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Freudism and Experimental Psychology |
20:10 - 22 Luglio 2005 |
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| The analysis of E. G. Boring with Hanns Sachs |
Freudism and Experimental Psychology.
The Analysis of E.G. Boring with Hanns Sachs
As I don’t believe that it is possible to talk about the history of fears (1) without talking about the fear of the historian, I will refer to a particular case which demonstrates this fear, in order to then draw some hypotheses of method.
The case that I am referring to is that of Edwin Garrigues Boring, a psychologist and psychology historian, and Harvard professor from 1922 to 1968, best known as the author of A History of Experimental Psychology, which was published in 1929 and reprinted in 1950. This text was essential in forming the belief in the existence of an experimental psychology, a science established by Wundt in 1879, based on the use of laboratory methods in studying the human subject, which would mark «the termination of the long development of philosophic thought about mind» and which would eventually become an autonomous field. (2)
Immediately following the publication of the first edition of A History in 1939, Boring fell into an «emotional crisis» (3), which brought him to seek therapy from the Freudian analyst Hanns Sachs.
What did this emotional crisis express?
In his autobiography, Boring writes about electrical engineering, his first choice of study before turning to psychology:
«What got me into engineering? Action at a distance. When I was quite young, I discovered electricity – with a dry cell, an electric door-bell, and some wire. It seemed a marvellous thing to be able to ring the bell at will away off at the far end of a wire. (…) Magnetism seemed just as wonderful. (…) I began to play with motors and electric machines. I had, of course, to prepare in some way to make my living (…). So, knowing but little what I was doing, I choose electrical engineering.» (4)
Boring refers to magnetism yet again when he explains that his unusual move from studying engineering to studying psychology was the consequence of his fascination with Titchener, an experimental psychologist who ended his career by studying Arabic and numismatics:
«I took the (Titchener’s) course in 1905 in Morrill Hall with people spilling over into all the adjacent rooms. I can not exaggerate the magnetism of the lecturer. (…) I was than an engineering student, and yet it is the memory of these lectures that caused me to change to psychology five years later.» (5)
«Action at a distance», electricity, magnetism. We must not interpret these three terms, but accept them in their vague meaning of an undefined world made of invisible, pursued and/or feared realities, realities exchanged in a relationship.
Boring turned to psychology to ignite in himself a part of that world; to make himself, as he expressed with disarming naïveté, more “likeable,” (6) a «creative identity». (7)
If we compare this wait which came about in 1905 to the identity of psychology historian that he took on in 1929, and which represented the greatest realization of that wait, we can start to give some meaning to his 1930 emotional crisis.
Compared to this wait which came about in 1905, this identity should have seemed inconsequential to Boring, not only in terms of «action at a distance», that is, being acknowledged by others and exercising a certain amount of influence, but also because of his awareness of some «dissonance» within the very product that made this identity possible: A History. This «dissonance» consists, if nothing else, of having founded the genesis of psychology, as a science that was autonomous from philosophy, upon a discovery that was idealistically understood to be some sort of heroic act, and of antedating to 1879 this genesis whose very notion was brought about, based upon this assumption, by the book A History in 1929. (8)
This explanation of the emotional crisis is correct, but only partial. Rereading the last above-cited passage allows a deeper understanding of the topic at hand.
In fact, that passage does not only say that the move from engineering to psychology was sparked by a general interest in magnetism; it also says that the hope of being able to fulfill that interest, which determined this change, was related to one specific person. Boring was therefore not attracted to magnetism in general, but to Titchener’s «magnetic» personality, which promised him the opportunity to realize it.
The writing of A History should be regarded based on this premise, and as the development thereof, in the context defined therein. Boring would later write:
«Titchener» once said to me: “Choose a field in which you can be the most expert person alive.” Just then I choose psychology history and(…) I came near enough to be among the top few, at least in America.» (9)
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