Vol. X. No. I. 13368 JAN 20 1914 LIBRARY THE January 15, 1913 PSYCHOLOGICAL BULLETIN GENERAL REVIEWS AND SUMMARIES PSYCHOLOGICAL PROGRESS IN 1912 BY PROFESSOR EDWARD FRANKLIN BUCHNER In approaching our tenth consecutive survey of the annual achievements in psychology, the temptation to review the decade as a whole is strong. In a science so active as is ours at present, the ten years, however, could suffice to give only indications which might sound much as mere beginnings. And, in view of the timely readjustment of the plans of this journal to meet the task of disseminating and evaluating our new knowledge, we do not yield. We therefore limit ourselves to the year just closing. Nineteen hundred twelve has not been a twelve month which will stand out as conspicuous for a few single, great achievements. The flood of productivity has been kept to its high level, fed by the inpouring streams of the periodical and other material. The inner unity of the science, so notable towards the close of the last century, seems either to have been consciously neglected, or to have quietly disappeared amid the richer activities directed towards particular problems of methods and results. The reflective worker may well ponder the problem: Is the future of a science so young as psychology in any serious danger when it passes through movements which seem to affect a neglect of its historical continuity? The psychologist of today is actuated by a zeal for doing whatever his hands find to do, and the year has consequently shown its tendencies. As though to overcome the loosening of its connections with the science's past, the year has given us a few interesting summaries and systematic treatises which should be mentioned first. If one may find progress by looking backward occasionally, then the most interesting thing brought to hand is President Hall's (11) biographical chart which shows us the way by which our science has come to be. In selecting Zeller, "the scholar in his field," von Hartmann, "the philosopher of temperament," Lotze, "the harmonizer," Fechner, "the animist," von Helmholtz, "the ideal man of science," and Wundt, "a scientific philosopher," as the six founders, the author adds to the account of the fundamental advances and changes which psychology made in the nineteenth century, an intimate autobiography which illumines the source of his own permanent contributions. To the cis-Atlantic student, the book is of peculiar value and definite service, being filled with those rare tokens of progress that outlive the range of single years. Also through the medium of another lecture foundation, the Ichabod Spencer at Union College, Angell (1) has summed up more objectively and popularly “a just and comprehensive impression of the principal features of the psychology of today." The eight chapters become an inventory which reveals well-funded assets. Perhaps more striking and instructive is the sharp, and justly impatient criticism which Titchener (27) makes of the eleventh edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. One is wholly right in regarding encyclopedic compilations as indexes of the advances made in knowledge. The sad limitations of this particular enterprise in psychology, as detailed, become a direct summary of the historical movements which have produced the facts and laws which constitute what should generously be called the currently accepted contents of our science. "There is no article is the recurrent reply coming from his search for treatment of the expected topics. Rand's (20) compilation of representative selections from the writings of forty-three psychologists affords another opportunity to survey the historic background and the age-long interests of psychology. It is worth while noting that Aristotle, James, and Wundt are the three given most space, aggregating one sixth of the volume. Lotze, Fechner, von Helmholtz, and Wundt are the four in Hall's list of six "Founders" mentioned by Rand. Brett (3) presents an extended account of theories from primitive thought to St. Augustine. More technical and comprehensive systematic works showing present results and pointing the way for further activity are those by Lehmann (14) and by Wirth (31). The latter is especially notable, for its inclusion in a larger work on physiology, and its unusual attempt to extend the meaning of "psychophysics" over the whole field of "experimental" psychology. The rapid accumulation of new material in special fields of the science is best indicated in the impressive revision and expansion of Meumann's Vorlesungen (15). The particular interests of the year have been in the nature of critical reactions towards some of the work of former years. These have been most marked in the attacks on introspection, as a psychological method, the critical testing of tests, and the more secure establishment of the field of applied psychology. If the criticisms are not captious, all methodological questions are strictly fundamental (2). The recent efforts to secure an acceptable theory of introspection, whose issues confessedly involve seriously all analytic and experimental work, are a sign of growth. Dodge (5), for example, finds marked limitations of introspection, and believes it "is only one of the indicators of mental reality." Dunlap (7) is more decisive, and concludes that "there is, as a matter of fact, not the slightest evidence for the reality of 'introspection' as the observation of 'consciousness.' Hence, we must, in default of such evidence, cease the empty assumption of such a process. We might keep the word to apply to the . . . observation of feelings and of kinesthetic and cœnesthetic sensations. . . . It is probably better to banish it for the present from psychological usage." Dugas (6) goes to the other extreme, and upholds the positive, central value of introspection; because, without it not only psychology but all the other mental sciences would directly disappear. All proposed physical, physiological or social tests, with which to replace it in the science, are illegitimate. Meunier (16) appeals to the unique position of psychology among the sciences, from which it is able to oppose their conclusions with its own, and to deal with the very