Chapter 11 - American Psychology and Functionalism

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In general, Hall urged the study of adolescence because

during this transitional period, the individual was forced to rely on instincts, and therefore adolescence was a very good time to study human instinctual makeup.

What did Hall feel So strongly about that he believed that it, instead of physics, should act as a model for science? from who/what influence was this belief associated with? how did he relate it to his won developmental psychology?

evolutionary theory -he believed that each individual in his or her lifetime reenacted all evolutionary stages of the human species. -This idea, most associated with Ernst Haeckel is called the recapitulation theory of development -During prenatal development, a single-celled organism develops into a newborn child whose capabilities are equal to a number of mammals lower than humans on the phylogenetic scale. -In childhood, there is still evidence of the impulsiveness, cruelty, and immorality that characterized earlier, less civilized stages of human development. -Hall's view was that if these primitive impulses were not given expression in childhood, they would be carried into adulthood. encouraged parents and teachers to create situations to let it out

his ideas contained the seeds that would grow into the school of

functionalism

James believed that much animal and human behavior is governed by what and how does he explain this?

instinct -instinctive behavior is "blind and invariable" --> is modifiable by experience. - new instinct-like patterns of behavior develop within the lifetime of the organism = *learned patterns of behavior habits* -Repetition causes the same neural pathways to, from, and within the brain to become more entrenched, making it easier for energy to pass through those pathways -had a neurophysiological explanation of habit formation, and his account of learning was very close to Pavlov's -Habits are functional because they simplify the movements required to achieve a result, increase the accuracy of behavior, reduce fatigue, and diminish the need to consciously attend to performed actions.

According to pragmatism, which is a cornerstone of functionalism, any belief, thought, or behavior must be

judged by its consequences.

Dewey believed that the concept of democracy has to be

made a living truth in the lives of individuals—in their educational experiences, for example. In several influential books, Dewey described how democratic ideals could be, and should be, translated into social action.

For Carr, what was both necessary in adapting to the environment

perception and behavior, because how the environment is perceived determines how an organism responds to it. ex: Seeing a wild animal in a zoo and seeing one while walking through the forest would elicit two different reactions.

As James had, Dewey embraced

pragmatism. -For both, abstract philosophical concepts were meaningful only insofar as they had practical value.

With his concept of stream of consciousness, James opposed those who were searching for what? and why?

searching for the elements of thought. 1) consciousness is personal. It reflects the experiences of an individual, not common to all minds. 2) Second, consciousness is continuous and cannot be divided up for analysis: 3) Third, consciousness is constantly changing. James quoted Heraclitus's aphorism about the impossibility of stepping into the same river twice. same is true for conscious experience. never have exactly the same idea twice because the stream of consciousness that provides the context for the idea is ever-changing. 4) Fourth, consciousness is selective. Some of the many events entering consciousness are selected for further consideration and others are inhibited. 5) consciousness is functional. the point from which the school of functionalism developed. the thing the elementists overlooked—is that its purpose is to aid the individual in adapting to the environment. (Here we see the powerful influence of Darwin on early U.S. scientific psychology) -Very little in this is compatible with the view held by Wundt or the structuralists. James' famous conclusion concerning consciousness: Consciousness, then, does not appear to itself chopped up in bits. Such words as "chain" or "train" do not describe it fitly as it presents itself in the first instance. It is nothing jointed; it flows. A "river" or a "stream" are the metaphors by which it is most naturally described. In talking of it hereafter, let us call it the stream of thought, of consciousness, or of subjective life. (Vol. 1, p. 239)

compare structuralism vs functionalism

structuralism and functionalism overlapped The schools nicely illustrate Kuhn's concept of paradigm *because their assumptions, goals, and methodologies were distinctly different.* - structuralism and functionalism were incommensurable. ---->For the structuralist, the assumptions concerning the mind were derived from British and French empiricism, the goal was to understand the structure of the mind, and the primary research tool was introspection. --->For the functionalist, the assumptions concerning the mind were derived from evolutionary theory; the goal was to understand how the mind and behavior work influence adjustment to the environment, and research tools included anything that was informative—be it introspection, the study of animal behavior, or the study of the mentally ill.

Harvey Carr wrote Psychology: A Study of Mental Activity which was "concerned with

the acquisition, fixation, retention, organization, and evaluation of experiences, and their subsequent utilization in the guidance of conduct"

what was the uniquely American school of functionalism a blend of?

the doctrine of evolution combined with the U.S. Zeitgeist

Thorndike's work can be seen as representing the transition from what to what?

the school of functionalism to the school of behaviorism.

