XVI The Teaching of Psychology
Place of psychology in the curriculum
Historically, as an offshoot, and rather a recent offshoot, from philosophy, psychology has been under the care of the department of philosophy in colleges and universities, foreign as well as American, and has been taught by professors concerned in part with the courses in philosophy. Though this state of affairs still obtains to a considerable extent, the tendency is undoubtedly towards allowing psychology an independent position in the organization and curriculum of the college. In recent appointments, indeed, the affiliation of psychology with education has frequently been emphasized instead of its affiliation with philosophy, for the professional applications of psychology lie more in the field of education than elsewhere. As a required study, our science is more likely to find a place in the college for teachers than in the college of arts. But, on the other hand, the applications to medicine, business, and industry are increasing so rapidly in importance as to make it logical to maintain an independent position for the science. Only in an independent position can the psychologist be free to cultivate the central body of his subject, the “pure” as distinguished from the applied science; and, with the multiplication of practical applications, it is more than ever important to center psychological teaching in the person of some one who is simply and distinctively a psychologist.
The introductory course to be general, not vocationally applied psychology
For a similar reason, psychologists are wont to insist that the introductory course in their subject, no matter for what class of students, with general or with professional aims, should be definitely a course in psychology as distinguished from educational or medical or business psychology. Illustrative material may very well be chosen with an eye to the special interests of a class of students, but the general principles should be the same for all classes, and should not be too superficially treated in the rush for practical applications. Some years ago, a Committee of the American Psychological Association was appointed to make a survey of the teaching of psychology in universities, colleges, and normal schools, and the Report of this Committee (1), still the most important contribution to the pedagogy of the subject, emphasizes the concurrent view of psychologists to the effect just stated, that the study of psychology should begin with a course in the central body of doctrine. The psychological point of view must be acquired before intelligent application can be made, whether to practical pursuits or to other branches of study such as philosophy and the social sciences, to which psychology stands in the relation of an ancillary science.
During the war, the applications of psychology in the testing and selection of men and training them for specified military and naval work, in rating officers, in morale and intelligence work, and in several other lines, became so important that it was decided to give psychology a place as an “allied subject” in the curriculum of the Students’ Army Training Corps; and the report of the committee of psychologists that prepared the outline of a course for this purpose deserves attention as a contribution to the pedagogy of the subject. They proposed a course on “Human Action,” to be free from questions of a speculative or theoretical nature and concentrated on matters relevant to military practice and the military uses of psychology. The aim was to enlist the student’s practical concern at the very outset, and to give him the psychological point of view as applied to his problems as a member of the Army and a prospective officer. In method, the course was to depend little on lectures, or even on extensive readings, and much on the student’s own solution of practical psychological problems. Evidently the psychologists who prepared this plan were driven by the emergency to abandon “academic” prepossessions in favor of a course in pure psychology as the necessary prerequisite to any study of applications; and it is quite possible that courses in psychology for different groups of students could be prepared that should follow this general plan and be intensely practical from the start. It would still remain true that the thorough psychologist should be the one to plan and conduct such courses.
The psychological point of view must be emphasized in the introductory course
The psychological point of view means attentiveness to certain matters that are neglected in the usual objective attitude toward things. It is identified by many with introspection, but there is at present considerable dissent from this doctrine, the dissenters holding that an objective type of observation of human behavior is distinctively psychological and probably more significant and fruitful than the introspective attitude. However this may be, both introspection and behavior study require attention to matters that are commonly disregarded. Every one is of course interested in what people do, or at least in the outcome of their activities; but psychology is interested in the activities themselves, in how the outcome is reached rather than in the outcome itself. Ordinarily, we are interested in the fact that an inventor has solved a problem, but regard it as rather irrelevant if he proceeds to tell us the mental process by which he reached the solution. We are interested in the fact that a child has learned to speak, but devote little thought to the question as to how he has learned. It is to bring such psychological questions to light and arouse intelligent interest in them, with some knowledge of the answers that have been found, that the psychologist is chiefly concerned when initiating beginners into his science. This primary aim is accomplished in the case of those students who testify, as some do, that the course in psychology has “opened their eyes” and made them see life in a different light than hitherto.
Values of the study of psychology—cultural rather than disciplinary
Whether this primary value of psychology is to be counted among the disciplinary or among the cultural values may be a matter of doubt. Psychologists themselves have seldom made special claims in behalf of their science as a means of formal discipline, many of them, in fact, taking a very negative position with regard to the whole conception of such discipline. What psychology can give of general value is a point of view, and a habit of attentiveness to the mental factor. The need of some systematic attention to these matters often comes to light in the queer efforts at a psychology made by intelligent but uninstructed persons in the presence of practical problems involving the mental factor.
