Functional psychology

Functional psychology studies mental processes and behavior by asking how they help organisms adapt to their environments. It emphasizes what psychological activities do rather than only how they are structured.

William James: An American philosopher and psychologist whose writings helped establish psychology as a distinct discipline. His account of consciousness and habit supplied functional psychology with foundational ideas.
Consciousness: The state of being aware of experience, surroundings, or oneself. Functional psychology asks what conscious experience enables organisms to do.
Structural psychology: An approach that analyzes conscious experience into basic elements and their combinations. Functional psychology asks what mental activities accomplish, not chiefly which elements compose them.
Applied psychology: The use of psychological knowledge and methods to address practical problems. Functionalists' focus on what mental processes do encouraged psychology's practical applications.
John Dewey: An American philosopher and educator associated with pragmatism, educational reform, and functional psychology. His 1896 reflex-arc paper challenged analyses that separated stimulus, response, and sensation.
Habit: A learned tendency to perform a response automatically in familiar circumstances. James treated habits as efficient adaptations that reduce effort and stabilize behavior.
Behaviorism: A psychological approach that makes observable behavior central to scientific study. Behaviorists rejected much functionalist reliance on consciousness and introspective reports.
Educational psychology: The study of how people learn and how teaching can support learning. Functionalist interest in development and adaptation helped connect psychology with educational practice.
James Rowland Angell: An American psychologist who helped define and institutionalize functional psychology at the University of Chicago. His 1907 address set out a program for studying mental operations and their adaptive functions.
Reflex arc: A neural pathway linking sensory input to a bodily response, often through the spinal cord. Dewey argued that stimulus and response form a coordinated activity rather than isolated stages.

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