Like Dewey, Woodworth disagreed with what? what did he propose

those who talked about adjustments to the environment as a matter of stimuli, brain processes, and responses. Woodworth chose the symbols S-O-R (stimulus-organism-response) to designate his theory in order to emphasize the importance of the organism. -He used the term mechanism much as Carr had used the term adaptive act, to refer to the way an organism interacts with the environment in order to satisfy a need. -These mechanisms, or adaptive behavior patterns, remain dormant unless activated by a need (drive) of some type. -Thus, in the same physical environment, an organism acts differently depending on what need, or drive, is present (internal condition --> activates behavior)

James Rowland Angell views on mind body

▪ Mind and body cannot be separated; they act as a unit in an organism's struggle for survival.

Through habit formation, we can make our nervous system our ally instead of our enemy offered five maxims to follow in order to develop good habits and eliminate bad ones.

▪ Place yourself in circumstances that encourage good habits and discourage bad ones. ▪ Do not allow yourself to act contrary to a new habit that you are attempting to develop: "Each lapse is like the letting fall of a ball of string which one is carefully winding up; a single slip undoes more than a great many turns will wind again" (p. 12). ▪ Do not attempt to slowly develop a good habit or eliminate a bad one. Engage in positive habits completely to begin with and abstain completely from bad ones. ▪ It is not the intention to engage in good habits and avoid bad ones that is important; it is the actual doing so: "There is no more contemptible type of human character than that of the nerveless sentimentalist and dreamer, who spends his life in a weltering sea of sensibility and emotion, but who never does a manly concrete deed" (p. 15). ▪ Force yourself to act in ways that are beneficial to you, even if doing so at first is distasteful and requires considerable effort. All of James's maxims converge on a fundamental principle: Act in ways that are compatible with the type of person you would like to become.

Central to Carr's psychology is what he called the adaptive act, which has three components:

(1) a motive that acts as a stimulus for behavior (such as hunger or thirst) (2) the environmental setting or situation the organism is in, (3) a response that satisfies the motive (such as eating or drinking). - Needs must be met for organisms to survive-->Needs motivate behavior--> until an act satisfies the need,--> at which point learning occurs-->next time the organism is in the same situation and experiences the same need-->, the organism will tend to repeat the behavior that was effective previously.

The premises of Hall's argument against coeducation were derived from three concerns of recapitulation:

(a) that adolescence was a critical period in the development of the reproductive organs in women, (b) that the adolescent male needed freedom to engage in cathartic expression of his savage impulses, (c) that natural sexual differentiation during adolescence was the basis for later attraction between the sexes. -part of his concern for the normal development of the female reproductive capacity, was worried about what association with males might do to the "normalization" of the menstrual period:

Sahakian's stage 4?

*Stage Four: U.S. Functionalism -science, concern for practicality, emphasis on the individual, and evolutionary theory combined into the school of functionalism. -marks the beginning with the publication of John Dewey's article "The Reflex Arc in Psychology."

follow Sahakian's (1975) description of the four stages of early U.S. psychology, which begins circa 1640 what is stage 1?

*Stage One: Moral and Mental Philosophy (1640-1776):* - to learn psychology was often to learn the accepted theology of the day. -combined with religious indoctrination. -A period of "American Enlightenment" began w/ John Locke's An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (recall, Locke considered a number of topics clearly psychological in nature—for example, child psychology, the nature of consciousness, the nature of knowledge, and perception). -basis for a logic and a psychology that could be used to support one's religious beliefs. -Roback: Psychology existed for the sake of logic, and logic for the sake of God"

Sahakian's stage 3?

*Stage Three: The U.S. Renaissance (1886-1896):* -->these events marked the beginning of a psychology that was to emphasize individual differences, adaptation to the environment, and practicality (A PSYCHOLOGY COMPATIBLE WITH EVOLUTION) -Titchener began his structuralist program -ground for physiognomy, phrenology, mesmerism, and spiritualism—practices that purported to help individuals live more effective lives. examples: -Herbert Spencer's Principles of Psychology was used as a text at Harvard -John Dewey published Psychology, described the new empirical science. -first American Journal of Psychology, in the United States -William James's The Principles of Psychology was published.

Sahakian's (1975) what is stage 2?

*Stage Two: Intellectual Philosophy (1776-1886)* -psychology became separate discipline in the United States, under the influence of Scottish commonsense philosophy. -The Scottish philosophers: self-examination yields valid information + morality based on self-evident intuitions -God need not be proved logically because one's personal feelings could be trusted on these matters. - respectability of the senses by the Scottish philosophers led to topics like perception, memory, imagination, association, attention, language, and thinking. reminder* (Scottish school was a reaction against philosophers such as Hume, who maintained that nothing could be known with certainty and that moral and scientific laws were merely mental habits) (Scottish philosophers such as Thomas Reid disagreed, saying that sensory information could be accepted at face value (naive realism))

what was James's Crisis

- It was clear to James that if the materialism was correct, it applied to him as well.. His depression, for example, was a matter of fate, and it made no sense to attempt to do anything about it. James's acceptance of Darwin's theory of evolution exacerbated the problem. In Darwin's view, there is variation, natural selection, and survival of the fittest; there is no freedom or choice.

what did throndike say he was wrong about and why?

