1797, from Ger.
Phänomenologie, used as the title of the fourth part of the
"Neues Organon" of Ger. physicist Johann Heinrich Lambert (1728-77), coined from Gk.
phainomenon (see
phenomenon) +
-logia, from
-logos "one who deals with certain topics." Psychological sense, esp. in Gestalt theory, is from 1930.