PSYC 4008

What is phrenology?

Belief that mental characteristics correspond to bulges on the skull

Who created phrenology? Who advanced it?

Gall created phrenology, and Spurzheim helped advanced and popularize it

What British empiricist had a mechanistic view to the point that he believed there was no free will?

James Mill

For Locke, what ideas came first as we develop as infants?

Infants are born with no innate ideas. The mind is like a blank slate "tabula rasa”.

How did Locke see the mind at birth? What were his thoughts on innate ideas?

The first ideas we develop come from sensations. Later, we develop ideas through reflection.

Contrast act psychology and Wundt’s approach.

Act psychology: Brentano’s system of psychology, which focused on mental activities rather the contents of consciousness

Wundt’s approach: Focused on conscious experience and studied its elements, especially sensations and feelings, using introspection

How did Wundt view feelings?

Viewed feelings as the subjective complements of sensations. They do not arise directly from a sense organ.

Feeling states in three dimensions: Pleasure/displeasure, tension/relaxation, and excitement/depression

Was Wundt much of a writer?

Yes, he established the first laboratory and edited the first psychology journal. Also wrote on ethics, logic, and systematic philosophy

What did Bessel study? What were his conclusions?

Bessel studied Kinnebrook’s errors in recording the times of star movements.

His conclusion: There are personal differences among people over which they have no control, which he called the “personal equation”. Astronomy was affected by the human observer and that the human observer is important to all sciences

What does “naturalistic” mean?

Progress/changes are inevitable, result of general zeitgeist.

What does “personalistic” mean?

Progress/change are a result of individual contributions

Mind-body problem

The question of the distinction between mental and physical qualities

What did Descartes mean by “dualism”?

He proposed that the mind and body are joined. Mind influences body, and body influences mind, but are separate of each other.

What did Descartes think the use of mathematics in science would produce?

It would lead to clear reasoning and systematic understanding

To whom did Ebbinghaus dedicate his book “The Principles of Psychology”?

Gustav Fechner

Why is Ebbinghaus significant in the history of psychology? What about his methods were impressive?

He investigated learning and memory and showed that Wundt was wrong. Changed the way association, or learning, is studied. He controlled the conditions under which chains of ideas were formed and recorded the rate at which associations were formed

In what ways did Ebbinghaus test higher mental processes that are still in use today?

Research with nonsense syllables: syllables presented in a meaningless series to study memory processes

How did Fechner measure the two lowest levels of sensations? Which two ways?

Absolute threshold and differential threshold.

Absolute threshold: Point of sensitivity below which no sensations can be detected

Differential threshold: Point of sensitivity at which the least amount of change gives rise to a change in sensations

How did Fechner see the relationship between a mental sensation and a material stimulus?

A stimulus increase does not produce corresponding increase in sensation. Rejected Cartesian dualism

What was Fechner’s most important contribution to psychology?

Introduced psychophysics

What was Brentano’s primary research method?

Act psychology, focused on mental activities rather than mental contents

What did Flourens do?

French physiologist who studied brain function using the extirpation method and argued that functions were distributed throughout the brain rather than located in one specific area

Who was Broca? What did he do? What method of research did he use? How is it still used today?

Physician who studied the relationship between brain damage and speech. Used the clinical method, examining patients with language problems and connecting their symptoms to damage in specific brain areas. Still used today to study how brain damage affects behavior and mental abilities

What did Cajal do?

Discovered the direction of travel for nerve impulses

Carl Jung based important decisions on dreams. Who before him also did that?

Freud

What did James Mill stand for? John Stuart Mill?

James Mill: Father, believed that “the mind is a machine”. Mind is a passive entity, run by internal physical forces, no free will and no creative function

John Stuart Mill: Son, disagreed that the mind was a passive machine. Believed complex ideas are more than just the sum of simple ideas

How did Kulpe oppose Wundt? What was his view known as?

Kulpe believed that thought processed could be studied experimentally.

View known as systematic experimental introspection. Imageless thought

What were Helmholtz’s contributions to psychology?

Investigated the speed of the neural impulse and researched external eye muscles and the mechanism that focuses the lens. Developed a theory of color vision.

Why were clocks important in theories related to early psychological thought?

Clock: “Mother of machines”, lead to activities being more regularized and predictable, became model for life

What field does your text say is similar to the study of the history of psychology?

Physiology

What is “determinism”

The doctrine that acts are determined by past events

What is “reductionism”

The doctrine that explains phenomena on one level in terms of phenomena on another level

What is “positivism”

Recognizes only natural phenomena or facts that are objectively observable

What is “Zeitgeist”

Refers to the prevailing spirit, cultural climate, or dominant attitudes of a particular historical period that shape psychological theories, research, and human behavior

What is “innate idea”

Ideas that arise from the mind or consciousness, independent of sensory experiences or external stimuli

Who invented the ophthalmoscope?