---->Research had forced him to abandon his law of exercise completely, for he had found that practice alone did not strengthen an association and that the passage of time alone (disuse) did nothing to weaken it. ----->discarded half of the law of effect, concluding that a satisfying state of affairs strengthens an association but that an annoying state of affairs does not weaken one. (In modern terminology, Thorndike found that reinforcement is effective in modifying behavior, but punishment is not.)

ideo-motor theory of behavior:

---> an idea of a certain action causes that action to occur. -He believed that in the vast majority of cases, ideas of actions flowed immediately and automatically (habitually or reflexively) into behavior. -This automatic process continues unless mental effort is expended to purposely select and hold an idea of interest in consciousness. -voluntary action and mental effort were inseparable. -The will functions by selecting one from among many ideas of action --> by controlling our ideas of behavior that we control our actual behavior. -So if we combine James's theories of volition and emotion, what we think determines what we do, and what we do determines how we feel.

if the mental muscle approach was true...why did it seem that more difficult courses produced brighter students? he answered, the mental muscle approach to education with identical elements theory of transfer: which is what? what should schools do and not do?

--> which states that the extent to which information learned in one situation will transfer to another situation is determined by the similarity between the two situations. If two situations are exactly the same, information learned in one will transfer completely to the other. If there is no similarity between two situations, information learned in one will be of no value in the other. -Schools should teach skills that are similar to those that will be useful when students leave school. -Rather than attempting to strengthen the faculties of the mind

Functionalism took on a slightly different appearance under James McKeen Cattell..

-.Cattell did basic research in such areas as reaction time, psychophysics, and mental testing. -followed Galton in assuming that intelligence could be measured by studying sensory and motor abilities. -believed that ideas and methods should always be evaluated in terms of their usefulness: -According to Cattell, almost everyone attempts to apply psychological principles in what they do: "All our systems of education, our churches, our legal systems, our governments and the rest are applied psychology" (1904, p. 186). It is not, then, a matter of whether behavior should be controlled or not. It is a matter of using the most valid knowledge of psychological principles in exercising that control. - had been instrumental in the founding of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), which favored complete academic freedom and tenure

hwo did eh solve his crisis? what chnaged his mind?

-A major turning point in James's life came when he read an essay on free will by Charles-Bernard Renouvier ( -This change in beliefs improved James's depression, and he became highly productive, beginnings of James's pragmatism= the belief that if an idea works, it is valid. -That is, the ultimate criterion for judging an idea should be the idea's usefulness or "cash-value." -conflict between the objective, scientific viewpoint based on determinism and personal, subjective feelings, such as the feeling that one's will is free. -used pragmatism to solve the problem. -While using the scientific method in psychology, he said, it was necessary to assume that human behavior is determined useful but had limits. -Certain metaphysical questions lay beyond the reach of science, and a subjective approach was more useful in dealing with them. -need a scientific and a philosophical approach must be used in the study of human behavior and thought. -not proper for science to determine which aspects of human experience are worthy of investigation and which are not. -proposed a radical empiricism by which all consistently reported aspects of human experience are worthy of study. -explored the phenomenon of religious experience volume that remains the standard text in psychology of religion courses even today.

Hall's Magnum Opus

-Adolescence: Its Psychology and Its Relations to Physiology, Anthropology, Sociology, Sex, Crime, Religion and Education, which focused on a wide variety of topics, including growth norms, language development, diseases of childhood, hygiene, juvenile crime, lying, showing off, bashfulness, fear, curiosity, and friendship. -between ages 14 and 24, -and masturbation during that period was discussed in considerable detail. -Hall rejected the claim that masturbation caused psychosis, or even death, but he did believe it had a number of less severe consequences but the most serious to be on the biological quality of the offender's offspring. -due to acceptance of Lamarckian theory: effects are manifest in the incomplete maturity of mind and body in the next generation; in persistent infantilism or overripeness of children. -To discourage this "evil habit," he said Work reduces temptation and so does early rising.... Good music is a moral tonic.... [C]old is one of the best of all checks.... -focused exclusively on masturbation among boys -Hall opposed coeducation since enhanced sexual sublimation and, thus, facilitated social progress -females are preparing for motherhood, males still have the need to satisfy primitive impulses, and therefore it makes no sense to include both sexes together in the same educational system: -inhibition converts sexual desire into social progress.

