American Social Psychology

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AMERICAN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
Its Origins, Development, and European Background

BY

FAY BERGER KARPF, PH.D.
Lecturer in the Theory and Methods of Social Investigation and Director ofthe Department of Social Research, TheGraduate School for Jewish Social Work

WITH A FOREWORD BY

ELLSWORTH FARIS, PH.D.
Professor and Chairman of the Department of Sociology, The University of Chicago

FIRST EDITION

McGRAW-HILL BOOK COMPANY, ING.
NEW YOEK AND LONDON 1932

COPYRIGHT, 1932, BY THE MCGRAW-HILL BOOK COMPANY, INC.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission of the publishers.

THE MAPLE PRESS COMPANY, YORK, PA.

To M. J. K.
WITHOUT WHOSE DAY-BY-DAY STIMULATION, COUNSEL, AND HELP THIS BOOK COULD NOT HAVE BEEN WRITTEN

PREFACE
This work had its origin in the attempt to outline the development of social-psychological thought in this country. But since this subject could not be presented significantly in isolation, the work has gradually assumed its present proportions. The study was begun in 1921 when the need for some such survey stood out glaringly, and it was completed in its original form in 1925. Since that time, the appearance of several shorter surveys, especially the chapter by Kimball Young in The History and Prospects of the Social Sciences, edited by Harry Elmer Barnes, has indicated the importance of the material and encouraged its revision and elaboration to its present form. The treatment, except for some necessary background, has been confined to the development of social psychology as social psychology. Hence no attempt has been made to extend the background survey beyond the nineteenth century crystallizations of social-psychological thought. Also, the treatment has throughout been determined by the original interest in illuminating American social-psychological thought. This consideration explains many details of emphasis and procedure which might otherwise come into question. The method of presentation decided upon as being best adapted to the accurate handling of the task in hand, in view of the very important role which personalities still play in the social-psychological movement, is a modified form of biographical exposition organized broadly, as a matter of convenience and in order to be able to reflect the development of American social psychology upon the background of European thought, along relevant national lines. This method has certain obvious advantages in providing natural classifications, which to the author seemed determining in the present state of social-psychological development. However, it also has, as would any other method, some definite limitations. There are thus certain other possible approaches to the consideration of social psychology and especially of social psychologists. Professor Faris has undertaken to suggest in the Foreword how some of them might be followed out with profit in filling out the picture here unfolded. No claim is made for exhaustiveness of treatment in any part of this survey and certainly not in the European background. The treatment has necessarily been selective. Others might have varied the emphasis

viii

PREFACE

and selection of material to be dealt with somewhat, but not materially, since the limitations of space to a single volume have made it possible to deal only with the high spots of recognized lines of influence. Something remains to be said about the form of presentation adopted in this survey. For obvious reasons, it seemed highly desirable to present the crucial points in an author's position as far as possible in his own words. The superiority of this manner of presenting such material cannot be questioned and the method has been adhered to, in some instances even at the expense of smoothness and conciseness of exposition, especially in Part II of the survey. In Part I, it was naturally less feasible to follow out this manner of presentation consistently, but even there it was adhered to at especially important points. The preparation of a work like this obviously places one under a manysided obligation to authors, publishers, and others intimately connected with the work. Specific acknowledgments of indebtedness, especially in the first two connections, must necessarily be taken care of in the footnote and bibliographic references. But the author finds it necessary to make the following further acknowledgments: First and foremost, the author is under obligation to the late Dean Albion W. Small and Professors Faris, Park, and Burgess of the University of Chicago, all of whom have at one time or another offered valuable suggestions in respect to the preparation of the manuscript. Professor Faris, in particular, has been intimately in contact with the work from the beginning. Not only was the work in the first instance carried out under his guidance, but he has maintained an unfailing interest in the material ever since. In addition, he has read the entire manuscript on two different occasions. In the course of his contact with every phase of the work, he has made many invaluable suggestions which have in one way or another been adopted. The author welcomes this opportunity to acknowledge the important part which he has had in the planning of the work. Professor Reuter of the University of Iowa, editor of the series in which the work appears, has likewise read the manuscript twice and he, too, has made invaluable suggestions which have been incorporated in the completed work. The author is particularly under obligation to him for his critical evaluation of parts of the material and for his expert editorial advice and assistance in the final preparation of the manuscript for publication. Professor Louis Wirth of the University of Chicago has been very helpful in respect to the section dealing with German social-psychological thought. He not only directed the author's attention from time to time to important source materials, but he also read the entire section in proof. While he did not completely agree with certain points of evalua-

