Hein Van den Berg - Wundt and Kraepelin: An Attempt to Ground Psychiatry as a Proper Science

Hein Van Den Berg (University of Amsterdam)

The Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh invites you to join us for our Lunch Time Talk. Attend in person at 1117 Cathedral of Learning or visit our live stream on YouTube at Hein Van den Berg

Tuesday, December 3rd @ 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm EST

Title:  Wundt and Kraepelin: An Attempt to Ground Psychiatry as a Proper Science

Abstract:

In the early stages of his career, Emil Kraepelin (1856-1926), one of the founders of modern psychiatry, attempted to synthesize work done in the newly established science of experimental psychology and psychiatry. This work was influenced by the pioneering research of Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920), with whom Kraepelin studied. Kraepelin’s experimental research remains a relatively little studied field and is mostly interpreted in the context of a debate on whether his experimental work influenced his later nosological research.  In this work, I adopt a novel perspective on Kraepelin’s programme, and look into the extent into which Wundt’s writings on logic can shed light on the methodological foundations of Kraepelin’s research. By adopting this perspective, I demonstrate firstly that both Wundt and Kraepelin saw experiments as a means to apply the method of analysis, analyzing complex mental phenomena, including mental disorders, into their elementary parts. Secondly, I show that Kraepelin did not reject patho-anatomic studies of the brain in psychiatry, as is sometimes suggested, but that he applied Wundt’s method of experimental analysis to correlate elementary cerebropathic processes with elementary psychopathological processes. Thirdly, I show that the method of correlating cerebropathic processes with psychopathological processes was also due to Wundt, who in his physiological psychology attempted to correlate outer physiological processes with inner mental phenomena. Finally, I give a novel analysis of Kraepelin’s envisioned experiments.

Can’t make it in-person? This talk will available online through the following:

This talk will also be available live streamed on:

Zoom:  https://pitt.zoom.us/j/92918314146 and

YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrRp47ZMXD7NXO3a9Gyh2sg.