Theoretical foundations of early school of psychology
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Psychology started emerging as a scientific discipline in 1879 when Wilhem Wundt, a German physiologist opened the first psychology laboratory in the University of Leipzig, Germany. Wundt considered psychology as the study of conscious experience and therefore focused on the components or structure of the mind. Wundt's model became known as structuralism because it focused on the fundamental elements that form the foundation of thinking, consciousness, emotions and other kinds of mental status and activities. Structuralists studied the mind by bringing people in laboratories and asking them to respond to stimuli (for example, the sound of a bell). Data was collected through a method known as introspection, which involved observing and analyzing ones own conscious mental processes. This was done under controlled conditions (same physical surroundings, using the same stimulus and same verbal instructions to each subject). For example people were presented with a stimulus - such as bright green object or a sentence printed on a card - and asked to describe in their own words and in as much detail as they could manage, what they were experiencing.
Structuralism failed to grow because introspection was criticised as not being scientific enough. It was difficult for other people to accurately verify the introspections made by other people. People also had difficulties describing some of their inner experiences such as thoughts and emotional responses. Structuralism has, however, been reactivated into a vibrant scientific discipline of psychology known as cognitive psychology, which deals with cognitive processes such as memory, perception, thinking, language and reasoning.