Early Approaches to Psychology, Evolution, Testing & Functionalism – Key Vocabulary

Vocabulary flashcards covering major people, concepts, methods, and theories from early experimental psychology, evolutionary thought, intelligence testing, and functionalism as presented in the lecture notes.

Voluntarism

Wundt’s school of psychology that emphasized voluntary control of attention and the active, creative nature of the mind.

Structuralism

Titchener’s approach aimed at describing the structure of the mind by cataloguing its basic elements via introspection.

Thought Meter

Wundt’s pendulum-and-bell apparatus used to measure the time (≈1⁄10 s) required to shift attention.

Experimental Introspection

Wundt’s controlled, laboratory form of introspection used to report immediate experience (sensations/feelings).

Stimulus Error

Titchener’s term for naming or describing an object rather than reporting its raw sensory qualities.

Sensation

Elementary mental experience produced when a sense organ is stimulated (e.g., hue, pitch, loudness).

Feeling (Affection)

The subjective accompaniment of sensations; Titchener held it varied only on a pleasant–unpleasant dimension.

Apperception

Wundt’s term for consciously attending to and thus integrating a percept; voluntary, attention-based perception.

Mental Chronometry

Measurement of the time course of mental operations through reaction-time experiments.

Völkerpsychologie

Wundt’s ‘cultural/folk psychology’ that studied higher mental processes through language, myth, art, etc., not experiments.

Tridimensional Theory of Emotion

Wundt’s notion that feelings vary on pleasant–unpleasant, tension–relaxation, and excitement–depression dimensions.

Law of Contiguity

Principle (embraced by Titchener) that mental elements combine because they occur together in time or space.

Act Psychology

Brentano’s approach focusing on what the mind does (acts like judging, remembering) rather than its contents.

Intentionality

Brentano’s idea that every mental act refers to or is about something beyond itself.

Phenomenology (Stumpf)

Study of intact, meaningful conscious experiences rather than breaking them into elements.

Clever Hans Phenomenon

Observer-expectancy bias revealed in Stumpf’s lab when a horse seemed to solve arithmetic by picking up experimenter cues.

Systematic Experimental Introspection

Külpe’s method of having participants solve problems and then retrospectively report their thought processes.

Mental Set

A problem-solving strategy that operates automatically, often outside awareness, induced by instruction or experience.

Nonsense Syllable

Ebbinghaus’s consonant-vowel-consonant stimulus (e.g., “DAP”) used to study pure memory uncomplicated by meaning.

Savings (Ebbinghaus)

Difference in trials between initial learning and relearning of material; index of memory retention.

Learning Curve

Graphical depiction of improvement in learning over time; first described by Ebbinghaus.

Over-learning

Continued practice beyond initial mastery that makes material more resistant to forgetting.

Evolution by Natural Selection

Darwin’s mechanism explaining species change through differential survival and reproduction of adaptive variants.

Malthusian Struggle for Survival

Idea that population growth outpaces resources, producing competition central to natural selection.

Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics

Lamarck’s theory that traits gained during lifetime can be passed to offspring; partly echoed in modern epigenetics.

Social Darwinism

Spencer’s application of ‘survival of the fittest’ to societies and economics, advocating laissez-faire policies.

Spencer-Bain Principle

View that behaviour followed by pleasure is likely to recur, and pain suppresses future occurrence.

Galton’s Anthropometric Laboratory

Victorian exhibit where Galton measured head size, reaction time, visual acuity, etc., to study individual differences.

Quincunx (Galton Board)

Device invented by Galton to demonstrate the normal (bell-shaped) distribution of traits.

Correlation (Galton/Pearson)

Statistical technique quantifying the degree to which two variables vary together; coefficient later formalised by Pearson.

Regression toward the Mean

Galton’s observation that extreme scores on a trait tend to be followed by more average scores in offspring.

Mental Test

Cattell’s term for Galton-style sensory and reflex measures intended to index intelligence.

