COMPARATIVE PSYCHOLOGY
AT the present time the data for a comparison of the bodily functions of
the members of one race with those of another are so scanty that the
science of ethnical physiology can scarcely be said to exist.
Fortunately, there is a quite different state of affairs for the study
of the mind—or Psychology—though even in this field there is yet a great
deal of work to be done.
During the eighteenth century the term “Anthropology,” which was very
vaguely employed, was often used to designate a comprehensive psychology
dealing with the entire mental side of man, as well as the relations
between soul and body. Later, as its scope became widened, the centre of
gravity shifted over to physical man; but anthropologists have always
maintained their right to deal also more or less with psychology.
[Sidenote: =Phrenology.=]
Psychology in early times concerned itself with the essence of the soul
as an independent entity, its relations to the body, its destructibility
or indestructibility, and the laws of its operations. The word
“Psychology” has always had a vague and varying significance. Thus, when
Hunt, in his presidential address before the Anthropological Society in
1866, says: “I am glad to know that there are many Fellows of this
Society who are at present working on the psychological aspects of our
science,” he referred to the interest then taken by the members in the
phrenology of the period. Later on, however, he expresses his opinion
with regard to “modern phrenology” as being “wholly unscientific.” The
old phrenology is now practically dead.
[Sidenote: =Psychical Research.=]
During the last quarter of the last century a study of various obscure
mental states received a fresh impetus in this country by the founding
of the Society for Psychical Research. This society principally
investigates (1) hypnotism, disorders of personality, automatic writing,
and crystal-gazing, which are universally recognised by psychologists as
furnishing fields for scientific study; and (2) thought-transference and
its manifestations, which are not, however, at present generally
accepted as facts.
Though but recently crept forth, _vix aut ne vix quidem_, from
the chill shade of scientific disdain, Anthropology adopts the
airs of her elder sisters among the sciences, and is as severe
as they to the Cinderella of the family, Psychical Research. She
must murmur of her fairies among the cinders of the hearth,
while they go forth to the ball, and dance with provincial
mayors at the festivities of the British Association.[59]
Footnote 59:
A. Lang, _Making of Religion_, p. 43.
The hypnotic and kindred practices of the lower races have until lately
scarcely attracted the attention of anthropologists. Bastian in 1890
wrote a tract, _Ueber psychische Beobachtungen bei Naturvölkern_, and
Tylor has also touched on the subject in _Primitive Culture_; but its
main advocate is Andrew Lang, who declares: “Anthropology must remain
incomplete while it neglects this field, whether among wild or civilised
men,” and “In the course of time this will come to be acknowledged.”
[Sidenote: =Methods and Aims.=]
If we turn now from popular to scientific notions of psychology, we
discern the following methods and aims of the science. There are two
methods—(1) the introspective, by which one’s own mental states are
observed; and (2) the objective, by which the conduct of others is
observed: both may be studied without or under experimental conditions.
It is very difficult to secure reliable introspection in backward
peoples, and also to interpret the mental state of an individual by
observing his behaviour.
The objects of psychology are five-fold:—
1. The study of mind compared with non-mental processes.
2. The study of the mind of the individual compared with other minds.
3. The study of the normal mind of the individual compared with the
abnormal.
4. The study of the mind of one race compared with that of other races.
5. The study of the mind of genus Homo compared with that of animals.
All these are of interest and value for Anthropology, especially the
second, fourth, and fifth.
In the earlier days of psychology, when the subject was in the
leading-strings of philosophy, it had little ethnological value. Indeed,
the possibility of such a subject as ethnological psychology was not
realised.
[Sidenote: =Ethnical Psychology.=]
Ethnical psychology, the study of the mind of other races and peoples,
of which, among the more backward races, glimpses can be obtained only
by living among them and endeavouring to reach their point of view by
means of observation and experiment, is a modern conception; and for
this branch of the subject there is no history.
As an illustration of the change of attitude with regard to ethnical
psychology during the last fifty years, we may quote from Burmeister[60]
in 1853: “It is not worth while to look into the soul of the negro. It
is a judgment of God which is being executed that, at the approach of
civilisation, the savage man must perish”; and again,[61] in 1857: “I
have often tried to obtain an insight into the mind of the negro, but it
was never worth the trouble.” Compare with this such works as R. E.
Dennett’s _At the Back of the Black Man’s Mind_, 1906. In justification
of his attempt to represent the basal ideas of the West African native,
Dennett says: “I cannot help feeling that one who has lived so long
among the Africans, and who has acquired a kind of way of thinking
black, should be listened to on the off-chance that a secondary
instinct, developed by long contact with the people he is writing about,
may have driven him to a right, or very nearly right, conclusion” (pp.
133-4). And as the keynote of his elaborate investigation, which results
in “crediting the Africans with thoughts, concerning their religious and
political system, comparable to any that may have been handed down” to
ourselves by our own ancestors, he quotes from Flora L. Shaw[62]: “It
may happen that we shall have to revise entirely our view of the black
races, and regard those who now exist as the decadent representatives of
an almost forgotten era, rather than as the embryonic possibility of an
era yet to come.”
