History of Psychology Midterm

Descartes

• Mind body dualism

• “I am thinking, therefore, I exist”

• Mind/soul distinct from body

Descartes thought mental processes were

mechanisms of physical body rather than elements of the mind (Perception, emotions, memory, etc. ) and were naturalistic

Descartes believed ____ belonged to mind

Reason

Legacy of Descartes and Locke

Man were now seen as part of the natural world

• Led to research in what this meant for body and brain function 

• Experiment

Locke (Associationism)

Complex ideas were made up of very simple ideas that had combine together

Locke (Empiricism)

knowledge gained through the sense

Locke’s Goal

To find way society could function civilly without conflict and loss of human life

• By helping people form clear and distinct ideas that were free from political and religious influence

• Reject God and innate ideas

Tabula Rasa

Humans are a blank slate at birth (Locke)

Gall - 2 Scientific Contributions

1. Grey matter (cell bodies of nerve cells) and white matter (subcortical brain areas containing nerve cell axons)

2. Demonstrated 2 hemispheres of brain are connected 

Gall is most famous for

Phrenology

Phrenology

a method of discerning mental abilities by reading the bumps on someone’s skull 

Flouren did

Experimental studies on brain specific to local functions, which helped establish scientific norm of experimentation to show facts

Ladd-Franklin studied

vision, colour vision

Mueller developed the doctrine of

Specific nerve energies

• noted that the structure and function of the brain influences our experience rather than objects themselves

Doctrine of specific nerve energies

Each sense is specialized to respond in ways that are unique to each sense (ex. Visual nerves give visual sensations

Darwin

A naturalist, who came up with idea of evolution by natural selection

• Adaption and function

• origin of species

Darwin did 4 Major things

1. Provided evidence that humans are part of nature and subject to the same laws

2. Called attention to the importance of considering behaviour

3. Created a space for studying comparison psychology and developmental psychology

4. Natural selection and human variability - allowed for development of differential psychology, working with diverse populations

Romanes looked at

Animal mental ability (anecdotally) by expanding on darwin’s findings

Law of Conservation of Energy

Energy cannot be created or destroyed; it can only be transformed from one kind to another

Physiognomy

claimed a direct link between physical, outward appearance of a person and one’s inward nature or character 

• Johann Caspar Lavater

• Immanuel Kant 

Declared empirical. But may lay people used their knowledge of physiognomy to assess character 

Psychological Practices

the use of psychological knowledge in making sense of oneself and the world, as well as practical strategies for self and social management

Conduct Books

popular devotional aid for Christians in the 16th and 17th centuries

• Materials in the books were intended to encourage spiritual reflection; self control—of thoughts, sinful impulses, etc—was the intended outcome

Protestant reformation

A movement within the Christian faith that asserted that salvation came by faith alone, and that each believer had a direct relationship with God, not dependent on the Church. This direct relationship required of Christians that they pay careful attention to their inner life and devote themselves to spiritual practices 

• led by Martin Luther, Ulrich Swingi, and John Calvan 

3 Consequences from Protestant Reform

1. Emphasis on personal, private relationship with God and looking inward

2. Faith was seen in daily life, not just Sunday Church

3. Technologies such as the “conduct book” and personal diaries were created to help maintain relationship (kind of liek today’s self help books)

Protesetanism allowed people to

be individuals, where Catholic church mediated salvation, and you had to be a part of the group

Commercial society

People and their relationships were defined by what they bought, sold, produced, including their labor, capital, or land (16th, 17th century England)

Psychological Consequences of Commercial societies (3)

• Can cause focus on material conditions, greed, selfishness

• But actually encouraged sense of social obligation, leading to order and discipline

• Conscience is important 

Adam Smith

Coined invisible hand and moral sentiment to describe the impact of commercial societies

• Supported division of labour, fighting for different work positions

Invisible hand

when every person seeks their own interests, the net result is that the interests of all are served

Moral sentiment

principle that human beings need functioning relationships with other people, and this need makes us mindful of others and guides our actions as we act for our own interests

Industrial revolution

• Mid-1700s in England (differed throughout Eu)

