Abstract
George Herbert Mead’s social psychology went off in two different directions; one explained the social world in terms of language, the other in terms of (individual) biology. This paper addresses the latter approach, in Mead’s early social psychology in terms of instincts and in his later social psychology in terms of fundamental impulses. The approach derives from William McDougall’s An Introduction to Social Psychology in 1908 and changed in response to criticism of instincts following World War I by John Dewey, Ellsworth Faris, Floyd Allport, and Luther Bernard, among others. The paper argues that such an approach was a dead end and had to be rejected to allow for a scientific social psychology.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Allport, F. H. (1919). Behavior and experiment in social psychology. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 14, 297–306.
Allport, F. H. (1924). Social psychology. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Bernard, L. L. (1924). Instinct: A study in social psychology. New York: Holt.
Bernard, L. L. (1926). An introduction to social psychology. New York: H. Holt.
Cravens, H. (1978). The triumph of evolution: American scientists and the heredity-environment controversy, 1900–1941. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Dewey, J. (1894). The study of ethics: A syllabus. In The early works, 1882–1898 (Vol. 4, pp. 219–362). Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press.
Dewey, J. (1922). Human nature and conduct: An introduction to social psychology. New York: Holt.
Faris, E. (1921/1937). Are instincts data or hypotheses? In The nature of human nature and other essays in social psychology (pp. 61–72). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Faris, E. (1925/1937). The subjective aspect of culture. In The nature of human nature and other essays in social psychology (pp. 21–35). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Faris, E. (1926/1937). The nature of human nature. In The nature of human nature and other essays in social psychology (pp. 7–21). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Faris, E. (1936/1937). Of psychological elements. In The nature of human nature and other essays in social psychology (pp. 173–189). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Feyerabend, P. (1978). Against method: Outline of an anarchistic theory of knowledge. London: Verso.
Krantz, D. L., & Allan, D. (1967). The rise and fall of the instinct doctrine. Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences, 3, 326–338.
Kuhn, T. S. (1963). The structure of scientific revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
McDougall, W. (1908). An introduction to social psychology. London: Metheun.
McDougall, W. (1921–1922). The use and abuse of instincts. Journal of Abnormal Psychology and Social Psychology, 16, 285–333.
McDougall, W. (1923). An outline of psychology. London: Metheun.
McDougall, W. (1924). Can sociology and social psychology dispense with instincts? American Journal of Sociology, 29, 657–673.
Mead, G. H. (1908). McDougall’s social psychology. Psychological Bulletin, 5, 385–391.
Mead, G. H. (1909). Social psychology as counterpart to physiological psychology. Psychological Bulletin, 6, 401–408.
Mead, G. H. (1910). What social objects must psychology presuppose? Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, 7, 174–180.
Mead, G. H. (1912). The mechanism of social consciousness. Journal of Philosohy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, 9, 401–406.
Mead, G. H. (1922). A behavioristic account of the significant symbol. Journal of Philosophy, 19, 157–163.
Mead, G. H. (1925). The genesis of the self and social control. International Journal of Ethics, 35, 251–277.
Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, self & society (C. W. Morris, Ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Mead, G. H. (1982a). 1914 class lectures in social psychology. In D. L. Miller (Ed.), The individual and the social self: Unpublished work of George Herbert Mead (pp. 27–105). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Mead, G. H. (1982b). 1927 class lectures in social psychology. In D. L. Miller (Ed.), The individual and the social self: Unpublished work of George Herbert Mead (pp. 106–175). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Parkovnick, S. (2011). John Dewey and the history of social psychology. Paper presented at the Joint Confrence of the History of the Neurosciences and Cheiron, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, June 16–19, 2011.
Parkovnick, S. (2015). The behaviorism of George Herbert Mead. The American Sociologist, doi:10.1007/s12108-015-9256-y.
Weber, M. (1904/1930). The Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism (T. Parsons,Trans.). New York: Scribner.
