Key Concepts in Psychology: Historical Perspectives and Theories

APA membership

Membership continued to grow, and began to include associate members who held no voting rights but paid fees.

Associated members

Associated were mostly women and Jewish people, therefore not readily accepted by predominantly white males running APA.

Applied work in APA

Associates were mostly involved in applied work, which APA did not support.

Emergency commitment during WWII

Recognized during the war to incorporate more applied psychologists into clinical work.

Külpé

Student and chief assistant of Wundt who disagreed with Wundt's thoughts on 'psychology was not and could not be a strictly natural science.'

Positivism

Embraced positivism: the observable world is foundational to science.

Experimental psychology at Würzburg

Külpé and his colleagues and students at Würzburg proceeded to develop an experimental psychology on a positivist basis and to include in it complex mental processes, such as thought, that Wundt had declared off-limits.

Focus of psychology according to Külpé

Wanted psychology to focus on what could be observed rather than internal mental states.

Behaviourism

His thoughts came to be labeled as behaviourism.

APA and AAAP during WWII

APA and AAAP joined after this time and were recognized greatly during the war.

Doctoral degree requirement

Agreement between the APA and the VA to make the doctoral degree the entry-level criterion for clinical psychology.

Cooperative research

Psychologists began to engage in research with other disciplines, which increased funding availability and allowed the field of psychology to grow and diversify.

Hull's background

Was a teacher before returning to school to get a doctorate in psychology.

Applied research by Hull

Conducted applied research on links between psychoanalysis and conditioned reflexes on serious problems like bullying and juvenile delinquency.

Mathematical description of learning

Learning was mathematically described in terms that specified linkages among drive (e.g., hunger drive, operationally defined as hours without food), habit strength, reinforcement, and several other variables.

Chains of conditioned reflexes

Learning consists of chains of conditioned reflexes.

Neo-behaviourists

One of the most prominent neo-behaviourists.

Operationism

The definition of scientific constructs in terms of how each one is measured.

Percy Bridgman

Operationism taken from the work of physicist Percy Bridgman.

Tolman's background

Graduated with a degree in theoretical chemistry but went on to pursue graduate study in psychology due to interest.

Latent learning

Believed that organisms are constantly learning about environments but learning wouldn't be demonstrated until called for (latent) and research supported this theory.

Purposive behaviour

Book = purposive behaviour in animals and men.

Goal-directed behaviour

Assumed behaviour was goal directed.

Social Darwinism

A commonly held position in the latter half of the 19th century that used the evolutionary theories of Charles Darwin and Herbert Spencer to suggest that differences between human beings were grounded in the laws of nature.

Erik Erikson

A Danish artist trained by Anna Freud who fled the Nazis and became one of the 20th century's best-known psychologists.

Theory of identity formation

A theory developed by Erik Erikson that became standard fare in most undergraduate courses.

Stages of psychosocial development

Erik Erikson's theory consisting of 8 stages.

Survival of the fittest

The concept that those who are wealthy or successful are so because they are the most fit.

Intelligence testing

A method to determine how well IQ predicts life outcomes, notably reflected in Yerkes army testing.

Gifted children

A term associated with Lewis Terman's research on children with high IQs.

Yerkes army testing

Intelligence testing during WW1 that reflected racial attitudes and concerns in the US.

Gordon Allport

The older brother of Floyd Allport who insisted on the primacy of the individual in social psychology.

Group fallacy

The belief that social behavior can be reduced to the sum of its individual parts.

Social psychology textbook

A published work by Floyd Allport stating that social psychology studies the behavior of individuals in relation to others.

Eugenics movement

A movement that correlated certain racial groups with lower intelligence, often used to justify discriminatory practices.

Paper and pen testing technology

An assessment method used during WW1 to validate the superiority or inferiority of different racial groups.

Lewin's field theory

A theory developed by Kurt Lewin emphasizing the importance of context in understanding individual behavior.

Committee for Research in Problems of Sex (CRPS)

A committee formed in 1921 to organize efforts to understand sexuality.

Action research

A method developed by Lewin during WW2 to work with participants to generate data for social change.

Life space

A concept indicating that personality includes the organism and its psychological environment at a given moment.

Max Wertheimer

The founder of Gestalt psychology as an alternative to the Wundtian tradition.

Gestalt laws of perception

Principles that form the basis of the Gestalt approach to psychology.

Gestalt

A branch of psychological theory that emphasizes holism and methods of understanding-in-context.

Gestalt psychologists

Psychologists interested in studying the relationship between the part and the whole in terms of perception and cognition.

Gestalt (in English)

Means 'form' or 'configuration'.