PREFACE

ix

tion relevant to this section, his comments and especially references to the pertinent literature were extremely valuable. Professor Moses J. Aronson, formerly of The Sorbonne and now of The College of the City of New York, has been similarly helpful in respect to the section dealing with French social-psychological thought. Not only did he read the entire section in proof but his comments regarding various details of treatment proved to be exceptionally helpful and encouraging. The following graduate students of the Department of Sociology at the University of Chicago assisted in the collection of the original materials of this study during the early stages of the work: W. P. Meroney, Celian Ufford, Evalyn Cohn, Clifford Manschardt, Alison R. Bryan, William S. Hockman, Percy E. Lindley, Belle T. Pardue, Ada Davis, Frances Watson, Regena Beckmire. Grateful acknowledgment of their assistance is hereby made. The author also wishes to acknowledge gratefully the help of Dr. Ruth Shonle Cavan of Rockford, Illinois, in assisting in the early set-up of the material and in later taking over the task of preparing the Index. Appreciative acknowledgment is also made of the assistance of Mr. George M. Wolfe, Research Assistant at The Graduate School for Jewish Social Work, who has read the entire page proof and assisted in the preparation of the bibliography. Mr. Jacob B. Lightman and Miss Ettarae Serlin, Research and Assistant Librarians at the latter institution, have likewise been helpful in the preparation and checking of the bibliography. The author further wishes to acknowledge the courtesy of authors and publishers who have generously permitted the inclusion of quotations from their works. Acknowledgment of this is made specifically in connection with the quotations used, but the author feels this further acknowledgment is justified by the whole-hearted response of the publishers and authors involved. Most of all the author is under obligation to Dr. M. J. Karpf for his invaluable aid in every phase of the work. No merely formal statement of indebtedness can possibly do justice to his contribution to the formulation, planning, and execution of the work. F. B. K.
NEW YORK, N. Y.,

March, 1932.

CONTENTS
PAGE

PREFACE FOREWORD BY ELLSWORTH FARIS INTRODUCTION

vii xiii 1

PART I EUROPEAN BACKGROUND
CHAPTER I
NINETEENTH CENTURY PHILOSOPHICAL BACKGROUND 7

I. G. W. F. Hegel II. Auguste Comte III. Herbert Spencer CHAPTER II
THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL-PSYCHOLOGICAL THOUGHT IN GERMANY

7 14 26
41

I. Introductory Statement 41 II. The Study of Culture History as an Approach to Social Psychology: Folk Psychology 42 1. Moritz Lazarus and Hermann Steinthal 42 2. Wilhelm Wundt 51 III. Social-psychological Aspects of German Sociology 66 1. Albert Schaffle 67 2. Ludwig Gumplowicz and Gustav Ratzenhofer 71 3. Georg Simmel and More Recent Developments 75 CHAPTER III
THE DHVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL-PSYCHOLOGICAL THOUGHT IN FRANCE 89

I. Introductory Statement II. The Study of Imitation as an Approach to Social Psychology: Interpsychology 1. Garbriel Tarde III. The Study of "Collective Representations" as an Approach to Social Psychology: Collective Psychology 1. Emile Durkheim 2. Lucien Le>y-Bruhl IV. The Study of Crowd Behavior as an Approach to Social Psychology: Crowd Psychology 1. Gustave Le Bon CHAPTER IV
THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL-PSYCHOLOGICAL THOUGHT IN ENGLAND

89 93 93 108 108 123 134 134

145

I. Introductory Statement xi

145

xii
II. The 1. 2. 3.

