Psychological experiments on student self-government: The early impact of Wilhelm Mann's work in Chile and the German Empire.

Abstract

One of the most important successes in the history of psychology in Chile was the foundation in 1908 of the first experimental psychology laboratory in Santiago by the German psychologist Wilhelm Mann (1974-1943). Four years later, Mann give a shift to his classical experimental psychology research to intervene in the discussions about German School Reform (1900-1920). Mann used Chile as a "testing ground" for explore the viability of student self-government published in three papers. The method used to verify the early impact of Mann's papers was the quantitative analysis of citations with Publish or Perish software using a Google Books database and Scripta Paedagogica. The reception of Mann's texts was analyzed using the context of citation and the functions and use of those citations. The three unknow Mann's papers about Student Self-Government published in 1913 and his citations. The results shows that Mann's critics and recommendations published in one of his papers was the fourth more citated in a database of 16 foundational German works of to self-student government. Finally, this Mann's article was cited and used in an ideological way to argue in favor of reactionary and conservative opinions of school democratization in German Empire teacher circles. Mann's diagnosis and critical suggestions was recognized by prominent German philosophers and pedagogues. Precisely Mann criticized the Student Republics as the only way to stimulate the student self-government for their artificial character and especially for the loss of students' psychological individuality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).