Helmholtz

Why is Freud’s historical impact on psychology incomplete?

Much of his work was scientifically limited, culturally biased, and methodologically flawed

What is the state called when a science is still developing yet very divided in different schools of thought?

Pre-paradigmatic

What is the mind-body problem?

The question of the distinction between mental and physical qualities

What is reflex action theory?

The idea that an external object can bring about an involuntary response

What is behaviorism?

Watson, based on observable behavioral acts and an objective methodology.

What did Newton and Galileo have to do with mechanistic theory?

Galileo laid the experimental and conceptual groundwork for mechanistic physics via careful experiments.

Newton built on Galileo’s insights, formulating three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation

How did Babbage’s calculating machine come about?

His desire to automate mathematical calculations and eliminate human errors. Calculator imitated human mental actions

What concept did psychology borrow from physics?

Borrowed the mechanistic spirit

What was Weber’s law related to change in a stimulus?

States that the just noticeable difference (JND) between two stimuli is a constant proportion of the original stimulus. (Simpler, the larger the original stimulus, the larger the change must be for you to notice a difference)

Who is credited with founding psychology?

Wilhelm Wundt

Who was David Kinnebrook and why was he important?

An assistant to an astronomer whose job was to record the times of star movements. He was important because he made observations that were consistently slower than his boss’s was was eventually fired for it.

Bessel later developed the “personal equation” idea from this

What did Titchener say was the first significant advance in learning since Aristotle?

Ebbinghaus’s study of learning and memory to be the first significant advance in the study of learning since Aristotle

What was Hartley’s fundamental law of association? Why was it important?

It was association by contiguity and repetition. Hartley believed that the more frequently two ideas occur together, the more strongly they become associated.

It was important because he applied this law to explain many psychological processes, including: memory, reasoning, emotion, voluntary/involuntary action

What else did Hartley propose besides the fundamental law of association?

He proposed that the mind and psychological processes could be explained mechanically

Who were Marbe and Watt and what were they known for?

Psychologists associated with the Wurzburg school of psychology, challenging some of Wundt’s ideas about conscious thought

Marbe studied thinking and problem-solving and Watt studied thought processes using experimental methods

Supported the idea of “imageless thought”

Sensation

Derived from direct sensory input

Reflection

Forming ideas through this, via sensory input

Simple ideas

Elementary ideas that arise from sensations and reflection

Complex Ideas

Derived ideas that are compounded of simple ideas and can be reduced to small components

Theory of Association

The notion that knowledge results from linking or associating simple ideas to form complex ideas (John Locke)

Primary qualities

Characteristics that exist whether or not we perceive them; do not change (size and shape)

Secondary qualities

Exist in our perception of the object Ex: color and odor

How did Wundt classify sensations?

Sensations are one of the two elementary forms of experienced. Aroused whenever a sense organ is stimulated and the resulting impulses reach the brain

The nature of the body (Descartes)

Physical matter, governed by laws of the physical world: mechanical laws

The doctrine of Ideas

Descartes. Mind produces two kinds of ideas.

Derived ideas: Provided by the direct application of an external stimulus

Innate ideas: Ideas that arise from the mind or consciousness, independent of sensory experiences or external stimuli.

British empiricist that championed women’s rights

John Stuart Mill

Berkeley’s mentalism

Theory that mind and mental states are the only things that truly exist. Physical objects do not exist independently of a mind perceiving them

What did Helmholtz’s research on the speed and nerve impulse suggest?

Neural transmission is not instantaneous, but rather a measurable, physical process traveling at a relatively low speed

What did Fritsch and Hitzig do with electrical stimulation?

Used mild electrical stimulation on the exposed cerebral cortex of dogs to prove that specific brain regions control specific body movements

What was Johannes Muller’s most influential publication?

Elements of Physiology, became standard reference text for medical students and biological scientists across Europe

What did Galvani do related to nerve impulses and the nervous system?

Discovered that electricity can stimulate muscle contractions through the nervous system

Why was Kenneth Clark rejected at Cornell?

Because the university would not tolerate black and white graduate students working closely together. Told that the “institution does not have the co-educational or social facilities to accommodate black students”

Who was the first black president of the APA?

Kenneth Clark in 1966. Presented research in front of SCOTUS in ‘54

Graduate student that had a separate dining room set up for him

Francis Cecil Sumner, at Clark University.

John B. Watson

Early psychologist who burned his personal papers, letters, and research manuscripts shortly before his death

Most important contribution of psychology: Founding the school of behaviorism