CONTENTS
PAGB

Background of English Evolutionary Doctrine Charles Darwin and Herbert Spencer Walter Bagehot English Evolutionary Anthropology

147 147 158 165

III. The Study of the Instinctive Basis of Social Behavior as an Approach to Social Psychology: Instinct Psychology 173 1. William McDougall 176 2. Wilfred Trotter, Graham Wallas, Leonard T. Hobhouse . . . . 196

PART II THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL-PSYCHOLOGICAL THOUGHT IN THE UNITED STATES
CHAPTER V
BACKGROUND AND BEGINNINGS 211

I. Introductory Statement 211 II. Lester F. Ward and Other Early American Sociological Influences . . 216 III. William James and Other Early American Psychological Influences. . 247 CHAPTER VI
SOCIAL-PSYCHOLOGICAL THOUGHT AS AN EXTENSION OP PSYCHOLOGICAL AND SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 269

I. James M. Baldwin
II. CHARLES H. COOLEY

269
291

CHAPTER VII
THE EMERGENCE OP A DIFFERENTIATED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY 308

I. II. III. IV.

Edward A. Ross 308 George H. Mead 318 John Dewey 327 William I. Thomas, Ellsworth Faris, and Others Associated with Their Social-psychological Viewpoints 351 CHAPTER VIII

THE EMERGENCE OF A DIFFERENTIATED SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY (CONTINUED)— ATTEMPTS AT SYSTEMATIC TREATMENT 385

I. Charles A. Ellwood II. Emory S. Bogardus III. Other Recent Attempts at Systematic Treatment 1. Floyd H. AUport 2. L. L. Bernard 3. Kimball Young and Others CHAPTER IX
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEX

385 394 400 400 407 413

416 431 449

FOREWORD Social psychology is a vital and important subject of present-day discussion and investigation throughout the world, perhaps particularly in America. Attempts to designate it by special terms and to give it systematic formulation began only a little over twenty years ago, but since that time systematic treatments of it in books are found by the dozen. Other books dealing with various aspects of the field, although not necessarily bearing the title, are numbered by the hundred, while articles and special researches of a briefer character carried in the learned journals of the world are to be counted literally by the thousand. Nor is there any sign of a decrease in interest. On the contrary, more men are working in the field now than ever before. The present work of Dr. Karpf, which attempts to give the history of American social psychology, with its European background, is thus, in the highest degree, timely. The interest in social psychology has not been confined to any one section of social science. On the contrary, workers in sociology, psychology, economics, and political science, historians, psychiatrists, and even literary men have all written important and significant books which must be classified as directly bearing on this field. The attempt to understand social psychology is obviously greater every year, and the student who tries to avail himself of the heritage is confronted with a laborious and confusing body of reading which soon makes him aware of the need of some guiding clew. It is clear then that a historical guide like the present work ought to serve a very useful purpose, besides being of general interest to the intellectual reader. Social psychology has already accumulated a body of traditions, problems, explanations, and systems which form a broad stream whose tributaries can be traced far back in time and space. The sources offer great variety. To trace them back to a single origin is, of course, impossible, for there is not one but many. Moreover, as the stream flows on, some channels have been cut out at an angle and by a divergent path have been flowing on until they have become lost in the desiccations of the desert sand. There are other muddy currents which have refused to mingle with the main stream, being particularly resistant to the assimilating influence of the rest. There are, of course, many ways of describing all this. The author has chosen a sort of modified biographical treatment inherited from the tradition of histories of philosophy, and by copious quotation and sym-