James's highly influential Principles appeared in two volumes, 28 chapters, and a total of 1,393 pages. Two years later, James published a condensed version of his Principles titled Psychology: The Briefer Course. The Briefer Course came to be called Jimmy, as the larger Principles was called James.

-Almost everything in Principles can be seen as a critical evaluation of what James perceived Wundt's approach to psychology to be. -James would have seen a remarkable similarity between himself and Wundt. In any case, it was Wundt the experimentalist who, after reading James's Principles, commented, "It is literature, it is beautiful, but it is not psychology" (Blumenthal, 1970, p. 238). -Although James appreciated Fechner's excursions into the supernatural he did not think much of Fechner's scientific endeavors, which had so impressed Wundt -James was more closely aligned with the type of psychology seen in Stumpf. -But within the Principles James tries to offer a fair consideration between the empirical and the rational, between the experimental and the phenomenological.

Edward Lee Thorndike's view on education were similar to whose?

-Also like Galton, Thorndike believed intelligence to be highly heritable. -Thorndike believed that educational experiences should be stratified according to a student's native intellectual ability. -did not believe gender differences in intellectual ability were substantial enough to support arguments against coeducation.

How did James see free will and truth?

-Any belief that helps create a more effective and satisfying life is worth holding, whether such a belief is scientific or religious. -Believing in free will was emotionally satisfying -truth is not something "out there" in a static form waiting to be discovered, as many of the rationalists maintained. truth is something that must be gauged by effectiveness under changing circumstances. -What works is true, and because circumstances change, truth must be forever dynamic.

Mary Whiton Calkins

-Attended seminars with James and worked with Münsterberg in research, but could not be enrolled in Harvard (women were not admitted at this time). -Developed a paired-associate technique to study the influence of frequency, recency, and vividness on memory. -She took (unofficially) the Ph.D. examination but could not receive her degree. -She was offered a degree form Radcliffe College (undergraduate women's college affiliated with Harvard) but refused. -Developed self psychology, which was her major contribution to psychology.

James Rowland Angell, what was his presidential address?

-Both Dewey and Angell eventually served as presidents of the APA -Angell's presidential address, "The Province of Functional Psychology," contrasted functional and structural psychology In his address, Angell made several key points: ▪ Functional psychology is interested in mental operations rather than in conscious elements, but even mental operations in isolation are of little interest ▪ Mental processes mediate between the needs of the organism and the environment. -mental functions help the organism survive. -Behavioral habits allow an organism to adjust to familiar situations -but when an organism is confronted with the unfamiliar, mental processes aid in the adaptive process

How was Münsterberg's theory of voltiion closer to James then Wundt? and what happened to their relationship later on?

-For James ideas cause behavior; -for Münsterberg behavior causes ideas. In fact, there was a closer correspondence between James's theory of emotion and Münsterberg's analysis of voluntary behavior. -As we have seen, the James-Lange theory of emotion: states that consciously experienced emotions are by-products of bodily reactions elicited by a situation. -For Münsterberg the feeling of willful action results from an awareness of covert behavior, or a readiness to act overtly, elicited by a situation. ---->In both cases (emotion for James, the feeling of volition for Münsterberg), conscious experience is a by product (epiphenomenon) of behavior. -Münsterberg elaborated his theory in Voluntary Action, a book that James called a masterpiece and Wundt criticized harshly. -James's pragmatic attitude toward philosophy and psychology began to irritate Münsterberg, who had a more positivistic approach to science. -He was especially appalled by James's acceptance of psychoanalysis and religious phenomena into the realm of psychology. -For Münsterberg, "Mysticism and mediums were one thing, psychology was quite another. -felt very strongly that psychologists should attempt to uncover information that could be used in the real world. -did much to create what is now referred to as applied psychology.

Psychology and Religion: So what was the religious conversion that Hall referred to?

-Hall believed that religious conversion during adolescence was "a natural, normal, universal, and necessary process" but was clear that he was not referring to the acceptance of any religious dogma. -Sin, for him, was not a state of evil but a sense of limitation and imperfection that should be understood psychologically rather than in terms of religious dogma -Rather than embracing a set of religious beliefs, it was the psychological process of subordinating the self to the needs of others. "the great conversion from love of self to love of others" -Several of Hall's beliefs are now considered incorrect—for example, his views of sexuality, especially masturbation, and his claim that religious conversion is normative or even universal in adolescence. -Also, like Spencer but unlike Darwin, Hall believed that evolution meant progress -Still, Hall is generally considered a pioneer in educational, child, and adolescent psychology and in parent education and child welfare programs -Hall's interests in both religion and developmental psychology lasted throughout his life. His Senescence: The Last Half of Life (1922) can be seen as a forerunner of modern life-span psychology as well as an extension of what he started in Adolescence. Hall's Senescence is generally considered a classic in the study of aging. Among the topics covered were a cross-cultural analysis of the treatment of the elderly, sources of pleasure, belief in an afterlife, anxiety concerning death, beliefs about longevity, and recognition of the signs of aging.

why were Hall's views of women were paradoxical (as were Titchener's and Münsterberg's).