The practical value
Besides this “cultural” value, and besides the special uses of psychology as a preparation for teaching and certain other professions, there is a very real and practical value to be expected from an understanding of the mental mechanism. Since every one works with this mechanism, every one can make practical use of the science of it. Most persons get on passably well, perhaps, without any expert knowledge of the machinery which they are running; yet the machine is not entirely “fool proof,” by any means, but sometimes comes to grief from what is in essence a lack of psychological wisdom either in the person himself or in his close companions. Mental hygiene, in short, depends on psychology. The college student, looking forward to a life of mental activity, is specially in a position to utilize information regarding the most economical working of the mental machine; and, as a matter of experience, some students are considerably helped in their methods of mental work by what they learn in the psychology class. Among the results of recent investigation are many bearing on economy and efficiency of mental work. This value of psychology, it will be seen, is practical without being professional—except in so far as all educated men can be said to adopt the profession of mental engineer. Much more emphasis than has been customary might well be laid on this side of the subject in elementary courses.
Content of the introductory course in psychology
The content of the first course in psychology is just now undergoing a certain amount of revision. Traditionally the aim has been, not so much, as in most other subjects, to initiate the student into a range of facts lying outside his previous experience, as to bring definitely to his attention facts lying within the experience of all, and to cause him to classify these so as to refer any given mental process to the class or classes where it belongs. This calls for definition, the making of distinctions, the analysis of complex facts, the use of a technical vocabulary, and in general for much more precision of statement than the student has been used to employ in speaking of such matters. Some laws of mental action, verifiable within ordinary experience, are also brought to light in such a course, and some account of the neural mechanisms of mental life is usually included; but its chief accomplishment is in leading the student to attend to mental processes and gain a point of view that may remain his future possession.
With the great expansion of psychological knowledge in recent decades, due to research by experimental and other empirical methods, it has become possible to give a course more informational in character and going quite beyond the range of the student’s previous experience; and this new material is finding its way into elementary texts and courses. Many of the results of research are not at all beyond the comprehension of the beginner; indeed, they are often more tangible than the distinctions and analyses that give the stamp to the traditional course. These empirical results also have the advantage, in many cases, of throwing light on the practical problems of mental health and efficiency; and some inclusion of such material is desirable if only to fit the needs of the considerable number of students who cannot become interested in a course of the traditional sort. Practice in this matter is at present quite variable, some teachers basing the introductory course as far as possible on the results of experiment, and others adhering closely to the older plan.
Methods of teaching psychology—Practical exercises
There is certainly some advantage in keeping the first course untechnical. The student can then be set to observing for himself, instead of depending on books. Many of the facts of psychology are so accessible, at least in a rough form, as to make the subject a good one for appealing to the spirit of independence in the student. Some teachers are, in fact, accustomed to introduce each part of the subject by exercises, introspective or other, designed to bring the salient facts home to the student in a direct way, before he has become inoculated with the doctrine of the authorities. “The essential point is that the student be led to observe his own experience, to record his observation accurately—in a word, to psychologize; and to make the observation before, not after, discovering from book or from lecture what answers are expected to these questions. Individual experiments should so far as possible be performed in like manner before the class discussion of typical results. In all cases the results of these introspections should be recorded in writing; representative records should be read and commented on in class; and the discussion based on them should form the starting point for textbook study and for lecture.” The plan thus highly recommended by Professor Calkins53 she found not to be widely used at the time of her inquiry; a commoner practice was the assignment of reading for the student’s first introduction to a given topic. This alternative plan is a line of less resistance; and it is also true that exercises in original observation by beginners in psychology are likely to be instructive mostly as evidence of the ineptness of the beginner in psychological observation. Moreover, when the content of the course is informational and based on the results of research, preliminary exercises by the student are of rather limited value, though they still could serve a useful purpose in bringing forcibly to his attention the problems to be studied.
The use of “exercises,” somewhat analogous to the examples of algebra or the “originals” of geometry, is quite widespread in introductory courses in psychology, and several much-used textbooks offer sets of exercises with each chapter. Several types are in vogue: (1) some call for introspections, as, for example, “Think of your breakfast table as you sat down to it this morning—do you see it clearly as a scene before your mind’s eye?” (2) some call for a review and generalization of facts presumably already known, as “Find instances of the dependence of character upon habit;” (3) many consist of simple experiments demanding no special apparatus and serving to give a direct acquaintance with matters treated in the text, such as after-images or fluctuations of attention; and (4) many call for the application of the principles announced in the text to special cases, the object being to “give the student some very definite thing to do” (Thorndike), in doing which he will secure a firm hold of the principles involved. In general, teachers of psychology aim to “keep the student doing things, instead of merely listening, reading, or seeing them done” (Seashore, 1, page 83). In a few colleges, laboratory work of a simple character forms part of the introductory course, and in one or two the laboratory part is developed to a degree comparable with what is common in chemistry or biology. As a rule, however, considerations of time and equipment have prevented the introduction of real laboratory work into the first course in psychology.
