Völkerpsychologie

Völkerpsychologie, or folk psychology, is a historical term in psychology for the study of collective mental life. It examines how language, religion, art, customs, and shared emotions shape the thinking and behavior of groups rather than individuals alone.

Originating in late 19th-century Germany, the field is closely associated with Wilhelm Wundt, who argued that higher mental phenomena cannot be understood by studying isolated minds but must be traced through cultural products and historical development. The term signals a contrast with experimental psychology focused on the individual.

Method and scope: Völkerpsychologie combined historical‑comparative analysis, philology, ethnography, and the study of language and myths. It treated cultural artifacts as evidence for the development of cognition and emphasized collective representations and social norms as drivers of mental life.

Influence and critique: The program influenced early anthropology and linguistics and is sometimes viewed as a precursor to cultural psychology. It faced criticism for insufficient empirical rigor and for inferences about an abstract "collective mind." Its aims were later incorporated into broader approaches in psychology and the humanities.

Today the term is mostly used in historical contexts. Modern cultural psychology and cross-cultural psychology study how culture shapes cognition with empirical methods, exploring language, symbols, and socialization while drawing on but moving beyond earlier Völkerpsychologie.