He was the founder of behaviorism, Watson defined pyschology as the scientific study of oberservable behavior. -
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud, a Viennese physician, was perhaps the most famous of the early psychologists. The school thought that he founded, called psychoanalysis, emphasizes the importance of unconscious motives and internal conflicts determining human behavior. Freud's theory more than the others, has become a part of popular culture. His theory is the ideas that people are driven by hidden impulses and that verbal slips and dreams represent unconcious wishes. -
Kenneth B. Clark
Kenneth Clark brought diversity into Psychology. He went to Harvard University and majored in psychology. He and his wife did clinical work that led to several studies showing the negative effet of segragation on the self-esteem of African American children. He also examined the qulaity of education and the problems of juveniles delinquency and crime. He was among the first to recommend preschool, after-school programs, and community participation. -
B. F. Skinner
According to Skinner, people learned in the same way animals did. Like animals, people learn to behave in certain ways because they have been reinforced for doing so. He founded Gestalt psychology, which is based on the idea that perceptions are more than the somes of their parts. Rather, they are wholes that give shape, or meaning to the parts. -
Plato
Plato (428-438 B.C.), a student of Socrates in ancient Greece, recorded his teacher's advice: "Know thyself." This phrase has remained a motto of psychological study ever since. -
Aristotle
(384-322 B.C.) Aristotle raised many questions about human behavior that are still discussed. Aristotle outlined the laws of associationism, which are still at the heart of learning theory more than 2000 years later. One of his works is called Peri Psyches, which means "about the mind". He argued that human behavior, like the movements of the stars and the seas, is subject to certain rules and laws. -
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History of Psychology
