Japanese Psychology Research Articles

人格に関する研究動向

人格に関する研究動向

I. Consciousness raising activities and Japanese women's psychology

I. Consciousness raising activities and Japanese women's psychology

On International Students ’Learning through Mini-naikan Experience in a Japanese Psychology Course in Japan

On International Students ’Learning through Mini-naikan Experience in a Japanese Psychology Course in Japan

What Was Not Discussed: Reply to Comments

Here I respond to comments and questions raised in commentary papers (Castro and Lafuente, Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 42, 2007; Charles, Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 42, 2007; Woodward and Hetley, Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 42, 2007) and address three issues not discussed on my previous paper: (1) the historiography used in the history of Japanese psychology, (2) the first generation of Japanese women psychologists to flesh out the history of psychology in Japan, and (3) how applied psychology and psychical research existed in the early phase of psychology in Japan. Consequently, this paper, together with the previous one, provides a broader picture of the development of psychology in Japan.

Missed Opportunities: Speculation on What Japanese Psychology Could Have Been

Takasuna (Integr. Physiol. Behav. Sci. 41, 2007) mentioned the ease with which evolutionary theory was accepted by Japanese psychologists, and certainly this is admirable. He also mentioned the stubborn force which had to be used to gain an understanding of the (thoroughly Western) subjective objective distinction. Alas, during the formative years of Japanese psychology, there was much philosophical work afoot attempting to destroy that distinction. It is speculated that only a small change of which books were translated, or with which Americans early Japanese psychologists trained under, would have made Japan into a haven for these still underdog theories.

Proliferation of Western Methodological Thought in Psychology in Japan: Ways of Objectification

When the field of psychology was first introduced into Japan, it was based on the proliferation of Western thought, particularly experimentation and Darwinian evolutionary theory. The current Japanese word for psychology, shinrigaku, was coined by scholar Amane Nishi in the early 1870s. It originally meant "mental philosophy," not psychology. Nishi also translated "subject" and "object" into Japanese. Before that, objectivity was not a concept in Japan. And although psychological experimentation must have prompted the subject/object division, experiments did not take root in Japanese psychology until Yujiro Motora, considered the founder of Japanese psychology, established the first psychological laboratory in 1903 at the University of Tokyo. In regards to Darwinian evolutionary theory, it is likely that scholars (e.g., biologists, sociologists, politicians) more readily accepted the theory when introduced into Japanese society in the 1870s because Japanese embrace a view that maintains diffuse boundaries between humans and animals. Finally, the roles of Japanese scholars who studied abroad during of the inception of psychology in Japan are discussed.

Psychology in China and the Chinese Psychological Society

Psychology in China and the Chinese Psychological Society

Representing the Other in Modern Japanese Literature: A Critical Approach (review)