xiv

FOREWORD

pathetic condensation has set for herself the task of giving the reader the teachings of the various authors on the questions that interested them most. French, German, and English writers pass in review before the reader, for all these have left a tradition without which the views of the Americans could not be understood. Until the latter part of the work is reached the treatment of the Americans is roughly chronological, so that the development can be seen and the influences traced. A history of American social psychology might be written in one of two or three ways. It would hardly be possible to write it in all three of these ways. The choice of the plan must obviously be left to the author. If, therefore, the reader finds certain gaps in it, that must be set down to the necessities of literary choice. Moreover, with the clews here supplied these gaps can be filled in by sufficiently vigorous effort and sufficiently wide acquaintance with the literature. In the first place, the student would like to know more about the place of a given author in his social and cultural setting. The answer to this demand would tend to add to the question of what the author teaches and what he advocates the more difficult question of why he taught and advocated those doctrines. Obviously here anyone who tries to answer is treading on slippery ground. Just why the ardent and valiant defenders of instincts should be also in the main conservative in their philosophical, social, and political views, many of them being avowedly vocal opponents of democracy; just why the vigorous advocates of behaviorism should adopt a violently radical attitude toward religion and conventional morals with which the doctrine of behaviorism strictly defined has no more connection than it has with the politics of Mars; just why one author or one group of authors should hold that fundamental in human life is a desire for exciting and thrilling experiences, while others, perhaps because their work is more interesting, find no truth in the doctrine; why one author's work breathes sympathy with the oppressed classes, furnishes texts for economic radicals, while another's becomes a vade mecum for defenders of the status quo—all these questions are very difficult but not without their central importance. To answer them would require a vigorous and persistent campaign in attempting to unearth the personal and biographical details of each man's life, and the result would be an interpretation so difficult to make objective that the success of such an effort would always be problematical. Nevertheless the question is not out of order. We know already too much about the relation of thought and reflection to action and ambition to fail to realize that we must eventually psychologize the psychologist if we are to understand his psychology. There is another and easier and less invidious aspect of the history of social psychology which it would be interesting to know. Each author is not merely the deliverer of a message; he is the exponent of a culture

FOREWORD

XV

or, in our day, of some aspect of the culture of his people. For mind is not merely individual mind, nor is it merely social mind; it is, as we have been taught by Cooley, an organic whole; the individual and society are twin born. Each writer, therefore, not only writes about the group. He is also a part of a group. His ideas are generated in his group. The social forces that made and are still making social psychology are not inaccessible, and the trends of thought and sentiment if set alongside the expositions here would add much to that which we should like to know about the development of the science. Perhaps the author will be granted the leisure and have the impulse to make this account clear in a subsequent volume. It is to be hoped that she will; and if she does, she will put us all the more in her debt. The instinct doctrine of social psychology, now rapidly dying out, did not come into existence full armed, nor do we account for it adequately when we give the arguments and statements of any particular author who is an advocate of that definite system. It is only in perspective, perhaps, that we can see how the various antecedent formulations were found increasingly difficult and how gradually this particular scheme came to be more advantageous. Moreover, when the doctrine began to lose its ascendency, it would be interesting and highly profitable to know what were the various influences, forces, and weaknesses which finally brought about the transition to something which seems to be more satisfactory. The presentation of separate authors with their separate views, while interesting and quite necessary, does not give the connection between and relation to the various points of view out of which the doctrine grew or into which it merged or which it stirred up. And there are many of these which it would be best fitting to have set forth in such a manner. The extreme reflex doctrine, starting in Russia and somewhat independently in America with the study of animals and influenced by many other forces, conspicuous among them the conflicts among the orthodox psychologies regarding the presence of imageless thought, and the firm hold that the doctrine of elements had, even for those who had rejected the instincts and which caused them to substitute a set of definite reflexes instead—all of this would be illustrative of the point that is here made. A similar tracing of the doctrine of wishes or of the neglect of physiology by the psychoanalysts or of the rejection of mental elements by the Gestaltians on the one hand and by men like John Dewey on the other, with, in each case, quite different motives and quite different outcomes— all these and other questions like them would add greatly to the interest of the story of the development of social psychology. For we are all social psychologists enough now to know that while it is not easy to get rid of our prejudices and predilections, it is possible sometimes to know what they are, to know that we have them, to know what our friends' prejudices are, and to make allowances for both theirs

