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.

 

Although the history of feelings and emotions in Western countries was outlined by Gardiner, Metcalf, and Beebe-Center (1937), its Japanese counterpart was not documented, because in those days Japanese researchers seemed to think that psychology in Japan had not yet caught up with psychology in Western countries. Recently, however, there have been some movements to clarify the origin of Japanese psychology (Sato, 2002; Sato & Mizoguchi, 1997) against the background of dramatic progress in Japanese psychology. Sato (2002) pointed out that Japanese psychologists did not refuse to adopt any Western theories when they were imported to Japan, because there was no theory that conflicted with them in Japan. However, did Japanese psychologists accept theories from western countries immediately? This paper provides an overview of the history of the psychology of feelings and emotions in Japan up to 1970.

In the current paper, we divide the history of Japanese psychology on feelings and emotions into the following five periods, and discuss it, respectively: (a) the time before Japan opened its door to the outside world ( 1850s); (b) the late 19th century; (c) from 1903 to the beginning of World War II; (d) from the beginning of the World War II to the 1960s; and (e) the 1960s.

Before Japan opened its door to the outside world, ending some 300 years of isolation, there were only a few researchers who specialized in Confucianism. In one of the most popular schools of Confucianism, Shushigaku, it was pointed out that humans had "Shichi-jo," literally meaning "Seven emotions," that is, happiness, anger, sadness, fear, love, hatred, and desire. However Japanese psychology after the Meiji era has abandoned the idea of this theory because of the switch to psychological theory imported from Western countries.

In the 1850s, Japan opened its door to the outside world. The knowledge and technology from Western countries rushed into Japan, together with psychology developed in Western countries.

In those days, psychology was introduced to Japan by Amane Nishi (1829 1897), who translated Joseph Haven's Mental Philosophy (1869) into Japanese in 1878. After that, several psychology books were imported to Japan, and some of them were translated into Japanese. Ota (1997) cites works by Alexander Bain (1818 1903), Mental and Moral Science (Bain, 1868) and Mind and Body (Bain, 1871), and James Sully (1842 1923), Outlines of Psychology (Sully, 1884) and Teacher Handbook of Psychology (Sully, 1886), as examples of such translations.

Influenced by studies on sense, Bain suggested that emotion was derived from senses. He pointed out two levels of feelings; the primary feeling is similar to senses, and the secondary feeling is similar to emotion. Moreover, the primary feeling possesses three features (affective value, strength, and trait of sense). Sully, another psychologist whose books were translated into Japanese, emphasized the emotions as a motive element of one's will. In addition to these two scholars, The Emotion by James McCosh (1880) was very popular, although it was not translated into Japanese. McCosh divided feelings into four specifics: affection, an idea of object or occurrence, conscious feeling, and organic affection.

He classified emotions into three types: (a) retrospective emotions such as self-satisfaction; (b) immediate emotions such as joy and sorrow; and (c) prospective emotions such as surprise. The Principles of Psychology (1855) by Harvard Spencer (1820 1903) and Principles of Mental Physiology (1874) by William Carpenter (1813 1885) were used to teach psychology at the University of Tokyo, which was the only university in those days, and some private schools. Spencer devoted many pages of his book to feelings and emotions, and regarded feelings as the products of actions of nerves.

Although those theories were introduced to Japan, Japanese researchers refuse to adopt these theories. In Japan, Shigeki Nishimura (1828 1902) wrote Shingaku-Kougi (Lectures on Mind, 1885), and introduced foreign thought on mind to Japan. In his book, he maintained his own theory under the influence of various scholars, including Kant, Hartley, Read, Upham, and Spencer. According to his original theory, feelings can be divided into three categories: feelings related to forms, feelings related to intelligence, and feelings related to ethics. Moreover, Ryukichi Endo (1887) argued that Japanese has "Jouchou-sei," which means emotional aspects of non-emotional things, in his article, "Three features of Eastern philosophy." This period is that during which foreign thoughts on mind were introduced to Japan. Some of the intellectuals not only introduced them, but also suggested original theories derived from them.

After studying under G. S. Hall (1844 1924) at Johns Hopkins University in the USA from 1885 to 1888 and obtaining a PhD, Yujiro Motora (1858 1912) returned to Japan in 1888. (See also, Oyama, Sato, & Suzuki, 2001). After that, he started teaching psychophysics at the University of Tokyo (1888), and became the professor (1890). He introduced experimental psychology to Japan.

In 1903, the first psychological laboratory was founded at the University of Tokyo. Experimental studies grew more increasingly than before. Some books that introduced experimental methods were also published.