• Greatest dynamic of change in western world to date

• Large boom in industrial and employment growth 

• Factories

• More work, increased wages

• Important to know where you stood in relation to others

• Viewed based on merit vs family lineage

Changes in Family Status in Western Eu and Rnglanf in beginning of 18th century

• Increased emphasis on privacy 

• Greater intimacy and affection within families

• Greater child orientation within the family

Changes in family status / life came from

• More “nuclear families” - outside of household (aunts, uncles, gp)

• From rise of self-reflection, daily devotion to God and autonomy

• No more living with unrelated people

Kant’s 2 proposed domains for reality

1. Noumenal world

   1. External experiences, objects in pure state that exists independent of human experience

2. Phenomenal world 

   1. Internal experiences of nounmenal world, filtered through mental and sensory apparatus 

Why did Kant’s 2 proposed domains of relaity matter

• Step toward understanding mind is active vs passive

• Said it was important to study organizing properties of mind, no other way to observe/manipulate

• Believed psychology would remain historical/philosophical and described vs studied

Herbart

Tried to apply numerical values to different psychology experiences and equilibriums

-Fell short of doing so, but showed applying math could work

Psychophysics

a branch of study involving the physical measurement and quantification of psychological phenomena

Weber developed

Just noticeable differences - through experiences conducted in his own sensations

Just noticeable differences:

the smallest increase in physical intensity of a stimulus that can be reliably discriminated as a sensory experience.

Wundt studied

Visions and perception of space and built on Helmholtz’s work with nerve impulses, at “new” german university

Experimental introspection (wundt)

introduction of laboratory apparatus that would standardize and mechanize presentations of stimuli upon which subjects would report

• Helpful for sensation and perception, not for thought and language

Wundt’s legacy:

father of scientific psychology, but he still believed that there are parts of psychology that can’t be tested using methods of natural science

German education reform

• German Universities had traditionally been organized into 4 schools (faculties): law, theology, medicine, and arts/philosophy

• Degrees for first 3, not art

• in 19th century, educational reform - schools broke away from religious focus and support, and the philosophy and arts, which were once seen as holding low status or prestige, became more important and of interest to people

Helmholtz - Mechaninism

All natural phenomena can be explained in terms of the causal interactions among material particles, without any reference to an external, supernatural force or agency.

James

• Had training on physiology and medicine

• became enthralled with Helmholtz’s work and became interested in learning more about the possibility of the scientific study of psychology

James proposed 3 methods of studying psych:

1. Introspection: looking into our minds and reporting what we see

2. Experimentation: liked Wundt’s introspection

3. Comparison: understanding our minds through comparison with others (darwin?)

Functionalism (James)

Understanding psych should be based on analysis of function vs structure 

Watson

Behaviourism - was uncofmrotable with idea of introspection and interaction with human subjections

Behaviourism:

Focused on observable behaviour, to predict and control

Eugenics

beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population

Positive Eugenics

encourages the interbreeding of eminent individuals to improve the quality of the genetic stock (gall)

Negative eugenics

Method of social and population control that involves restricting the ability of so-called “unfit” individuals to procreate, often through sex-segregation or enforced sterilization

Cerebral Localization

The idea that specific functions are associated with particular areas of the brain

Consciousness

Awareness of thoughts, perceptions, and experiences

Deism

the belief that although god had designed the universe and set the clockwork of life in motion, he had no direct influence, and did not intervent in the day to day life of human beings

Dreams

royal road to the unconscious

• Manifest content = superficial

• Latent content = real meaning

Upham

Wrote Elements of Mental Philosophy

• broke the study of the mind into many topics that are familiar to us today (sensation and perception, attention, consciousness, memory, reasoning, emotion, etc)

• Tried to find lawful relationships among large body of factors

• still tied to the belief that the human mind was created by God

McCosh

• Believed that evolution was God’s handiwork as well

Hypnosis

A trance-like state with heightened focus and suggestibility

Mesmerism

therapeutic technique developed late 18th century, based on the idea of animal magnetism—a supposed natural energy that could be manipulated to heal ailments. It involved inducing a trance-like state and was an early precursor to hypnosis.