Binet-Simon Scale

First practical test of intelligence (1905) using a hierarchy of cognitive tasks normed by age.

Mental Age

Stern’s concept indicating the chronological age level at which a person can pass Binet items.

Intelligence Quotient (IQ)

(Mental Age ÷ Chronological Age) × 100; formula popularised by Terman for the Stanford-Binet.

g Factor

Spearman’s posited general intelligence underlying performance across diverse cognitive tasks.

Factor Analysis

Statistical method (devised by Spearman) for identifying underlying latent factors from correlations among variables.

Army Alpha Test

Group intelligence test for literate WWI recruits, organised by Yerkes.

Army Beta Test

Non-verbal counterpart to the Alpha, designed for illiterate or non-English-speaking soldiers.

Flynn Effect

Observed generational rise in average IQ scores over time.

WAIS

Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale; multi-score test with verbal and performance subscales, mean = 100, SD = 15.

WISC

Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children; child version of WAIS using same scoring metric.

Eugenics

Galton-coined movement advocating selective breeding to improve human hereditary traits; later misused in policy.

Functionalism

US school focusing on the purpose of mental processes in helping organisms adapt, emphasising practicality.

Pragmatism

James’s philosophy that the truth of ideas is judged by their practical consequences (‘cash-value’).

Stream of Consciousness

James’s metaphor for the continuous, flowing, ever-changing nature of conscious experience.

James-Lange Theory of Emotion

Proposal that physiological arousal precedes and causes the subjective experience of emotion.

Ideo-Motor Theory

James’s view that ideas of actions tend automatically to produce those actions unless inhibited.

Reciprocal Antagonism

Münsterberg’s clinical technique of strengthening thoughts opposite to distressing ones to alleviate symptoms.

Paired-Associate Technique

Calkins’s memory method studying how frequency, recency, and vividness affect recall of paired items.

Self-Psychology (Calkins)

Approach emphasising the conscious self as the central fact of psychology, countering impersonal experimentalism.

Recapitulation Theory

Hall’s notion that individual development mirrors the evolutionary stages of the species.

Puzzle Box

Thorndike’s apparatus in which animals learned to escape through trial and error, enabling study of learning laws.

Law of Effect

Thorndike’s principle that behaviours followed by satisfying outcomes are strengthened; annoying outcomes weaken them.

Law of Exercise

Thorndike’s (later discarded) claim that stimulus-response connections are strengthened by use and weakened by disuse.

Identical Elements Theory of Transfer

Thorndike’s idea that transfer of learning depends on the similarity between original and new situations.

Morgan’s Canon

Rule stating that animal behaviour should not be interpreted in terms of higher mental processes when simpler explanations suffice.

Mental Orthopedics

Binet’s exercises aimed at training will, attention, and discipline so children could ‘learn how to learn.’

Systematic Desensitisation Precursor

Münsterberg’s use of reciprocal antagonism foreshadowed behaviour therapy techniques reducing anxiety via opposite responses.

Intentionality (repeat)

(See Brentano) Quality of mental acts being ‘about’ something; foundational for phenomenology and cognitive science.

Savings Curve

Plot by Ebbinghaus showing rapid initial forgetting followed by slower loss over time.

Overlearning (repeat)

(See earlier) Continued rehearsal beyond mastery increasing retention.

Survival of the Fittest

Spencer’s phrase summarising natural selection; later used in social and economic contexts.

Selective Breeding (Artificial Selection)

Deliberate mating for desired traits; Darwin contrasted this with natural selection.

Army Testing Program

WWI mass assessment that popularised psychological testing but had questionable validity; spearheaded by Yerkes.

Functional Periodicity

Hollingworth’s research refuting the idea that women’s intellectual ability fluctuates across the menstrual cycle.

Flywheel of Society (Habits)

James’s metaphor for habit as a stabilising force enabling smooth functioning of individuals and society.

Anthropometry

Measurement of human physical and mental traits; foundational to Galton’s differential psychology.