The old psychology

The spate of "new" psychologies with which we were familiar in the nineteen-twenties (to say nothing of the nineteen-tens and the eighteen-nineties) has died down, and psychologists now talk in terms of points of view and preferred concepts rather than party allegiances. Nevertheless, one impression persists which needs to be enquired into. Among those interested in ,the subject, but not themselves psychologists, it takes this form: psychology is in continuous, large scale flux, and is therefore a new-fangled, insecure, aggressive, and rather" gimmicky" field of endeavour. Among psychologists themselves, the assumption is more specific and sophisticated: it is, that psychology became respectable with the rise of experimentalism (with the foundation by Wilhelm Wundt of the laboratory at Leipzig in 1879, if 'an exact date is wanted), and that previous work can be relegated to a species of antiquarian rag-bag, or rubbish-heap of superstition.