Wolfgan von Goethe

Imbued the term 'Gestalt' with notions of wholeness that fit within German beliefs in the unity of the people, the community, and the nation.

Gestalt theory

A major alternative to the Wundtian tradition, referred to as gestalt psychology today.

Law of Pragnanz

States that human perception has a tendency toward organization of any whole or Gestalt into as good or as simple a structure as conditions permit.

Law of simple formation

Another name for the Law of Pragnanz.

Dembo

A woman who was a student of Lewin.

Psychotechnics/Psychotechnique

The applications of psychology to work, law, and education, popularized by Munsterberg.

Psychotechnics growth factors

Included labor shortages due to high casualty rates in World War I and the need to reintegrate returning war veterans into the workforce.

Psychotechnique (coined by)

Coined by Perion in France.

Shell Shock

Described soldiers whose behavior was disoriented and hysterical, originally believed to be caused by brain concussion from shells exploding.

Cumulative frustrations

Argued by Dembo to be involved in anger, indicating that anger is not reducible to a stimulus-response analysis.

Experimental situation (by Dembo)

Designed to elicit anger directly by frustrating the participant.

Munsterberg

Popularized the term 'Psychotechnics' after World War I.

Psychotechnics in Germany

Had its most extensive and rapid growth after World War I.

Psychotechnics applications

Involved clients such as the Paris public transport system, two French railroads, and the national education system.

Merleau-Ponty

A philosopher associated with Gestalt theory.

Carl Stumpf

Worked with Gestalt psychologists looking at visual perception.

Koffka and Kohler

Collaborators with Gestalt psychologists.

Albert Einstein

Became friends with a Gestalt psychologist after he left military research.

Phi Phenomenon

Experimental results published by a Gestalt psychologist on apparent movement.

Myers

Coined during WW2 and wrote extensively about the psychological processes of language and perception.

Myers

Held the chair of child psychology and pedagogy at the Sorbonne.

Myers

Intensively studied children's acquisition of language.

Myers

Critiqued and extended the work of the Gestalt psychologists.

Myers

His interest in the descriptive psychology of his time influenced the development of his theories of intersubjectivity.

Behaviorism

An approach to psychology proposed by John B Watson, focusing on observable behavior and being more scientific than introspection.

Myers

Became director of Cambridge psychological laboratory.

Myers

The establishment of psychology as a scientific discipline was primarily due to him.

Myers

Coined shell-shock, highlighting the needs for care of veterans.

Myers

Resigned from Cambridge due to dissatisfaction with academic politics.

Myers

Bartlett was his student.

Myers

Had an interest in applying psychology to the social problems of Britain.

Behaviorism

Its goal was the prediction of behavior.

Skinner's behaviorism

Behavior modification programs were developed to improve classroom behavior and learning.

Rivers

Developed a treatment for 'shell-shock' based on Freudian Talk Therapy.

Emergency Committee in Psychology

Formed to provide national level coordination and oversight of psychology's involvement in the war.

Walter Miles

Chairman of the Emergency Committee in Psychology.

National Research Council (NRC)

Suggested to sponsor a conference on psychology and government service to unify psychology's war efforts.

Emergency Committee in Psychology (ECP)

An interorganizational advisory group formed from the meeting in Washington, DC.

Buhler, Karl & Charlotte

Interested in using assessment techniques to select men suitable for intelligence work.

Office for Strategic Services

Established following America's entry into the war after the intelligence failure of Pearl Harbor.

Kulpes

Research assistant who studied children's cognitive development.

Charlotte Buhler

Focused on the cognitive and personality development characteristic of each stage of growth.

Consumerism

The good life happened everyone was living through consumption.

Duncker

Conducted groundbreaking work on productive thinking and problem solving.

Productive Thinking

Articulated as occurring in stages that are closely connected and may or may not result in sudden insight into the solution.

Perceptual Field

Argued that the perceiver is a part of the perceptual field, not outside it, changing the dynamics of perception.

Skinner

Considered one of America's foremost scientists and influential in behaviourism.

GI Bill

Provided funding for education of the nations veterans, creating conditions for rapid growth and expansion of higher education.

Operant Conditioning

Organisms operating on their environments to produce consequences.

Air Crib

Specialized enclosed baby crib providing a temperature and humidity-controlled environment.

Behaviour Modification

The process of deliberately modifying human or animal behavior through the use of behavioural techniques.

Project Pigeon

Train pigeons to guide missile devices reliably and accurately toward a target.

Clark, Kenneth & Mamie

Conducted studies on racial identification among African American children, crucial evidence in U.S. psychology.

Doll Studies

Research conducted by Mamie on racial self-identification among young black children.

Northside Center for Child Development

Opened by Mamie to support child development in the African American community.