One of these books, Jikken-shinri-shashin-cho (Photo Albums of Experimental Psychology; University of Tokyo Psychological Laboratory, 1910), introduced three experiments related to emotions and feelings showing the photographs of the scenes of the experiments. The titles of the photographs are: Experiment of the relationships among emotions, blood pressures and respirations, using a pneumograph and a plethysmograph (Figure 1); Experiment of the relationships between emotions and fatigue of grasping power, using a dynamometer (Figure 2); Experiment of the relationships between emotion and pulling power of fingers, using ergograph (Figure 3). Nogami and Ueno (1909) also described three experiments using the "impressive method" and four experiments using the "expressive method." For the impressive method, experiments on Preference of color, Preference of color composition, and Preference of rectangle were described. For the expressive method, experiments on Respiration and pulse affected by feelings, The relationships of feelings and blood pressure, The effects of feelings to involuntary muscles, and the effects of feelings to voluntary muscles were described. These experiments indicated that, in addition to physiological aspects of emotion, one's preference was considered to have important meanings. However, most of the studies were introductions of foreign studies, and not experimental in the early period, except one conducted by Kuwata (1908). He controlled the feeling of subjects using sugar and cod liver oil, and measured the frequency of key pushing by subjects when the subject felt pleasure and displeasure.

In this period, foreign theories on feelings and emotions based on experiments were also introduced to Japan through some major Japanese journals, such as Tetsugaku-Zasshi, or Toyo-gakugei-zasshi. Wundt's three-dimensional theory, and the James-Lange theory were two of these theories. Wundt published his three-dimensional theory of feelings in 1896, and Motora and Nakashima (also Nakajima) translated this into Japanese in 1898. The James-Lange Theory (James, 1884; Lange, 1885) was introduced by Motora in 1885.

Although Japanese psychologists accepted the James-Lange theories, Wundt's three-dimensional theory met with some rebellion. Although Motora was an experimental psychologist, his theory of emotion was influenced by philosophical psychologists. Motora did not agree with Wundt's three-dimensional theory of feelings, and he insisted that the feeling had only one dimension (pleasure and displeasure) and the other dimensions were not feelings, by quoting Spencer and Hamilton. In this period of time, feeling that was derived from sense and emotion were separated very clearly. Philosophical psychologists tended to explain psychological phenomena by a particular kind of sense. Under their influence, Motora (1915) thought that arousal is a state of the nervous system, and tension-relaxation is a state of muscles. He thought that pleasure and displeasure were only elements of feeling, which was not explained by senses. His one-dimensional theory was popular among such philosophical psychologists as Spencer and Bain.

There was a psychologist who proposed another theory. He was Tomokichi Fukurai (1869 1952), an associate professor at the Tokyo Imperial University (1908 13), and one of the students of Motora. He studied relationships between nervous and emotional tones at the graduate level. He was against both the three-dimensional theory and the one-dimensional theory. Instead, he insisted that there were many kinds of emotions, which were not made from just a few elements (Fukurai, 1907). His theory was accepted by the Japanese at this time. Nevertheless, Fukurai resigned from the University of Tokyo because he caused a scandal about clairvoyance (for details, see Suzuki, 1997), and then his name faded away together with his theory.

In addition to Motora and Fukurai, Nakashima (also Nakajima, 1910) also denounced it. Although these examples revealed that some psychologists obviously felt incongruity with theories of the psychology of feelings and emotions that originated in foreign countries, Wundt's theory became popular in Japan gradually.

In contrast to theories, the Western methodologies seemed to be accepted more easily. G. S. Hall influenced the Japanese psychology of feelings and emotions, and he was a mentor of Motora. Hall had many publications on emotions, such as "A study of fears" (1897) and "A study of anger" (1899). He used questionnaires for research on facial expressions. The studies of Minamoto (1910) and Okada (1911), who were Motora's students, were also based on results from questionnaires, interviews, and field observations, and none of them were laboratory experiments. The topics of those Japanese studies were very similar to investigations by Hall. In fact, Minamoto quoted Hall's work (1899), and adopted his method in his own studies. Okada also wrote that he was influenced by Borgquist (1906), who was one of Hall's students. Furthermore, Yoshioka (1928) pointed out that Hall might have been the first psychologist who used such new methods as questionnaires for research on facial expressions. Thus Hall's studies influenced Japanese researchers engaged in research on emotions in the early part of these periods.

Today we usually discuss feelings and emotions together as one category, but in this period of time, they were different and classified into more detailed categories. The usage of the terms was not consistent among researchers in Japan, and these categories and their meanings were a topic of frequent discussion.

In the early part of the 20th century, some universities and their psychological laboratories were founded in Japan. As a consequence, the number of professional psychologists increased. Kuwata was one of the students of Motora, and studied folk psychology under W. Wundt at Leipzig University. His main interest was facial expressions. Therefore, he seemed to be also influenced by Darwin. Tanenari Chiba (1884 1972) was the first Professor of Psychology at Tohoku University (1922 40). He suggested "koyu-kanjo," an emotional state that was neither pleasure nor displeasure, but the canon of consciousness, and he published many papers about this (e.g., Chiba, 1916, 1917). Toshio Nogami (1882 1963), who was a professor at Kyoto University, was a child psychologist and introduced Ribot to Japan. Matasaburo Yokoyama was the founder of the psychological laboratory at Keio University (1926). Yokoyama's studies on feelings were published in the USA (1920, 1921) when he was a graduate student at Clark University. After his return to Japan, he published some papers on color perception and feelings (Nishikawa, 1995).