xvi

FOREWORD

and ours. The compulsive nature of social or collective thought is a factor of which we can always take account for the correcting of our data. For we are all children of our time, the scholar not least of all. Indeed, it might be contended that the scholar is most of all a child of his time. Perhaps he is the very voice of his time speaking for his group. It is the time become articulate in a single point. This, task of relating the author to his time and to his group inside the time is not so great as it might seem, for there are not so many kinds of system as there are men who write about them. There are far more books than there are classes of books, and the scholars and authors may be grouped and classified. Moreover, the groups and classes can be related to each other. Social psychology as a definite discipline known by distinctive terms is relatively young, but it is old enough already to have many "schools." We have our partisans, our sectarian champions, our orthodoxies, and our heresies. The ancient Romans used to find amusement in making their captives fight real battles, and the crowd enjoyed it most when the slaughter was most fierce. And even in this little arena the student can witness wars of words, the annihilating phrases, and the savage battle cries which show how human scholars are. Here the alliances are across jurisdictional boundaries, and behaviorism, instinctivism, Gestaltism, and the rest seek their allies in any camp. What these schools are, what their claims are, and what shibboleths are required to membership within the company are matters not hard to learn, but their real significance requires most careful interpretation and insight. When a science is sufficiently mature and advanced to have a clear conception of its problems and is able to organize its forces so as to attract them effectively, there are no schools. Schools of psychology are the growing pains of the science. Leaders of the schools perform the same function as fanatics in any sphere. The fanatic in religious or political or social life is one who calls attention to a neglected truth or duty by a strident exaggeration of its importance. They not only tend to become extremists, but they are also in danger of losing their scientific temper, since the search for truth is suspended by the necessity for fighting. Warfare, however, whether of attack or of defense, furnishes a pleasant excitement, an increase in loyalty, often also satisfying a certain welcome notoriety, no less satisfying for being short-lived. For the partisan leader of a school of thought there is little hope. He usually digs into a "well-prepared position in the rear" from which security he defends himself according to his resources. But the friends of science need not be disturbed. Indeed a truly scientific mind, surely a truly scientific psychological mind, cannot allow itself to be disturbed. The extremists, like the Pharisees in the Testament, have received their reward. Fortunately life is short, and neither they nor their work shall endure.

FOREWORD

xvii

The future is with the young who, listening to the confusing voices, will not be able or willing to continue the one-sided emphases. They will see the few grains in the heap of chaff and salvage what they can. Even the disciples and students of a pundit have been known to question his claims of infallibility in his own lifetime. Social psychology is not only new, vigorous, rapidly growing, and greatly confused; it is also vitally important. The answers to the questions that it asks are urgently needed. The unity of our culture is broken; the confusion of tradition is by now proverbial; we are becoming aware of human nature, but we do not understand what it is. The training of children, the discipline called education, the problem of inefficiency, the control of vice, crime, poverty, and war—these problems are present in a new and dreadful form. How does our human nature come to be? Is it unchangeable, and if it can be altered, how? Whence come our motives, our ambitions, and how may these be best conceived and best directed? We have discovered a new world, but we have not explored it yet, and our peace and success demand that we know it well. Social psychology is a name we give to this task. Dr. Karpf's book tells what men have declared when they came back from spying out the land. Although this book was not written as a college textbook, like any thoroughly comprehensive and scholarly work in the field it will admirably serve such a purpose. Nowhere is there available any comparable survey of the contributions of modern scholarship in this field. In addition to such a use, the work will certainly find an eager audience in students of social science, particularly those interested in economics and politics who wish to understand what is going on in this field and what characterizes the leaders of thought today. Here the critical comment and comparison throw the views into sharp relief, and the historical perspective of the various authors as treated by Dr. Karpf gives meaning and significance to what might otherwise seem unrelated and isolated. The general reader who is interested in modern thought will particularly appreciate the way in which the various trends are traced out and finally brought together in the concluding chapters. The author has brought to her task an exceptionally adequate training, a high and unwavering enthusiasm, and a thoroughness of competent scholarship which will be appreciated by all who will have the privilege of reading her work.
ELLSWORTH FARIS.
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO,

March, 1932.

