The Würzburg School is a group of researchers led by the German psychologist O. Kulpe, who studied at the beginning of the XNUMXth century. at the University of Würzburg (Bavaria) higher mental processes (thinking, will) through a laboratory experiment in combination with a modified method of introspection (“experimental self-observation”, in which the subject carefully observed the dynamics of the states he experienced at each stage of the instruction execution).
The German psychologists K. Marbe, N. Ah, K. Buhler, the English psychologist G. Watt, the Belgian psychologist A. Michott, and others belonged to the Würzburg school.
The Würzburg school introduced into experimental psychology, as a new object of analysis, the performance of tasks of an intellectual nature (the study of logical judgments, answers to questions requiring mental effort, etc.). It was revealed that thinking is a mental process, the laws of which are not reducible either to the laws of logic or to the laws of the formation of associations. The peculiarity of thinking was explained by the fact that associations are selected in accordance with the tendencies created by the task accepted by the subject. The organizing role was recognized for the setting that precedes the search for a solution, which some representatives of the Würzburg school considered a “setting of consciousness”, others considered an unconscious act (since it is hidden from introspection).
In contrast to the views generally accepted at that time, the Würzburg school came to the conclusion that consciousness contains non-sensory components (mental actions and meanings independent of sensory images). Therefore, the specificity of the concept of the Würzburg school is usually seen in the fact that it introduced the concept of imageless thinking into psychology. The process of thinking was interpreted by her as a change of operations, sometimes acquiring affective intensity (feelings of confidence, doubt, etc.).
The work of psychologists of the Würzburg school raised a number of important problems concerning the qualitative differences between thinking and other cognitive processes, revealed the limitations of the associative concept, its inability to explain the selectivity and direction of acts of consciousness. At the same time, however, thinking without images (“pure” thinking) was unjustifiably opposed to its other forms, and the dependence of thinking on speech and practical activity was ignored. Important positive results in the study of the problems posed by the Würzburg school were obtained by Gestalt psychology, L.S. Vygotsky, S.L.u.e.shtein and their students.