conditions of their methods and results. Titchener (28) admits that introspection does not furnish a psychological system. He also points out that the term is "highly equivocal"; but, he insists that "the introspection of the laboratory must be distinguished from that either of a moralizing common sense or of a rationalizing philosophy." Introspection is a scientific part of descriptive psychology; and although it shows "specific differences" in its procedure, all the forms present a generic likeness. Two contributions looking towards the systematization and extension of methods may be mentioned. Stern's (26) renewed efforts to establish securely individual psychology as a definite branch of the science, appears in the place of a second edition of his earlier work. His main problem is that of the methods of studying individual differences or "characteristics," which are the data usually neglected by the parent science. The results of the methods. most applicable,—as the test, the questionnaire and the historical, to immediate experiences, acts and dispositions, in their four relations of the variation, the correlation, the psychography and the comparison of characteristics, are to produce the true psychogram. The recent establishment of psychological laboratories in hospitals for the insane is the occasion for the appearance of Franz's manual (9), which by standardizing the diagnostic value of our science, will peradventure bring to a speedy end the individualizing procedure of clinicians, and also become a forerunner of further extension in the applications of psychology. A year ago it was necessary to specify the intense interest in tests as one of the leading features of that survey. Again this interest has kept steadily alive, reaching the point of that sort of criticism which we have already indicated as a sign of progress. The test was one of the earliest forms of experimentation which was so concrete as to fill the psychologist's heart with great hopes that, by securing a performance testing some particular capacity, as discrimination, attention, etc., we should be in the fortunate position of indexing a mind with complete confidence. In those years we could not understand what is clear today, why the test should suffer taboo. The current revival of this interest may lead to the result of setting up the test as one of the distinctive achievements of present psychology. The newer tests are readily recognized, in comparison with the old, as simpler, more indefinite, unspecialized, and less discriminative. And today's confidence finds its basis in the collective readings of many tests. In surveying this field with the systematic intent of pointing the way for future activity, Stern (25) introduces a new term, "intelligence quotient," to designate the part of normal intelligence a given child possesses. Squire (24) also notes the importance of securing norms of "standard achievement for the unretarded," and suggests a method of correlating physical, pedagogical and chronological ages to arrive at this result. Hart and Spearman (12) make a methodological and an explanatory appeal to the various correlations observable among many intellectual achi vements in the recent type of tests to support their belief in the existence of a common factor which they term "general ability." Wallin (30), by selecting fiv tests, which "include a few of the mental functions which are basic to intellectual development," and using them in observing some conditions in oral hygiene favorable to mental development, opened up an interesting field, and discovered a variety of indexes showing an unsuspected amount of average improvement. The value of the tendency to criticize methods, as well as the fact of the coöperative nature of our science, is shown in the second installment of the report of the special Committee of the American Psychological Association, which was prepared by Woodworth and Wells (21). The third chief characteristic of our year is to be found in the increasing confidence in the scientific validity of "applied" psychology, and in the labors to perfect the procedures in seeking solution for many problems in other sciences and in the art of living. Sometimes. this application means only a common-sense use of psychological insight; at other times a direct treatment of particular problems by the psychologist. At the twentieth meeting (1911) of the American Psychological Association, indication of this interest was notably shown in the presidential address, the symposium on psychology and medical education, and the section on educational psychology. The Fifth Congress for Experimental Psychology (Berlin, 1912) was characterized by a special manifestation of interest in the method and results of the applications of psychology, about one third of the forty papers presented being concerned with this field. This branch. of the science was taken by Münsterberg as the theme for his Ichabod Spencer lectures early in the year. Meunier's (16) and Stern's (26) views belong no less to this field. Among the many special interests of the year there are a few that stand out so interestingly as to deserve mention. After the appearance a few years ago of several studies on the psychology of drawing and art, chiefly in child development, interest in this topic seemed to wane. An awakening in this field has come, and we should now not be surprised to see ere long our technical methods applied to its problems (23, 32, 18). Drawing has very special psychological interest, inasmuch as it is an important form of mental expression, and offers a peculiarly constant means of understanding certain mental processes. In his special analysis of memory and ideation processes, Müller (17) promises a worthy achievement, when completed, and reports with unusual care the wonderful memory of a mathematical prodigy. The completion by Klemm of Vold's (29) prolonged study of experimentally stimulated dreams presents material which has permanent value, as contrasted with some results of the current attention paid to these phenomena. Ellwood's (8) critical review of the work of the last twenty years clears up many difficulties in studying social phenomena, and increases the fundamental value |