Functional Psychology
Functional Psychology
(Lat. functio from fungor, I execute) A tendency in American psychology represented by W. James, G. T. Ladd, G. S. Hall, J. Dewey and J. R. Angell which considered the mental processes of sense perception, emotion, volition and thought as functions of the biological organism in its adaptation to and control of its environment. Functionalism arose as a protest against structural psychology for which the task of psychology is the analysis and description of consciousness. The functional theory of mind is characteristic of the pragmatism and instrumentalism of C. S. Pierce, W. James, G. H. Mead and J. Dewey. See C. H. Morris, Six Theories of Mind, Ch. VI. — L.W.