Study of refleсtion is one of the innovative directions of modern psychology. The logic of the development and stages of refleсtion research in European philosophical and psychological thought from antiquity to the present are analyzed in the article. The main scientific schools  and directions of Russian psychology of refleсtion are being differentiated and characterized. The links between philosophical and psychological interpretations of refleсtion in the Russian psychology and the development of the literary and artistic critique in the 19th century are traced as well as the interaction of the modern psychology of refleсtion with adjoining humanities.