discipline of psychology

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When did psychology become a discipline? By who? Where was it first established?

-- sarah flores (blsflores@netzero.net), January 23, 2002

Answers

This is a very complicated question. Wilhelm Wundt is generally credited with having founded the first psychological research laboratory in 1879 at Leipzig. He also wrote one of the first textbooks on the topic and trained a nubmer of early experimental psychologists, both German and American. However, William James had a demonstration lab in 1875 at Harvard. And there was research conducted earlier (by, e.g., Helmholtz, Fechner, Weber) that is *now* considered to have been psychological (though they didn't dewscribe themselves in that way). See any basic textbook on the history of psychology for a more thorough answer.

-- Christopher Green (christo@yorku.ca), January 23, 2002.

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