-Hall viewed females as vital for the future evolution of the human species, and adolescence should be a period when females are trained for motherhood. -against coeducation, and he believed that the primary role for women was motherhood but was considered one of the institutions most open to female graduate students + highly supportive of female graduate students

Comparative Psychology. relate washburn and morgan?

-In The Animal Mind, Washburn, like Morgan, was primarily interested in inferring consciousness in animals at all phylogenetic levels. -To index consciousness in animals, she summarized hundreds of experiments in such areas as sensory discrimination, space perception, and learning ability. -Although her primary concern was with animal consciousness, her use of controlled behavior to index mental events was similar to the approach taken by many contemporary cognitive psychologists. -Comparative animal psychology flourished under functionalism.

How did Münsterberg deal with mentally ill individuals

-In an attempt to understand the causes of abnormal behavior, Münsterberg saw many mentally ill people. -He applied his "treatment," which consisted mainly of causing his patients to expect to improve, to cases of alcoholism, drug addiction, phobia, and sexual dysfunction, but not to psychosis. -He felt that psychosis was caused by deterioration of the nervous system and could not be treated. -also employed reciprocal antagonism= strengthening the thoughts opposite to those causing problems. -aware of Freud's work, treat symptoms directly, NOT search for the underlying causes of those symptoms.

Animal Research before Thorndike

-Modern comparative psychology clearly started with the works of Darwin, specifically with his book The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals (1872). -Darwin's work was taken a step further by his friend George John Romanes (1848-1894), who wrote a book also titled Animal Intelligence in 1882 and Mental Evolution in Animals in 1884. -In a third book, Mental Evolution in Man (1888), Romanes attempted to trace the evolution of the human mind. -All evidence was anecdotal, however, and he was often guilty of anthropomorphizing, attributed human motives and intelligence to nonhuman animals:. For example, attributed emotions such as anger, fear, and jealousy to fish;

Forensic Psychology

-Münsterberg was the first to apply psychological principles to legal matters, thus creating forensic psychology. -Among other things, he pointed out that eyewitness testimony could be unreliable because sensory impressions could be illusory, suggestion and stress could affect perception, and memory is not always accurate. -wide differences in the individual accounts of what had actually happened. -He believed that harsh interrogation could result in false confessions because some people want to please the interrogators, some need to give in to authority figures, and some very depressed people may feel a need to be punished. -In his book, described an apparatus that could detect lying by observing changes such as those in pulse rate and respiration.

Industrial Psychology

-Münsterberg's Vocation and Learning and Psychology and Industrial Efficiency are usually considered the beginning of what later came to be called industrial psychology. -dealt with such topics as methods of personnel selection, methods of increasing work efficiency, and marketing and advertising techniques. -To aid in personnel selection, for example, he recommended defining the skills necessary for performing a task and then determining the person's ability to perform that task. to learn whether a person had the skills necessary for doing a certain job adequately. -Often, work that some people consider boring is interesting to those doing it. -must take individual differences into account when selecting personnel and when making job assignments.

what did thorndike beleive was the neural mechanism of senses? what was he concerned with?

-Thorndike believed that sense impressions and responses are connected by neural bonds. -believed that probability of a response being made in the presence of a particular sensory event (stimulus) is determined by the strength of the neural connection between the stimulus and the response. -Thorndike's concern was not with how ideas become associated but with how neural connections or bonds between sensory impressions and responses change their strength as a function of experience. Because of this ctheory is often referred to as connectionism.

Thorndike's Puzzle Box

-To investigate systematically the trial-and-error learning that Morgan had described, Thorndike used a puzzle box" EXPERIMENT: -the box was arranged so that if the animal performed a certain response, the door opened, and the animal was allowed to escape; in addition, the animal received a reward such as a piece of fish. From his numerous puzzle-box experiments, Thorndike reached the following conclusions: ▪ Learning is incremental. That is, it occurs a little bit at a time rather than all at once. With each successful escape, subsequent escapes were made more quickly. ▪ Learning occurs automatically. That is, it is not mediated by thinking. ▪ The same principles of learning apply to all mammals. That is, humans learn in the same manner as all other mammals. -With these observations, Thorndike was very close to being a behaviorist. If thinking was not involved in learning, what good was introspection in studying the learning process? And if animals and humans learn in the same way, why not simplify the situation by studying only nonhuman animals?

in EARLY U.S. PSYCHOLOGY it is often assumed what?

