TOPIC :

STRUCTURALISM
Presenters name:

Ammara Khan Niazi ,,

M.ed Student
Psychology :
Psychology is the branch of science, which
studies bahaviour and mental processes.

Educational psychology :

According to Crow and Crow,

Educational psychology describes and
explains the learning experiences of an
individual from birth through old age.
School of thoughts in psychology:
When psychology was first established
as a science separate from biology and
philosophy, the debate over how to
describe and explain the human mind
and behavior began. The
different schools of
psychology represent the major
theories within psychology.

The following are some of the major schools

of thought that have influenced our knowledge
and understanding of psychology:
1. Structuralism
2. Functionalism
3. Behaviorism
4. Gestalt
psychology
5. Psychoanalysis
6. Humanistic psychology
1. Wilhelm wundt :
German philosopher.
Wundt, who noted psychology as a science apart
from biology and philosophy, was the first person to
ever call himself a Psychologist .He is widely
regarded as the "father of experimental
psychology".
In 1879,Wundt founded the first formal laboratory
for psychological research at the University of
Leipzig. This marked psychology as an independent
field of study.
The school of psychology that Wundt began and
championed all his life is referred to as
"structuralism. For this reason, Wundt is often
referred to as the father of structuralism.
 Titchener was a student of Wundt.
Titchener Americanized Wundts experimental psychology.
Translated Principles of Physiological Psychology into English.
Develop structuralism based on the ideas or concepts of his
teacher.
Defined psychology as the science of consciousness or
study of experiences.
He and his teacher both tried to describe the structure
of mind with the help of introspection method.

Titchener was an influential figure in the

formative years of psychology. As one of Wundt's students,
Titchener is perhaps best remembered for establish in
the school of thought known as structuralism.
Wundt applied himself to writing a work that came to be one
of the most important in the history of psychology,
Principles of Physiological Psychology in 1874. This was the first
textbook that was written pertaining to the field of psychology.
Wundt claimed that the book was "an attempt to mark out
psychology as a new domain of science.
Wundt was greatly emphasized on the study of
components of consciousness, which is the supposed
structure of our mind so, his approach to psychology is

called as structuralism.
Example:
An example of structuralism is describing an apple. An apple is crisp,
sweet, juicy, round, and hard. Another example of structuralism is
describing your experience at the ocean by saying it is windy, salty,
and cold, but rejuvenating.
 Titchener was extremely interested in attention, and he
differentiated between primary attention, which is
involuntary, and secondary attention, which is voluntarily
focused.
He emphasized the importance of association, but he
maintained that contiguity is the only law of association.
Titchener suggested that the study of association must
involve careful introspection of impressions made by the
stimuli, he emphasized association by contiguity, and he
argued for the importance of studying the physiology of
association.
Titcheners context theory proposed how the meaningless
sensation is given meaning in the form of perceptions.
Titchener distinguished between emotion and affect, which
may be nothing more than sensations of pleasantness or
unpleasantness.
 Titchener believed that the goal of psychology was to study
mind and consciousness. He defined consciousness as the
sum total of mental experience at any given moment, and
the mind as the accumulated experience of a lifetime. He
believed that he could understand reasoning and the
structure of the mind if he could define and categorize the
basic components of mind and the rules by which the
components interacted.
Interaction of elements OF Mind:
Titchener's theory of structuralism arises the
question how the mental elements combined and
interacted with each other to form conscious
experience. His conclusions were largely based
on ideas of associationism. In particular, Titchener
focuses on the law of contiguity, which is the idea
that the thought of something will tend to cause
thoughts of things that are usually experienced
along with it.
Wundt emphasize the study of
consciousness and its components:

Consciousness:
The normal state of being awake and able to
understand what is happening around you, it
represents a persons mind and thoughts .It is the
totality in psychology of sensations, perceptions,
ideas, attitudes, and feelings of which an individual
or a group is aware at any given time or within a
given time span .Your conscious experiences are
constantly shifting and changing.
Sensation:
Sensation refers to sensing our environment through
touch, taste, sight, sound, and smell (the 5 senses).
Sensation is something you feel.

Perception:
Perception is the way we interpret these sensations and
therefore make sense of everything around us. Perception
occurs when your brain gets involved, and you assimilate
what you sense into an experience. perception is something
you see.
Sensation couldn't exist without perception and
perception couldn't exist without sensation. They're
not the same but they're related. e.g ,you can feel the
piece of paper and you can see it
Thoughts:
Thought can refer to the ideas or arrangements of ideas that result
from thinking, the act of producing thoughts, or the process of
producing thoughts. Despite the fact that thought is a fundamental
human activity familiar to everyone, there is no generally accepted
agreement as to what thought is or how it is created.

Ideas:
A thought or collection of thoughts that generate in the mind. An idea
is usually generated with intent, but can also be created
unintentionally. Ideas often form during brainstorming sessions or
through discussions.
Emotions:
A mental state that arises spontaneously rather than through
conscious effort and is often accompanied by physiological changes.
It is a conscious mental reaction (as anger or fear) subjectively
experienced as strong feeling usually directed toward a specific object
and typically accompanied by physiological and behavioral changes in
the body.
Introspection method:
Introspection is examination of one s own conscious
thoughts and feelings.
In psychology , the process of introspection relies
exclusively on observation of one's mental state, while in
a spiritual context, it may refer to the examination of
one's soul. Introspection is closely related to human self-
reflection and is contrasted with external observation.

Through introspection experiments, Wundt began

to catalog a large number of basic conscious
elements, which could hypothetically be combined
to describe all human experiences.
 Limitations:
The school of Structuralism is, for the most part, completely dead
in psychology.

1. By todays scientific standards, the experimental methods

used to study the structures of the mind were too subjectivethe
use of introspection led to a lack of reliability in results.

2. Other critics argue that structuralism was too concerned with

internal behavior, which is not directly observable and cannot be
accurately measured.
 Conclusion:
Structuralism is important because it is the first
major school of thought in psychology.
It helps in the approval of psychology as separate
science.
Structuralism also influenced experimental
psychology.
It provides base for the study of mind under its
elements.
It provides techniques of using introspection
method in education.
It provide base for further study in Psychology.