Vol. 5 No. 2 (2025)
Constructing a Perspective: Epistemology of the Psi Sciences

Articles

Objectifying the Phenomenal in Experimental Psychology: Titchener and Beyond

Published 2025-12-31

  • Gary Hatfield
    • ,
  • Irina Rybakova

Gary Hatfield
University of Pennsylvania image/svg+xml

Irina Rybakova
Independent researcher

Abstract

This paper examines Titchener’s notion of stimulus error in the experimental study of mental experience. It places Titchener’s introspective methods into the intellectual world of early experimental psychology. It follows the subsequent development of perceptual experimentation primarily in the American literature, with notice to British and German studies as needed. Subsequent investigators transformed the notion of a specifically stimulus error into experimental questions in which subjects’ attitudes toward their perceptual tasks became independent variables to be manipulated experimentally. Ultimately, these manipulations supported a distinction between accessing phenomenal as opposed to cognitive aspects of subjects’ responses to stimulus objects.

Keywords

introspection, stimulus error, experimental studies of perception, history of psychology

PDF (Russian)

Author Biography

Gary Hatfield

A philosopher and author of works on the history of science, philosophy, and psychology; an Emeritus Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy (Adam Seybert Chair) and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania (USA).

Irina Rybakova

Psychologist, independent researcher.

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