AMERICAN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
INTRODUCTION Like most of the modern sciences of human behavior and social life, social psychology may be thought of as being both a very old and a very new field of endeavor. It may on the one hand be viewed as a very old subject with a history extending back into remotest antiquity, or at any rate into the earliest period of systematic philosophical inquiry, and on the other hand, as is more frequently the case, it may be looked upon as one of the most recent and least qualified claimants to recognition among the sisterhood of the modern sciences. There is evidently ground for both of these views. For certainly man has always concerned himself, in one way or another, with the field of inquiry with which modern social psychology seeks to deal systematically and scientifically. The practical wisdom regarding human nature and social life which custom, legend, precept, and maxim have stored down the ages of human history and the reflective theorizing about these matters which the centuries of philosophical thought record are eloquent testimony of this fact. But certainly, again, social psychology viewed as a specialized field of scientific endeavor corresponding to the other modern psychological and social sciences is a very new development and it has as yet little to commend it that is comparable to that which the better established sciences have to offer. The very conception of social psychology as a distinctfieldof scientific investigation is comparatively recent as scientific development goes. In fact, it hardly extends back beyond the middle of the nineteenth century. It is, however, only with the development of social psychology in this more specialized sense that this survey is to be concerned and, more specifically, only with those aspects of the movement which have had a more or less direct bearing on the development of social psychology in this country. It is necessary to bear this limitation of treatment in mind from the outset.1 As stated above, the very conception of social psychology as a distinct field of scientific investigation is a comparatively recent developSurveys of earlier thought which have an historical interest for the social psychologist are available in the histories of both psychology and social thought. Consult, for instance, RAND, The Classical Psychologists; BBETT, A History of Psychology, vols. I, II; BOGABDUS, A History of Social Thought, Chaps. I-X; LICHTENBERGER, The Development of Social Theory, Chaps. I-IX; SOBOKIN, Contemporary Sociological Theories, introductory sections. 1
1

2

AMERICAN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

ment. And naturally enough, too. For this conception had to await not only the emergence of modern naturalistic and scientific thought generally as applied to the study of human behavior but also the modern sociological movement. For centuries, as we know, the study of mental and social life remained subordinated to other than scientific interests—metaphysical, political, religious, ethical. Such was the nature of theory concerning the subject matter of social psychology in the Greek period and throughout the middle ages. During all this time there was, of course, mental and social philosophy, but no social psychology in the sense of modern thought. And even after the study of mental and social life began to take form as distinct fields of scientific investigation within the modern scientific era, the need for a social psychology still remained obscured for a long time, by the development of psychology and psychological thought generally along introspective and decidedly individualistic lines.1 It was only as positivism and modern comparative and evolutionary thought, as reflected upon the background of nineteenth century democratic tendencies, were preparing the setting for the modern sociological movement that the need for a social psychology began to make itself felt. As the sociological point of view gained ground, it gradually became increasingly apparent that the conventional individualistic interpretation of human behavior was inadequate and even wholly unadapted for the explanation of the socially most significant aspects of human nature. The resulting intellectual unrest and widespread groping after more adequate conceptions and methods in the investigation of human nature and social life are well-known background in the development of modern psycho-social science. This situation, in its general aspects, is to be associated with the early stages of the modern social-psychological movement as well as with related nineteenth century scientific developments. But more specifically, it was not until, with the progress of events, modern psychology set about to ally itself definitely with physiology and to take over the point of view and experimental technique of biological science as defined in distinctly individualistic terms, and sociology likewise began to define its interest in terms of the study of objective social organization, that the essential setting for the modern social-psychological movement was completed. With this turn of events, however, social psychology, as we are to be concerned with it here, began definitely to emerge alongside of general psychology on the one hand and general sociology on the other.2 Because of the background of individualistic thought upon which it began to take form, modern social-psychological thought got its first
See BRETT, A History of Psychology, vols. I, II. * See ibid., vol. II, pp. 366-360, vol. Ill, pp. 286-296; BALDWIN, History of Psychology, vol. II, pp. 126jf.;also MCDOUGALL, An Introduction to Social Psychology, Chap. I.
1