Reviewed by: Representing the Other in Modern Japanese Literature: A Critical Approach Joseph S. O'Leary Representing the Other in Modern Japanese Literature: A Critical Approach. Edited by Rachael Hutchinson and Mark Williams. London and New York: Routledge, 2007. xvi + 345 pages. Hardcover $135.00/£75.00; softcover $39.95/£21.99. Coming from a remote island country, only recently thrust into the international circuit, and often perplexed as an "Other" in the West or in colonial Asia, the Japanese traveler of the Meiji or Taishō periods was assailed on every side by fresh, delicious sensations of the exotic and developed a keen sensitivity to differences. The present volume, comprising sixteen chapters by as many contributors, examines the complexities of this experience as reflected and enriched in twentieth-century Japanese writing. [End Page 131] Even as late as 1959, in Kyōko no ie, Mishima Yukio was able to present prosaic details of New York life as glowing with alien charm (as Irmela Hijiya-Kirschnereit relates). Just as Americans may still be able to exoticize the streets or villages of Japan, Mishima shows himself a master of reverse Orientalism as he foregrounds such American exotica as doors that open automatically. When sensation fails to offer the traveler such thrills, fantasy fills the gap. Thus, Natsume Sōseki, unhappy in London, calls up historical visions in the Tower, adopting a "doctrine of jikohon'i or 'on my own terms,' which can be seen as an intellectual gauntlet thrown down in the face of Western society" (Susan Napier, p. 46). Dexterous use of literary sources sustains and enriches the fantasy of the alien land. Hijiya-Kirschnereit reveals how exoticism takes on an intertextual dimension when Mishima laces his stories with largely unnoticed allusions to Pater, Wilde, Mann, and Greek mythology, as well as drawing on an exotic trove of Chinese characters. Similarly, Satō Haruo, following a visit to Taiwan, his first trip abroad, blends Western and Chinese exoticism in his "Tale of the Fan" (1925), where he explicitly emulates Poe's "Fall of the House of Usher" in a variation on the Chinese cliché of the deserted woman lamenting in a ghostly mansion (as Faye Kleeman argues). Even sex became more exotic when seen through a Western prism. Ann Sherif presents the Japanese trial about Lady Chatterley's Lover as turning on "the aestheticization of sex" (p. 195) and "High Modernist assumptions that aesthetic response should encompass sexual response" (p. 203). It remains unclear whether the lawyers noted that "sex" here meant four-letter words and sodomy, or how much of the shock value, the "otherness," of Lawrence's breach of these taboos was transmitted to Japanese readers. But the present volume is not just a collection of aesthetic delights. Within the paradise of fantasy the serpent of problematization lurked. Some of the fantasists themselves undertook deconstruction of their initial self-indulgent projections. When Nagai Kafū dismantles the popular Meiji image of America as the "sacred land of liberty," this, according to Rachael Hutchinson, is "part of a wider discourse of dissent and doubt circulating among intellectuals after the Russo-Japanese War" (p. 71). When Kafū portrays a Japanese, symbolically named Kunio, in masochistic thrall to an American woman, the fantasy has a multiple subversive impact. Napier points out that Sōseki's fantasies are "rudely rejected by his landlord who offers prosaic explanations for every seemingly uncanny event" and is "disillusioning on the subject of the mysterious woman" whom Sōseki has imagined to be a reincarnation of Lady Jane Grey (p. 45). In parallel, Satō's narrator, according to Kleeman, scotches the superstition and romanticism of his Taiwanese friend Segaimin, though of course the narrative indulges to the full the frisson these "naïve" attitudes allow. Perhaps the most elaborate dialectic between fantasy and realism in twentieth-century literature is that pursued by Tanizaki Jun'ichirō in a long career. He began with fin-de-siècle decadence, blending it with a cult of Chinese exotica; then he indulged a fantasy of the West, derived from the movies; traditional Japan offered the basis for his later imaginations, which form a searching interrogation of the texture of Japanese psychology and cultural...

Episodes from the history of Japanese psychology

Episodes from the history of Japanese psychology

The history of psychology in Japan

The history of psychology in Japan

Psychology of feelings and emotions: Its history in Japan

Abstract: Although feelings and emotions are a major topic in psychology now, the research history in this area in Japan does not seem to be widely known. The current paper provides an overview of the history of the psychology of feelings and emotions in Japan up to 1970. Before Japan opened its door to the outside world (– 1850s), there were researchers who specialized in Confucianism. In the late 19th century, some Western philosophical psychologists were introduced. In approximately 1903, experimental methods were introduced to Japan, but very few experimental studies were published. In this period, G. S. Hall strongly influenced research directions. At approximately the time of World War Il, although Japanese psychology was influenced by Gestalt psychology, the popularity of Gestalt psychology altered the methods of experimental studies on emotions. After World War Il, American psychology showed a strong impact on Japanese psychology; in particular, the Yale school played a major role in encouraging studies on feelings and emotions in Japan.

An overview of the history of psychology in Japan and the background to the development of the Japanese Psychological Association1

: This paper discusses five topics. They are as follows: 1 A brief chronological record of the Japanese Psychological Association (JPA) and its annual meetings highlighting the following events: (a) its official establishment on the April 7, 1927, and the long and arduous preparations that preceded this event; (b) the 66th annual meeting of the JPA held in September 2002 in Hiroshima City; and (c) the 75th anniversary celebrations held simultaneously from the September 25–27, 2002. 2 The background of modern Japanese psychology at its inception and the origin of the Japanese term “shinrigaku.” 3 The introduction of modern scientific psychology to Japan, its early proponents and their mentors. 4 The spread of modern Japanese psychology through the work of scholars in imperial and private universities. The influence of Dr G. S. Hall on Japanese scholars, such as Dr Yokoyama of Keio-gijiku, who attended Clark University for their PhD. 5 The organizational background of the JPA and the growth in its membership through the participation of additional imperial and private universities.