Classroom methods—The lecture
Of classroom methods, perhaps all that are employed in other subjects find application also in psychology, some teachers preferring one and some another. The lecture method is employed with great success by some of the leaders, who devote much attention to the preparation of discourse and demonstrations. One professor (anonymous) is quoted54 as follows:
“I must here interject my ideas on the lecture system. The lecture has a twofold advantage over the recitation. (1) It is economical, since one man handles a large number of students; the method of recitation is extravagant. This fact alone will mean the retention of the lecture system, wherever it can possibly be employed with success. (2) It is educationally the better method, for the average student and the average teacher. For the reconstruction of a lecture from notes means an essay in original work, in original thinking; while the recitation lapses all too readily into textbook rote and verbal repetition.
“It is, nevertheless, true that sophomore students are on the whole inadequate to a lecture course. They cannot take notes; they cannot tear the heart out of a lecture. (They are also, I may add, inadequate to the reading of textbooks or general literature, in much the same way.) Hence one has to supplement the lecture by syllabi, by lists of questions (indexes, so to speak, to the lectures), and by personal interviews....
“The sum and substance of my recommendations is that you provide a competently trained instructor, and let him teach psychology as he best can. What the student needs is the effect of an individuality, a personality; and the lecture system provides admirably for such effect.”
The recitation
Though the lecture system is used with great success by a number of professors, the general practice inclines more to the plan of oral recitations on assigned readings in one or more texts, and large classes are often handled in several divisions in order to make the recitation method successful. Not infrequently a combination of lectures by the professor and recitations conducted by his assistants is the plan adopted, the lecturer to add impressiveness to the course, and the recitations to hold the student up to his work. Written exercises, such as those already mentioned, are often combined with the oral recitation; and in some cases themes are to be written by the students. Probably the seminar method, in which the subject is chiefly presented in themes prepared by the students, is never attempted in the introductory course.
Class discussion
On the other hand, a number of successful teachers reject both the lecture and the recitation methods, and rely for the most part upon class discussions, with outside readings in the textbooks, and frequent written recitations as a check on the student’s work. A champion of the discussion method writes as follows:55
“A teacher has not the right to spend any considerable part of the time of a class in finding out by oral questions... whether or not the student has done the work assigned to him. The good student does not need the questions and is bored by the stumbling replies which he hears; and even the poor student does not get what he needs, which is either instruction a deux, or else a corrected written recitation.... Not in this futile way should the instructor squander the short hours spent with his students. The purpose of these hours is twofold: first, to give to the students such necessary information as they cannot gain, or cannot so expediently gain, in some other way; second, and most important, to incite them to ‘psychologize’ for themselves. The first of these purposes is best gained by the lecture, the second by guided discussion. ‘Guided discussion’ does not mean a reversal of the recitation process—an hour in which students ask questions in any order, and of any degree of relevancy and seriousness, which the instructor answers. On the contrary, the instructor initiates and leads the discussion; he chooses its subject, maps out its field, pulls it back when it threatens to transgress its bonds, and, from time to time, summarizes its results. This he does, however, with the least possible show of his hand. He puts his question and leaves it to the student interested to answer him; he restates the bungling answer and the confused question; he leaves one student to answer the difficulties of another.... The advantage of the discussion over the lecture is, thus, that it fosters in the student the active attitude of the thinker in place of the passive attitude of the listener.... Obviously it is simplest to teach large classes by lecturing to them. Yet a spirited and relevant discussion may be conducted in a class of a hundred or so. Of course no more than eight or twelve, or, at most, twenty of these will take even a small part on a given day; perhaps a half or two thirds will never take part; and some will remain uninterested. But there will be many intelligent listeners as well as active participants; and these gain more, I believe, by the give and take of a good discussion than by constant lectures however effective.”
Class experiments
Brief mention should be made of a form of class exercise peculiar to psychology, the “class experiment.” This is in some respects like a demonstration, but differs from that in calling for a more active participation on the part of the student. Any psychological experiment is performed on a human (or animal) subject, and many experiments can be performed on a group of subjects together, each of them being called on to perform a certain task or to make a certain observation. Each of the class having made his individual record, the instructor may gather them together into an average or summary statement, and the individual variations as well as the general tendency may thus be brought to light. Very satisfactory and even scientific experiments can thus be performed, with genuine results instructive to the class.