Footnote 60:
_Der Schwarze Mensch._
Footnote 61:
_Reise nach Brasilien._
Footnote 62:
Flora L. Shaw (Lady Lugard), _A Tropical Dependency_, p. 17.
The earliest recognition of the anthropological aspect of psychology is
found in Germany, where Bastian was always insisting on the essential
connection between psychology and ethnology; and, although his own
literary method was peculiarly obscure, he did a very great deal, both
by his writings and personal influence, to stimulate the study of
psychology from the point of view of ethnology.
[Illustration:
P. W. A. BASTIAN.
]
[Sidenote: =Bastian.=]
[Sidenote: =Folk Psychology.=]
Adolf Bastian (1826-1905), after passing through five
universities—Heidelberg, Berlin, Jena, Wurzburg, and Prague—began his
life of travel in 1851 as a ship’s doctor. The next twenty-five years
were mainly spent in voyages of research in all parts of the world, and
always with one object in view—the collection of materials for a
comparative psychology, on the principles of a natural science. His
first journey, which occupied eight years, resulted in the publication
in 1860 of the first of a long series of writings. When not engaged in
travel, his life was filled with his work in connection with the Berlin
Museums. Great though these services were, Bastian’s main interest was
always concentrated on psychology. The ideas of folk psychology were in
the air, and the study of _Welt-Anschauung_, or, to use Bastian’s
phrase, _Völker-Gedanken_, was already inaugurated in Germany. To
organise this study by introducing wide scientific, inductive, and
comparative methods, and to collect evidence from among all the peoples
of the earth, was Bastian’s life-work, in which he was still engaged
when death overtook him at Trinidad in 1905. Among the conceptions of
the _Natur-Völker_—the “cryptograms of mankind,” as he called them—he
worked unceasingly, demonstrating first the surprising uniformity of
outlook on the part of the more primitive peoples, and secondly the
correlation of differences of conceptions with differences in material
surroundings, varying with geographical conditions. This second doctrine
he elaborated in his _Zur Lehre von den Geographischen Provinzen_, in
1886.
The term “psychology of peoples” has become familiar of late, and books
have been written on the psychology of special peoples, such as the
_Esquisse psychologique des Peuples Européens_ (1903), by A. Fouillée;
but these are based on general considerations, and not on experimental
evidence.
The place of Comparative Psychology in Anthropology was officially
determined in this country by the request which the Anthropological
Institute made to Herbert Spencer in 1875, to map out the Comparative
Psychology of Man, with a view to providing some sort of method in
handling the various questions that came before the Institute. The
result of this was Spencer’s provisional Scheme of Character, in which
the problem of measurement took an important place.
[Sidenote: =Experimental Psychology.=]
In the department of experimental psychology Germany again took the
lead. G. T. Fechner[63] attempted by means of laboratory tests to
discover the law of connection between psychical and bodily events. A
band of workers arose, and the new science spread to other countries. In
our country Sir Francis Galton took advantage of the International
Health Exhibition at London, 1884, to install in the exhibition an
anthropometric laboratory, in which a few psychological experiments were
made on a large number of people, and since then he has frequently made
arrangements for similar laboratories.
Footnote 63:
_Elemente der Psychophysik_, 1860.
In nearly all of the larger universities Experimental Psychology is a
recognised study, and almost every variety of mental condition is
investigated. Professor W. Wundt, in his _Völkerpsychologie_ (1904), has
been a master-builder on these foundations.
The experiments in psychological laboratories were of necessity confined
to subjects readily accessible, who naturally were mainly Europeans or
of European descent. A few observations had been made on aliens who, as
a rule, had been brought from their native countries for show purposes;
but in these cases the observations were made under unfavourable
conditions so far as the subject was concerned. With the exception of
these very few and unsatisfactory investigations, experimental
psychology was mainly concerned with the subjects numbered 2, 3, and 5
in the table on p. 81.
A new departure was made in 1898 by the Cambridge Anthropological
Expedition to Torres Straits. For the first time trained experimental
psychologists (Drs. W. H. R. Rivers, W. McDougall, and C. S. Myers)
investigated by means of an adequate laboratory equipment a people in a
low stage of culture under their ordinary conditions of life. The
foundations of ethnical experimental psychology were thus laid.
Professor R. W. Woodworth sums up the conclusions arrived at from his
own observations and those of others as follows: “We are probably
justified in inferring that the sensory and motor processes and the
elementary brain activities, though differing in degree from one
individual to another, are about the same from one race to another.”[64]
Footnote 64:
_Science_, xxxi., 1910, p. 179.
Lately an attempt has been made, under the auspices of the Royal
Anthropological Institute, to provide travellers with instructions for
psychological investigations in the field.
[Sidenote: =Eugenics.=]
During the last few years the subject of race improvement, or Eugenics,
has been greatly to the fore, and it has been in this country mainly
connected with the name of Sir Francis Galton, who as long ago as 1865
published his views on the subject. Eugenics is officially defined in
the Minutes of the University of London as “the study of agencies under
social control that may improve or impair the racial qualities of future
generations, either physically or mentally.” A eugenics laboratory has
recently been established in University College, London, in connection
with Professor Karl Pearson’s biometric laboratory.
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