An historical examination of the concept of jiga (ego) in Japanese psychology, particularly as employed in a dissertation by Yujiro Motora and in Ladd's psychological theory

Abstract: The translation of the terms “ego” as jiga, “self” as jiko, and “self‐consciousness” as jiko‐ishiki, has become standard in Japan. However, other Japanese words have been used for these terms in the past. For example, in the first English‐Japanese Dictionary of Philosophy, Tetsugaku jii, (Inoue, 1881), “ego” is translated as ga or jiko, and the term jiga does not occur in the dictionary, despite its use as early as the 16th century. The main aim of the present paper is to analyze the conceptual variations that have been attached to the Japanese term jiga. Under the influence of psychoanalytical ego psychology, and Erikson in particular, jiga now has the specific meaning of “ego” in Japan. This ignores the cross‐cultural perspective, for it is well‐accepted that the psychology of Westerners and of Japanese is very different, and this implies that the concept of ego should not be uncritically adopted from the West. Analyses of Yujiro Motora's English dissertation, “Exchange,” of the late 19th century (Motora, 1888), and of G.T. Ladd's original and translated work reveal what Japanese psychologists meant when using the terms ego, jiga, and jiko.

The early 20th century: Shaping the discipline of psychology in Japan1

Abstract: In this paper, we aim to describe the developing process of early Japanese psychology. This is the story of the institutionalization of psychology in Japan. We deal with the first period of Japanese psychology and trace the process of shaping the discipline of psychology in Japan. We also focus on the life and studies of Motora, who was the first psychology professor in Japan, and those of his students. In 1903, Yuzero Motora opened the first formal laboratory of psychology at Tokyo Imperial University, and in 1904, the first 2‐year course in psychology was commenced. Both the laboratory and the two‐year course could produce psychology students who studied “new” or experimental psychology. But not all the experimentation resulted in success. We also examine Fukurai's clairvoyance and thoughtgraphy experiments. Although Fukurai was one of the promising students of Motora, he gradually changed interest to parapsychology. Fukurai's adherence to these psychic phenomenon and his isolation from academic society resulted in the removal of clinical psychology from the psychology discipline in Japan.

The evolution of data analyses in Japanese psychology1

Abstract: A historical account of data analysis used in the journal, Japanese Journal of Psychology, was examined. Simple statistics were used before 1944. The number of articles that used statistical significance tests increased during the early 1950s, suggesting the occurrence of an inference revolution. This revolution mirrors what happened in the USA 5–10 years earlier. After 1960, the ANOVA overtook the t‐test as the most popular data analysis tool. Multivariate analyses became more widespread after the 1980s. The history of Japanese psychology can be segmented into four periods from the point of view of the statistical methods used: (a) the simple statistics age (1926–1944); (b) the diversification of statistical methods age (1948–1950s); (c) ANOVA, the king of statistics, age (1960s−1970s); and (d) the spread of multivariate analyses age (1980s–present). The use of a qualitative approach in psychology is discussed.

21世紀の教育心理学: 「教育心理学の不毛性議論」に触発されつつ

21世紀の教育心理学: 「教育心理学の不毛性議論」に触発されつつ

Japanese Psychology in Crisis: Thinking Inside the (Empty) Box

In part because of the information revolution, Japan is experiencing a crisis in culture. Because it is more sensitive to culture than other approaches, humanistic psychology may have much to offer in this time of crisis, particularly because of the Japanese value of inner privacy. Tomoda has explored ways of translating Rogers’s approach into a Japanese context of Zen, including the use of renku, a form of poetry collectively written by members of a group exploring their process in “a vague atmosphere of togetherness.” Another approach to bridging the East/West gap is explored in Naikan therapy in which an empathic therapist visits the client who sits and meditates on the dynamics of his or her personal relationships during a weeklong retreat. In the end, it is thinking inside the box, contrary to Western contemporary values, that seems to make humanistic psychology work for the Japanese, whose aesthetic values have persevered through the ages.

An introduction to the historical study of Japanese psychology

An introduction to the historical study of Japanese psychology

Learning from others. Japan's role in bringing psychology to China.

Recent research by Chinese and Japanese historians of psychology and education suggests that it was educational reformers' copying of Japan's education system in the 1st decade of the 20th century that provided the context for developing modern psychology in China. Psychology, although not well understood by those reformers, was thought to be useful in teacher training. In 1902 Japanese psychology teachers came to China and some textbooks were translated. Chinese students studying in Japan also brought back psychological knowledge in translations. However, the Chinese attraction to study in Japan declined after 1906. As the United States opened new universities and provided opportunities for Chinese students to study in U.S. schools, it became a more attractive option for later generations of Chinese, who saw psychology become established as a separate discipline.

Guest editor's introduction: Japanese developmental psychology in the 1990s

Guest editor's introduction: Japanese developmental psychology in the 1990s