Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt : The founder of experimental psychology

Wilhelm Wundt (born on August 16, 1832, in Germany), was a German physiologist and psychologist who is generally known as the father of experimental psychology and the founder of the world’s first psychology laboratory established in Leipzig, Germany in 1879.

Wundt is often associated with the school of thought called structuralism. Although it was his student Edward B. Titchner who was truly responsible for the set up of that school of psychology.

He has written approximately 53000 pages, including articles on animal and human physiology, poisons, visions, spiritualism, hypnotism, history and politics, linguistics, religion, and ethics.

In 1856, Wundt earned a medical degree at the University of Heidelberg. After studying briefly with Johannes Muller, he was appointed lecturer in physiology at the University of Heidelberg where in 1858 he became lecturer in physiology at the University of Heidelberg, where is 1858 he became an assistant to the Physicist and Physiologist Hermann von Helmholtz. There he contributed to the Theory of sense Perception.

Another reason Wundt is considered a pioneer of psychology is that he focused on developing experimental strategies and techniques to help systematically study human thought and behavior. Wundt believed that psychology was a science of conscious experience and that trained observers could accurately describe thoughts, feelings, and emotions through a process known as introspection.

However, Wundt made a clear distinction between everyday self observation which he believed was inaccurate, and experimental introspection (also called internal perception). According to Wundt, to be an internal perception one needs to be trained in observing the stimulus that he/she will be introduced.

Wundt also had many students who later became prominent psychologists including Edward Titchner, James Mckeen Cattell, Charles Spearman, G.Stanley Hall, Charles Judd, and Hugo Munstenberg.

Thanks to his work and contribution in psychology a whole new field was established and inspired other researchers to explore and study the human mind and behavior.

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