-U.S. psychology did not exist before Titchener and William James.

give an example of a U.S textbook that represents stage 2

-U.S. textbooks similar to Scottish philosophers began to appear ex: Noah Porter's The Human Intellect which defined psychology as the science of the human soul----->transitional period psychology was leaving the realm of philosophy and covered such topics as consciousness, sense perception, development of the intellect, association of ideas, memory, and reason.

Münsterberg's Fate

-William James had made psychology popular within the academic world, but Münsterberg helped make it popular with the general public by showing its practical uses. -Münsterberg was highly critical of Americans, saying that they had a general inability to concentrate their attention on any one thing for very long. -He explained this national inability to attend by the fact that, in the United States, women were influential in forming intellectual and cultural development. -The intellectual vulnerability of women also explained the popularity of psychological fads such as seances. While James was attempting to discover if any of the claims of "mediums" were valid, Münsterberg was busy exposing them as dangerous frauds.

Under the influence of evolutionary theory, throndike did what?

-added a behavioral component to associationism. -Rather than focusing on the association of one idea to another, he studied the association between the environment and behavioral responses. -was fucnitonalist but insistence that learning occurs without ideation id close to being a behaviorist

what were Carr's methods which was preffered and why

-although Carr, like the other functionalists, accepted both introspection and experimentation as legitimate methods, the latter became the favored research technique. -One reason for this preference was the growing success of animal research in which introspection was, impossible. -Showing both the pragmatism that characterized functionalism and a similarity to Wundt's Völkerpsychologie,

how did Münsterberg disagree with Wundt on voluntary activity?

-as Wundt's assistant, one of Münsterberg's studied voluntary activities through introspection. -The two men disagreed, however, over whether the will could be experienced as a conscious element of the mind during introspection. -Wundt believed that it could, whereas Münsterberg believed that it could not + did not believe that will was involved in voluntary behavior at all, we consciously experience this bodily preparedness and confuse it with the will to act., what we experience consciously as will is an epiphenomenon, a by-product of bodily activity. -This idea, was diametrically opposed to Wundt's interpretation of voluntary behavior. -For Wundt, volitional behavior is always preceded by a conscious will to act. Although James would never have removed consciousness as a causal element in his analysis of voluntary (willful) behavior, he did see in Münsterberg's position some support for his ideo-motor theory of behavior.

To account for his research findings, Thorndike developed psychology's first major theory of learning.

-combined associationism and hedonism -early version of his theory consisted mainly of the laws of exercise and effect. --->The law of exercise had two parts: 1) the law of use = the more often an association (neural connection) is practiced, the stronger it becomes. (This was essentially a restatement of Aristotle's law of frequency) 2) the law of disuse= the longer an association remains unused, the weaker it becomes. ---->early law of effect was: - that if an association is followed by a "satisfying state of affairs," it will be strengthened, - if it is followed by an "annoying state of affairs," it will be weakened. -In modern terminology, reinforcement strengthens behavior whereas punishment weakens it.

Conwy Lloyd Morgan sought to

-correct Romanes's excesses by applying the principle that has come to be known as Morgan's canon: which is often mistakenly interpreted as an argument against speculation about the existence of private thoughts and feelings in nonhuman animals. -however, believed that both human and nonhuman behavior is purposive and that purposes or intentions are experienced mentally. Rather than avoiding mentalism, he argued that comparative psychology would be impossible unless both humans and nonhumans possessed mental processes. -Morgan believed that mental events facilitate survival and that there is a gradation of those events across species. -was also mistakenly believed to be an argument against anthropomorphizing. but contrary believed that the cognitive processes of nonhuman animals could be understood only relative to our own

what is James views on The Self

-discussed what he called the empirical self, or the "me" of personality, which consists of everything that a person could call his or her own: divided the empirical self into three components: 1) the material self: consists of everything material that a person could call his or her own, such as his or her own body, family, and property. 2) the social self: is the self as known by others. "A man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him and carry an image of him in their mind" 3) the spiritual self. consists of a person's states of consciousness. It is everything we think and also includes the emotions associated with our various states of consciousness. experience of one's subjective reality. -The empirical self (theme) is the person as known by himself or herself, but there is also an aspect of self that does the knowing (the I). -the self is "partly known and partly knower, partly object and partly subject" J -dealing with the "me" was much easier than dealing with the "I," or what he called "pure ego." -similar to older philosophical and theological notions such as "soul," "spirit," and "transcendental ego."

what did Francis Cecil Sumner do?

