Wilhelm Wundt, the first psychologist in history?

Maybe not as well known as others, The figure of Wilhelm Wundt marks the history of our knowledge about the mind; We are talking about the father of scientific psychology, an honorary title that many psychologists are clear that he deserves. The origin of psychology as such would perhaps have to be sought centuries ago. Scientific psychology, however, has a strong root in this figure. Wundt, in the mid-19th century, created the first experimental laboratory.

Let’s continue with the background. Nowadays, psychology has its own academic route. Any student can pursue a university degree, complete a master’s degree, choose their specialization, take advantage of non-regulated courses and training to complement their knowledge, etc.

However, If we go back a couple of centuries, psychology as such was not regulated. So, anyone who wanted to study it had to train, to a certain extent, through associated branches, such as medicine or philosophy. The origin of knowledge was located in philosophical readings, such as those of Plato or Aristotle. With the context drawn, we talk about Wilhelm Wundt and his contribution to changing this course.

Now, we understand psychology as a part of our life. It’s like he’s always been by our side. In 1832, the year Wilhelm Wundt was born, not only did no such perception exist, nor could it be imagined that human behavior deserved a science I be a field of study in itself.

The life of Wilhelm Wundt

Wilhelm Wundt was born in 1832, in Germany. Since he was the son of a Protestant pastor, He was able to dedicate his entire youth to study and attend two universities: Tübingen and Heidelberg.

It was in the latter where he obtained his medical degree. During his career he studied with Helmholtz and after spending time in Zurich he ended up in Leipzig to complete his studies on human behavior at the Faculty of Philosophy.

Leipzig would become the cradle of experimental psychology once he created the corresponding institution, which you can learn about in the next section. After a prolific career, where He grouped together more than 50,000 pages among all his works, He died in 1920 without ever stopping working.

The importance of Wilhelm Wundt in modern psychology

In this way, it is considered that psychology itself was born in 1879. What happened at that moment in history? It was the year in which Wundt inaugurated the first experimental psychology laboratory in history. The event took place in the town of Leipzig. Until that moment, we find philosophers such as Hume or Descartes, who worked from a philosophical point of view on the nature of ideas, human perception of the environment, etc.

But The necessary foundations for the study of the brain and statistical matter began with Wundt. In this way, it was easier to understand human behavior, since the first measuring instruments were designed.

It can be said that the time in which Wundt lived was revolutionary in the field in question. Along with him, other important researchers appeared, like Francis Galton, who dedicated part of his efforts to experimentally studying memory. Together with them, Gustav Fechner was already investigating the physical stimulation produced by stimuli of different intensity and nature.

Wundt’s laboratory

It was the 1950s when Wilhelm Wundt decided to go one step further in the scientific study of the mind. He decided to combine the experimental method with statistics to generate replicable strategies that would allow us to better understand how our brain works.

Wundt took a fundamental step by abandoning his physiology classes at the University of Heidelberg. He left his comfortable teaching job and went to Leipzig, where introduced mental processes in a controlled environment, the laboratory. The idea was to produce certain oscillations in different variables to analyze the effect of this change, keeping the rest of the unstudied parameters constant.

For it, Fechner’s methodology was used to study perceptions and sensations. For example, exposing volunteers to different stimuli. Then, once he had used the patterns, he analyzed the results he had achieved looking for associations or differences. In this way he obtained data by eliminating external factors such as noise, position, etc.

So, Although today most of Wilhelm Wundt’s theories have been discarded, there is no doubt about what he meant. his way of trying to answer questions, questions that in some way had always been there, enjoying more speculation than data that resolved them.

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