INTRODUCTION

3

impulse from the side of the study of social life. In fact, the modern social-psychological movement was at first, quite naturally, but a particular aspect of the larger sociological movement, with which it was on common ground in its protest against psychological individualism. The development of social psychology, as we shall see, is thus intimately bound up during the early period with the development of sociology itself, though social-psychological thought has spread out from the first from both psychological and sociological sources. It was natural that in the general groping for a more adequate approach to the study of the social aspects of human behavior, sociology should attempt to extend its scope from the study of the objective side of social organization, which was its chief concern in the first instance, to the study of the personal side, with which, it began increasingly to appear, social organization in its deeper human meaning is so intimately related. On the other hand, it was to be expected also that psychology itself, once recognizing the inadequacy of its purely individualistic approach for the study of the more complex aspects of mental life, should attempt to extend and modify its point of view and methods in accordance with the new insight. Accordingly, modern social psychology is found developing from both of these directions and, in addition, closely connected with such other related fields of thought as social anthropology, evolutionary biology, and culture history. So far, social psychology has continued to remain, from the nature of its historical problems and its theoretical background, most intimately bound up with sociology, to the extent even of having fairly shifted the weight of emphasis in the latter science to the consideration of its own problems.1 But this fact has not interfered with its natural association all along also with psychology and, especially during its early history, also with certain aspects of anthropology and folk psychology, which, as will appear in the early part of this survey, has in some instances amounted to the practical identification of social psychology with portions of these relatedfieldsof endeavor. This interlinking of social psychology with related fields of scientific investigation, together with the intensely nationalistic character of nineteenth century thought generally and of psycho-social thought in particular,2 has been favorable for the more or less particularistic cultivation of distinct angles of approach in the field and for the crystallization of those differentiated tendencies of social-psychological development, which today define the field of social psychology. So far, too, these several directions of social-psychological development have remained largely uncoordinated from the social-psychological standpoint. We
For an early statement on this point, see Ellwood, Proc. Intern. Congress Arts Sci., vol. 5, p. 859, 1904. * See MBRZ, History of European Thought in the Nineteenth Century, vol. IV, pp. 429-430, 447-448.
1

4

AMERICAN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

find, therefore, that each of them has been held up, and in fact continues to be held up, as the social psychology, more or less without regard or relation to the other claimants for this designation. This situation, as may be readily imagined, is frequently confusing, especially to the interested general reader in the field and the beginning student, who, when confronted with the several current treatises, each of them purporting to deal with the subject of social psychology without modification, are frequently at a loss to make out the connections between them and to explain their diversity of conception and material. Thus, in this country, the two best known and probably most popular works, Ross*
Social Psychology and McDougall's, An Introduction to Social Psychology,

seem hardly, as it has frequently been pointed out, to be concerned with the same subject matter. And those who are acquainted also with the conceptions of Cooley, Mead, Ellwood, Dewey, and Thomas, to mention only the older and more widely recognized attempts to formulate socialpsychological theory in this country, know that each of these is again essentially distinct from both of the above as well as from each other. It has been considerations of this nature and the consequent conviction that there is at the present time an urgent need in the field of social psychology for some sort of general survey, in the light of which the various current treatments and conceptions of the subject may be given place in relation to each other and to the field in its larger outlines as it has developed in its several aspects up to the present time, that have prompted this work. It is hoped that the survey of social-psychological thought which is to be followed out here will help to meet this need in a preliminary way. In particular, it is hoped that the development of American social-psychological thought will appear in significant perspective in this treatment of the subject and that, at least in so far as social-psychological endeavor in this country is concerned, it will help clear the ground for those more positive tendencies in the field which are today variously beginning to get under way here, and upon which the further advance of such a scientifically applicable social psychology as has been the objective of American social-psychological thought from the beginning must from now on squarely rest.

PART I EUROPEAN BACKGROUND

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