he French Psychological Path: Transforming Cartesian Dualism into Scientific Psychology (1637–1968)

The primary aim of the study is to trace and analyze the dialectical process by which French psychological thought moved from Cartesian mechanistic dualism and Enlightenment materialism to the positivist and clinical-experimental paradigm of the 19th century.The object of the article is the historical evolution of French psychology from the 17th to the late 19th century.The subject is the transformation of its philosophical foundations into an independent scientific discipline.The main research question is: How did French psychology manage to free itself from metaphysical speculation and become a rigorous empirical science despite originating in René Descartes' strict mind-body dualism?The central hypothesis is that this transformation was driven not only by internal theoretical development but also by socio-political factors (class struggles, bourgeois progress, the revolutions of 1848, and the crisis of the Third Republic), which accelerated the rejection of metaphysics in favor of laboratory and clinical methods.The study employs historical-philosophical analysis, the comparative method (French tradition vs.British empiricism and German experimental psychology), and contextual socio-political interpretation of primary sources (works of Descartes, Gassendi, Malebranche, Bayle, d'Holbach, Ribot, Charcot, and others).The article demonstrates that Descartes laid the psychophysical foundations (pineal gland as interaction point, reflex theory, classification of six primary passions), The French Psychological Path: Transforming Cartesian Dualism into Scientific Psychology 17