-first African American to receive a Ph.D. in psychology. -Argued for segregated higher education; -pragmatic way to obtain funding for African American higher education. -Developed major center for training African American psychologists,came to be known as the "Black Harvard"

FUNCTIONALISM AT CHICAGO John Dewey

-functionalism was founded by john Dewey - never a well-defined school of thought as structuralism was,

James's Contributions to Psychology

-incorporate evolutionary theory into psychology: By stressing what is useful, he represented a major departure from the pure psychology of both voluntarism and structuralism. -For James, as well as for the functionalists who followed him, usefulness defined both truth and value. -James expanded research techniques in psychology by not only accepting introspection but also encouraging any technique that promised to yield useful information about people. -By studying all aspects of human existence—including behavior, cognition, emotions, volition, and even religious experience—James also expanded the subject matter of psychology. -James's ideas are not only considered foundational for functional psychology and pragmatic philosophy, but can be seen in behaviorism, cognitive science, and existential-phenomenological psychology (Henley, 2007), as well as clinical psychology (Howard, 1992).

what was Kenneth Clark's influence?

-pioneer work on the developmental effects of prejudice, discrimination, and segregation on children. -Extremely instrumental in the efforts to desegregate the school systems. -Clark went on to become the first African American president of the APA

Dewey's Analysis of Behavior in Terms of Reflexes, what was James' influence

-primary argument: shouldn't divide the elements of a reflex into sensory processes, brain processes, and motor responses for analysis -dividing behavior into elements was no more justifiable than dividing consciousness into elements. -influence of James's Principles, Dewey claimed that there is a stream of behavior just as there is a stream of consciousness. -->coordinated system directed toward a goal, and this goal is usually related to the survival of the organism. ex: a child touching a candle flame as an example.

So what was the purpose of Morgan's canon?

-purpose was to avoid anthropocentrism, the belief that nonhuman cognitive processes are the same as those of humans. -problem with the anecdotal evidence provided by Romanes and others was that it equated human and nonhuman intelligence -elieved that nonhuman animals could not possibly possess many of the human attributes that Romanes and others had attributed to them

As an evolutionist, Dewey thought that

-social change was inevitable, + could be influenced positively by proper plans of action. -created "progressive" education in the United States. -education should be student-oriented rather than subject-oriented, best way to learn something was to do it— not memorization, drills, -purpose of education is to transmit traditional knowledge. -Material should never be presented as something final or complete but in a way that stimulates personal interest in learning and the development of problem-solving skills, creative intelligence and prepare children to live effectively in a complex society.

Hall had many interests, even the histories of philosophy and psychology, to which he made significant contributions his legacy then and now was primarily in two areas, what were they?

-the psychology of religion and developmental psychology across the life span.

James was among the first to examine the circumstances under which people feel good or bad about themselves. He concluded that a person's self-esteem is determined by..... and one cold increase their self-esteem either by....

-the ratio of things attempted to things achieved: Self-esteem = Success Pretensions -one could increase self-esteem either by succeeding more or attempting less:

What methodology did James beleive should be used?

-urged the use of both introspection and experimentation, as well as the study of animals, children, preliterate humans, and abnormal humans. -encouraged the use of any method that would shed light on the complexities of human existence; he believed that nothing useful should be omitted.

Robert Sessions Woodworth, what was he interested in? and what was his brand of psychology?

-was interested in what people do and why they do it -primarily interested in motivation, so he called his brand of psychology dynamic psychology.

Thorndike and Woodworth combined their skills to examine what?

...the contention that the faculties of the mind could be strengthened by practicing the attributes associated with them. -For example, it was believed that studying a difficult topic, such as Latin, could enhance general intelligence. -Such a belief was sometimes called the "mental muscle" approach to education and sometimes formal discipline.

Heidbreder divided the functionalistic movement into three phases:

1) its initiation by Dewey 2) its development under Angell's leadership 3) its preservation as a definite influence by Carr"

CHARACTERISTICS OF FUNCTIONAL PSYCHOLOGY: Amid functionalism's diversity Keller explains common themes ran through the work, what were they?

1) never a well-defined school of thought with one recognized leader or a singular methodology. 2) opposed what they considered the sterile search for the elements of consciousness (which structuralists engaged) 3) The functionalists wanted to understand the *function* of the mind rather than provide a static description of its contents. (mental processes function to aid the organism in adapting to the environment). interested in the --> "is for" of the mind rather than the "is," 4) wanted psychology to be a practical science, not a pure science, and they sought to apply their findings to the improvement of personal life, education, industry, and so on. 5) urged the broadening of psychology to include research on animals, children, and abnormal humans. 6) accepted an eclectic methodology; from mazes to mental tests. 7) interest in the "why" of mental processes and behavior led directly to a concern with motivation. (why organism will act differently in the same environment as its needs change) 8) accepted both mental processes and behavior as legitimate subject matter for psychology, and most of them viewed introspection as one of many valid research tools. 9) tended to be more ideographic than nomothetic,

In 1907, James published Pragmatism (dedicated to the memory of John Stuart Mill), in which he delineated two types of personality: what is the relationship between pragmatism and these two types of personlaity? what is its purpose?

