Editing John Dewey (section)

==Functional psychology==
{{Main|Functional psychology}}
{{See also|History of psychology}}
At the University of Michigan, Dewey published his first two books, ''Psychology'' (1887), and ''Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding'' (1888), both of which expressed Dewey's early commitment to [[British idealism|British neo-Hegelianism]]. In ''Psychology'', Dewey attempted a synthesis between idealism and experimental science.<ref name=IEP>{{Cite book |author=Field, Richard |title=John Dewey in ''The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' |publisher=Northwest Missouri State University |url=http://www.iep.utm.edu/d/dewey.htm |access-date=29 August 2008 |archive-date=April 6, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090406082012/http://www.iep.utm.edu/d/dewey.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

While still professor of philosophy at Michigan, Dewey and his junior colleagues, [[James Hayden Tufts]] and [[George Herbert Mead]], together with his student [[James Rowland Angell]], all influenced strongly by the recent publication of [[William James]]' ''[[Principles of Psychology]]'' (1890), began to reformulate psychology, emphasizing the social environment on the activity of mind and behavior rather than the physiological psychology of [[Wilhelm Wundt]] and his followers.

By 1894, Dewey had joined Tufts, with whom he later wrote ''Ethics'' (1908) at the recently founded [[University of Chicago]] and invited Mead and Angell to follow him, the four men forming the basis of the so-called "Chicago group" of psychology.

Their new style of psychology, later dubbed [[functional psychology]], had a practical emphasis on action and application. In Dewey's article "The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology" which appeared in ''[[Psychological Review]]'' in 1896, he reasons against the traditional [[stimulus-response]] understanding of the [[reflex arc]] in favor of a "circular" account in which what serves as "stimulus" and what as "response" depends on how one considers the situation and defends the unitary nature of the sensory motor circuit. While he does not deny the existence of stimulus, sensation, and response, he disagreed that they were separate, juxtaposed events happening like links in a chain. He developed the idea that there is a coordination by which the stimulation is enriched by the results of previous experiences. The response is modulated by sensorial experience.

Dewey<!-- , not without polemic, --> was elected president of the American Psychological Association in 1899.

Dewey also expressed interest in work in the psychology of [[visual perception]] performed by Dartmouth research professor [[Adelbert Ames Jr.]] He had great trouble with listening, however, because it is known Dewey could not distinguish musical pitches—in other words was an [[Amusia|amusic]].<ref>*Thibeault, M.D. (2018). [https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0022429419896792#articleShareContainer Dewey's Musical Allergy and the Philosophy of Music Education] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200609042708/https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0022429419896792#articleShareContainer |date=June 9, 2020 }}</ref>