Checking the work of the students
Of methods of holding the student to his work, mention has already been made of the much-used written recitation. The usual plan is to have frequent, very brief written examinations. Sometimes the practice is to correct and return all the papers; sometimes to place them all on file and correct samples chosen at random for determining the student’s “term mark.” A plan that has some psychological merit is to follow the examination immediately by a statement of the correct answers, with brief discussion of difficulties that may arise, and to ask each student to estimate the value of his own paper in the standard marking system. The papers are then collected and examined, and returned with the instructor’s estimate.
Since an examination is, in effect, a form of psychological test, it is natural that psychologists should have attempted to introduce some of the technique of psychological testing into the work of examining students, in the interest of economy of the student’s time as well as that of the examiner. The teacher prepares blanks which the student can quickly fill out if he knows the subject, not otherwise. To discover how far the student has attained a psychological point of view, written work or examination questions often demand some independence in the application to new cases of what has been learned. Far-reaching tests of the later value to the student of a course in psychology have not as yet been attempted.
Place of psychology in the college course
No attempt has yet been made to obtain the consensus of opinion among psychologists as to whether the introductory course should be required of all arts students, and probably opinions would differ, without anything definitive to be said on either side. In quite a number of colleges psychology forms part of a required general course in philosophy. Where a separation has occurred between philosophy and psychology, the latter is seldom absolutely required. As a general rule, however, the introductory course, even if not required, is taken by a large share of the arts students. The traditional position for the course in psychology is late in the college curriculum, originally in the senior but more recently in the junior year. In many of the larger colleges it is now open to sophomores or even to freshmen. One motive for pushing the introductory course back into the earlier years is naturally to provide for more advanced courses in the subject; and another is the desire to make psychology prerequisite for courses in philosophy, education, or sociology. Still another motive tending in the same direction is the desire to make the practical benefits of psychological study available for the student in the further conduct of his work as a student in whatever field. If considerable attention is devoted in the introductory course to questions of mental hygiene and efficiency, the advantage of bringing these matters early to the attention of the student outweighs the objection which is often raised by teachers of psychology, as of other subjects, to admitting the younger students, on the ground of immaturity. The teachers who get the younger students may have to put up with immaturity in order that the benefit of their teaching may be carried over by the students into later parts of the curriculum.
Length of the introductory course
When the introductory course in psychology forms part of a course in philosophy, it is usually restricted to one semester, with three hours of class work per week. When psychology is an independent subject in the curriculum, a two-semester course is usually provided, since it is the feeling of psychologists that this amount of time is needed in order to make the student really at home in the subject, and to realize for him the values that are looked for from psychology. Often there is a break between the two semesters of such a course, the second being devoted to advanced or social or applied psychology. Sometimes, on the other hand, the two-semester course is treated as a unit, the various topics being distributed over the year; this latter procedure is probably the one that finds most favor with psychologists. Still, good results can be obtained with the semester course supplemented by other courses.
Content of advanced courses in psychology
The most frequent advanced course is one in experimental psychology. This is taken by only a small fraction of those who have taken the introductory course, partly because the laboratory work attached to the experimental course demands considerable time from the student, partly because students are not encouraged to go into the laboratory unless they have a pretty serious interest in the subject. For a student who has it in him to become somewhat of an “insider” in psychology, no course is the equal of the laboratory course, supplemented by judicious readings in the original sources or in advanced treatises. Next in frequency to the experimental course stands that in applied psychology, since the recent applications of psychology to business, industry, vocational guidance, law, and medicine appeal to a considerable number of college students. Other courses which appear not infrequently in college curricula are those in social, abnormal, and animal psychology. No precise order is necessary in the taking of these courses, and it is not customary to make any beyond the introductory course prerequisite for the others.
Robert S. Woodworth
Columbia University
Bibliography
Many of the textbooks contain, in their prefaces, important suggestions toward the teaching of the subject. There are also frequent articles in the psychological journals on apparatus for demonstrations and class or laboratory experiments.
1. Report of the Committee of the American Psychological Association on the Teaching of Psychology. Psychological Monographs, No. 51, 1910.
2. American Psychological Association, Report of the Committee on the Academic Status of Psychology, 1915: “The Academic Status of Psychology in the Normal Schools.”
3. Same Committee, 1916: “A Survey of Psychological Investigations with Reference to Differentiations between Psychological Experiments and Mental Tests.” Concerned with the availability of mental tests as material for the experimental course.
4. Courses in Psychology for the Students’ Army Training Corps. Psychological Bulletin, 1918, 15, 129-136. See also the Outlines of parts of the course in the same journal, pages 137-167, 177-206; and a note on the success of the courses by Edgar S. Brightman, in the Bulletin for 1919, pages 24-26.
Footnotes
53 In Report, pages 50-51.
54 By Sanford, 1, page 66.
55 Calkins, 1, pages 47-48.