1) the tender-minded: Tender-minded people are rationalistic (principle-oriented), intellectual, idealistic, optimistic, religious, and dogmatic, and they believe in free will. 2) the tough-minded. Conversely, toughminded people are empiricistic (fact-oriented), sensationalistic, materialistic, pessimistic, irreligious, skeptical, and fatalistic. ---> pragmatism as a way of compromising between the two worldviews. The pragmatist simply takes from each list whatever works best in the circumstances at hand. -criterion of the validity of an idea, according to the pragmatist, is its usefulness. -embraced parapsychology and in 1884 was a founder of the American Society for Psychical Research.

what is kinship between Vaihinger's philosophy of "as if" and James's pragmatism.

Both insisted that words and concepts be judged by their practical consequences. For both, arriving at concepts such as God, free will, matter, reason, the Absolute, and energy was not the end of a search for knowledge but a beginning. The practical consequences of such concepts must be determined:

William James (1842-1910) represents a transition between

European psychology and U.S. psychology.

where do we consider the origins of academic psychology?

Germany.

how did morgan lead to throndike?

Morgan's report of his dog's behavior describes the trial-and-error learning that was to become so important in Thorndike's research Now the question in any such case is: How did he learn the trick? -chanced to gaze out under the latch, lifting it with his head. He withdrew his head and looked out elsewhere but the gate had swung open. -Here was a fortunate occurrence arising out of the natural tendencies of a dog. But the association between looking out just there and the open gate ... is somewhat indirect. - In this case the lifting of the latch was unquestionably hit upon by accident, and the trick was only rendered habitual by repeated association in the same situation of the chance act and happy escape. Once firmly established, however, the behaviour remained constant. . -oncidentally, Bain (Chapter 5) had described essentially the same kind of trial-and-error learning as Morgan described above in 1855.

what are the three elements of a reflex according to dewey?

The analysis of such behavior in terms of reflexes claims that the child sees the flame of a candle (S) and grasps it (R). The resulting pain (S) then elicits withdrawal (R). According to this analysis, nothing changes, nothing is learned. -In reality, however, the experience of being burned changes the child's perception of the flame, and he or she will avoid it next time. -This, according to Dewey, could happen only if the child was still observing the flame while being burned and withdrew. -Thus, the so-called stimuli and responses are not separate but form an interrelated sequence of functional events. -Indeed, for the child, the candle flame is no longer the same stimulus; it now elicits avoidance. -all behavior be viewed in terms of its function—to adapt the organism to its environment. -To study elements of the adaptive act in isolation causes one to miss the most important aspect of the act: its purposiveness.

How do we look at psychology in the U.S without titchner? why is that important?t what was Titchner missing according to functionalists?

Titchener's brand of psychology in the United States, which he called structuralism, was essentially a psychology of pure consciousness which according to functionalists, was missing concern for practical applications.

what were the studies by Clark and Clark (1947) and Deutscher and Chein which led to the Supreme Court to conclude that "segregation was psychologically damaging both to minority and majority children" ? (the brown case)

a) Clark and Clark (1947), in which two- to seven-year-old black children were shown two sets of dolls that were identical except for skin and hair color. -majority of the black children judged the white dolls to have the "nice color" and indicated that they would be their preferred playmates. -Also, when the black children were instructed to "give me the doll that looks like you," 39% of them chose the white doll. b) Deutscher and Chein (1948), social scientists on the effects of enforced segregation were surveyed. unanimous opinion that enforced segregation had detrimental effects on black children, and slightly fewer (83%) also believed it also had detrimental effects on white children.

Clark has been criticized for...

abandoning the neutral objectivity of a scientist and, instead, becoming a political advocate

what does Titchener and Cattell disagree upon? what was the problem with Cattell and Titchener's argument?

argument: -only experimental psychology was real psychology and that everything else was mental or moral philosophy. -argued forcibly that experimental psychology should be completely separated from philosophy and especially from theology problem: i-gnored the fact that experimental psychology grew out of nonexperimental psychology; and therefore to understand the former, one must understand the latter.

what approach did Woodworth take? what approahc should psychologists take?

believed that psychologists should accept valid information about humans no matter from where it comes, and he believed that psychologists should maintain a middle-of-the-road, or eclectic, attitude

what was Jame's view on mind-body

bodily events cause thoughts and that thoughts cause behavior. - he was an interactionist.


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