The period was one during which methodologies and theories were imported from abroad. Although experimental methods and theories on feelings and emotions were also introduced to Japanese researchers, some theories, such as Wundt's three-dimensional theory, were met with some rebellion. This was because experimental methods were not yet mature enough to study the phenomena of "feelings and emotions," and Japanese psychologists tended to try to comprehend the phenomena by using not only psychological methods, but also philosophical methods.

In the period around the World War II, Japanese psychology was influenced by German psychology, particularly Gestalt psychology. However, even after the war, the influence of German psychology persisted until approximately 1960.

Usao Onoshima was one of the most important Gestalt psychologists in this period and devoted many pages to feelings and emotions in his books (1934, 1937). In these, he cited Lewin and Dembo (1931) as the most important research, and described feelings and emotions by using theories of Gestalt psychology. This tendency of emphasizing the work by Lewin and Dembo was not exclusive to Onoshima. Kanae Sakuma, who studied under Lewin at Berlin University, Hiroshi Chiwa and Gen'ichi Hagino were influenced by Gestalt psychology.³

In approximately 1941, World War II entered its fierce stage. The stance of Japan towards the war also influenced the Japanese Psychological Association, and presentations of research at the meetings were suspended (Japanese Psychological Association, 1980). Furthermore, it was difficult for researchers to carry out research on any topics unless they were useful for the war. Thus, this situation led to the decline of research on feelings and emotions.

Research on feelings and emotions also declined during the postwar period. The causes for such a decline were unclear, but we can speculate on some possible causes. One of these is the limited use of experimental methods in Gestalt psychology. Another possible reason is the decline in research on feelings and emotions in Western countries (Imada, 2002), which in turn influenced Japan.

In this period, theories, mainly Gestalt theories, did not meet with large resistance from Japanese psychology. Two of the possible reasons are that the psychological discipline was well established, and psychologists limited their research to carrying out experiments.

After World War II, American psychology became influential on Japanese psychology. This tendency was created partly by notable accomplishments by Japanese researchers trained in the USA. Imada (in Hirai, Imada, Ibaraki, Kosugi, & Ohmoto, 1982) pointed out that Matsuyama (1957, 1961) and (Marui, 1957, 1958) had played an important role in this tendency.

Yoshinori Matsuyama studied at Yale University under N. E. Miller from 1953 to 1955, and introduced to Japan the Yale school of Miller (e.g., 1948) and Mowrer (e.g., 1947). He carried out research on the emotional response of rats and discussed a clinical problem rooted from human emotions. He published the findings in 1958. Although the emotional conditioning of rats was already known in Japan through the Japanese Journal of Psychology in 1940, Matsuyama's (1958) contribution had a symbolic meaning because he combined research on feelings and emotion with clinical application. Matsuyama and his colleagues then founded the "Personality and behavior disorder research forum," based on the view described in 1960 (Hirai et al., 1982). It was clear that the members of this study group played a big role in Japanese research on feelings and emotions (e.g., Hirai, 1956; Imada, 1959; Sukemune, 1959), and related work on such problems as fear and anxiety. Other psychologists started to study affective meanings produced by colors, forms, abstract words (reviewed by Oyama, Yamada, & Iwasawa, 1998), or sounds (reviewed by Namba, 1989). Moreover, many books related to feelings and emotions were published in this period of time.

There was a drastic change in studies on feelings and emotions between the prewar and postwar periods. After World War II, the shadow of philosophical psychologists completely disappeared and the new behaviorism appeared.

Although Japanese psychology has been influenced greatly by foreign countries, there were a few original theories and topics of emotions out of Japan. One of these is "Koyu-kanjo" by Chiba (1932). This theory, which was partly similar to the theory of "Qualia," seems to be one of the most sophisticated theories in Japan. Tachibana (1938) wrote a paper about "sabi." The sabi, which was a kind of consciousness experience, was also original to Japan. Although these studies were genuinely Japanese in their origins, their works were not handed down to the next generation.

In brief, we have discussed the history of the psychology of feelings and emotions in Japan up to 1970. We are apt to feel that the psychology that we know, is all of psychology. However, the present studies on feelings and emotions focus on a smaller area and have limited methodologies compared with those from the past. Although some investigations originated from problems related to people in Japan, studies on feelings and emotions in Japan were initially imported from foreign investigations partly because many Japanese researchers valued foreign studies. While, from the late 19th century to the early part of the 20th century, Japanese psychologists were reluctant to adopt theories from Western countries, in the latter part of the 20th century, psychologists became more and more willing to discuss and adopt Western theories. There are two possible reasons for this. First, psychologists comprehended feelings and emotions using philosophical methods because feelings and emotions were difficult to deal with, using experimental methods in the early part. Second, the discussion was limited to the ability to carry out experiments because psychological discipline had developed in the latter part of the 20th century. However, as we followed studies conducted in foreign countries and learned from them, Japanese psychologists should conduct their own studies in Japan. The psychology of feelings and emotions in Japan has reached the stage of development and is ready for advancement in the future.