THE SCIENCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND BEHAVIOR

THE SCIENCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Typically, the activities that psychology studies are conscious performances, while many of those falling to physiology are unconscious. Thus digestion is mostly unconscious, the heart beat is unconscious except when disturbed, the action of the liver is entirely unconscious. Why not say, then, that psychology is the study of conscious activities? There might be some objection to this definition from the side of physiology, which studies certain conscious activities itself—speech, for example, and especially sensation.

There would be objection also from the side of psychologyy which does not wish to limit itself to conscious action. Take the case of any act that can at first be done only with close attention, but that becomes easy and automatic after practice; at first it is conscious, later unconscious, but psychology would certainly need to follow it from the initial to the final stage, in order to make a complete study of the practice effect. And then there is the " unconscious ", or the " subconscious mind "—a matter on which psychologists do not wholly agree among themselves; but all would agree that the problem of the unconscious was appropriate to psychology.

For all the objections, it remains true that the typical mental process, the typical matter for psychological study, is conscious. " Unconscious mental processes " are distinguished from the unconscious activity of such organs as the liver by being somehow like the conscious mental processes.

It would be correct, then, to limit psychology to the study of conscious activities and of activities akin to these.


THE SCIENCE OF BEHAVIOR

No one has objected so strenuously to defining psychology as the science of consciousness, and limiting it to consciousness, as the group of animal psychologists. By energetic work, they had proved that the animal was a very good subject for psychological study, and had discovered much that was important regarding instinct and learning in animals.

But from the nature of the case, they could not observe the consciousness of animals; they could only observe their behavior, that is to say, the motor (and in some cases glandular) activities of the animals under known conditions.

When then the animal psychologists were warned by the mighty ones in the science that they must interpret their results in terms of consciousness or not call themselves psychologists any longer, they rebelled; and some of the best fighters among them took the offensive, by insisting that human psychology, no less than animal, was properly a study of behavior, and that it had, been a great mistake ever to define it as the science of consciousness.

I t is a natural assumption that animals are conscious, but after all you cannot directly observe their consciousness, and you cannot logically confute those philosophers who have contended that the animal was an unconscious automaton. Still less can you be sure in detail what is the animal's sensation or state of mind at any time; to get at that, you would need a trustworthy report from the animal himself. Each individual must observe his own consciousness; no one can do it from outside. The objection of the behaviorist to " consciousness psychology" arises partly from distrust of this method of inner observation, even on the part of a human observer.

Indeed, we can hardly define psychology without considering its methods of observation, since evidently the method of observation limits the facts observed and so determines the character of the science. Psychology has two methods of observation.

When a person performs any act, there are, or may be, two sorts of facts to be observed, the " objective " ana the " subjective ". The objective facts consist of movements of the person's body or of any part of it, secretions of his glands (as flow of saliva or sweat), and external results produced by these bodily actions—results such as objects moved, path and distance traversed, hits on a target, marks made on paper, columns of figures added, vocal or other sounds produced, etc., etc. Such objective facts can be observed by another person.

The subjective facts can be observed only by the person erforming the act. While another person can observe, better indeed than he can himself, the motion of his legs in walking, he alone can observe the sensations in the joints and muscles produced by the leg movement. No one else can observe his pleased or displeased state of mind, nor whether he is thinking of his walking or of something quite different. To be sure, his facial expression, which is an objective fact, may give some clue to his thoughts and feelings, but " there's no art to read the mind's construction in the face ", or at least no sure art. One may feign sleep or absorption while really attending to what is going on around. A child may wear an angelic expression while meditating mischief. To get the subjective facts, we shall have to enlist the person himself as our observer.



source: PSYCHOLOGY A STUDY OF MENTAL LIFE BY ROBERT S. WOODWORTH, Ph.D.

Professor of psychology in Columbia University NEW YORK

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