Mesmer

• Mesmerism

• Believed individuals in this state could be directed to perform physical or psychological tasks they couldn’t normally do, and typically wouldn’t remember upon “awakening”

• Allowed for an exploration of the hidden inner workings of the mind (according to theorists)

Hall

• Student of William James , ended up more as a rival

• James supported exploration of psychical phenomenon and Hall dismissed it entirely

• Shady guy

• Founded APA

Spirtualism

• Renewed interest in 19th century america

• involved communication with the spirit realm and many other psychic phenomena, including telepathy

• Some sought to connect immortality of souls and afterlife to science to validate their claims 

• Embraced during civil war

• During last quarter of 19th century, spiritualism = psychology 

Charcot

• interested in the “anatomical-clinical” method, which helped clinicians determine signs and symptoms of diseases through the use of autopsy – this had yet to be applied to neurology but he began this journey

• Believed trauma could lead to hysteria

• Saw connections between hypnotism and hysteria, often bringing on hysteria and resolving it in public lectures, using hypnosis.

Freud

-Psychotherapy

-built off work of charcot

-Proposed hysterical symptoms were based in memories with such powerful emotions they become too difficult to recall - energy converts into hysterical symptoms 

• Didn’t like hypnosis, developed free association 

• Dream analysis 

Common Sense Realism

The belief that the world exists as we perceive it, without the need for deep skepticism

Cattell

• Instrumental to bringing “mental tests” to the attention of the public in 1890

• Studied unter wundt

Psychoanalysis

looked at relationship between emotions, mental processes and illness 

Therapeutic Nihilsm

The belief that medical treatment is often ineffective and should be approached with skepticism.

• Allowed for new therapies to be tried; experimental psychologists were asked to join asylums to help in understanding and assessing pathology

Binet

• Worked with charcot 

• through testing on his daughters, he came to believe that intelligence of children and adults differed, and that there were different kinds of intelligence.

• Individual psychology

3 Beliefs of Intelligence (Binet)

• intelligence can take many forms

• individuals were unique in their kind of intelligence

• it was impossible to sum up someone’s intelligence in a single number or score

Individual psychology

a research program developed by Alfred Binet and Victor Henri in which they sought to develop a set of tests of psychological processes that could provide a complete picture of a person’s abilities.

Binet-Simon Test

• 30 tasks that looked at “mental age” 

• Snapshot of time (not future)

• Thought children could improve scores through mental orthopedics

William Stern Created

IQ by dividing mental age by chronological age to measure how behind or advanced they may be 

Age of Enlightenment

• Period in the 18th century characterized by humans beginning to be led by reason/science vs faith/superstition

• Age of Reason

Maddness = lack of reason 

Godddard

• Heard about the Binet-Simon test in Europe and brought it back to US where he determined that it did a pretty good job of classifying levels of “retardation” in the residents in him home for the “feebleminded”

• Didn’t believe intelligence could change, believed in neg eugenics, but people didn’t like this so he advocated for institutionalization and segregation of the sexes

Intelligence Test

-Despite no clear understanding of exactly what these tests were testing, or what intelligence actually was, the development of these tests, as well as the use of them to make important decisions about where people should be placed academically and vocationally continued because it was seen as useful and profitable

Terman

• Revised the Binet test to establish the Stanford-Binet (named after Stanford University)

• began the practice of multiplying the quotient of mental age over chronological age by 100 to get a single number, which is what we now refer to as IQ

• Intelligence is consistent throughout one’s life 

• Standard intelligence test until mid 20th century 

Hysteria

A psychological disorder characterized by exaggerated emotions, sensory disturbances, or physical symptoms without a clear medical cause.

Yerkes

led the Committee on the Psychological Examination of Recruits which was to test the intelligence of army recruits to recommend their placement in the military

Yerkes, Term and Coddard worked to

develop a test that could screen out mental deficits but also helped the army make basic personnel decisions

These tests produced Army:

Army Alpha (literate in english) and Army Beta (illiterate)

Concerns with WW1 Testing

validity and administration of testing, along with a lack of discussion about how education may play a role in outcomes, rather than just innate ability, leading to discrepancies that fueled racism and eugenics