PHILOSOPHY AND PSYCHOLOGY AT THE SORBONNE, 1885-1913

The first university course in experimental psychology in Paris was lo cated in the Faculty of Letters rather than the Fault of Sciences or M edicine. The historical association of psychology with philosophy help s explain this placement, but this choice reinforced the philosophical character of the position at the expense of the experimental. In fact , the course included no laboratory instruction, with the exception of optional demonstrations conducted at psychological laboratories assoc iated with the Faculty of Medicine. The fragmentation of the emerging discipline, distributed among divergent and competing Faculties, meant that training in experimental psychology may have been more difficult in France than in the United States or Germany, where laboratory rese arch and training were more integrated. The first three instructors of the course - Theodule Ribot, Pierre Janet, and Georges Durnas - had a coherent vision of psychology as a synthesis of medical and philosoph ical approaches, but the matrix of institutional and disciplinary boun daries prevented them from bringing these approaches together.