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1 - Psychology: Evolution of a Science Flashcards

1
Q

William James

A

18 years old, liked to draw/paint, liked studying biology but doubted a naturalist’s salary would support a family, attended Harvard

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2
Q

Why was James struggling at Harvard and what happened because of it?

A

He lacked enthusiasm. With encouragement from faculty, he put medical studies on hold and joined biological expedition in Amazon.

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3
Q

What happened when James came back to Harvard?

A

His mental and physical health deteriorated. He was forced to leave med school again, this time to travel around Europe (he could speak 5 lang, so lang barrier wouldn’t be a problem). This is when he learned of a new science: psychology.

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4
Q

What happened after James went to Europe?

A

He came back and finished his med degree. He became a prof at Harvard and devoted the rest of his life to psychology.

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5
Q

What book did James write and why was it significant?

A

The Principles of Psychology, still widely read and remains one of the most influential books ever written in psychology

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6
Q

Psychology

A

The scientific study of mind and behaivour

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7
Q

The Mind

A

the private inner experience of perceptions, thoughts, memories, and feelings… (an ever flowing stream of consciousness)

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8
Q

Behaviour

A

Observable actions of human beings and nonhuman animals (The things we do in the world, by ourselves or with others)

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9
Q

What are the bases of perceptions, thoughts, memories, and feelings, or our subjective sense of self?

A

Electrical and chemical activities in our brains

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10
Q

What is an fMRI and how is it used in psychology?

A

Stands for functional magnetic resonance imaging, allows scientists to scan a brain to determine which parts are active when a person reads a word, sees a face, etc.

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11
Q

How does the mind usually allow us to function effectively in the world?

A

Adaptive psychological processes

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12
Q

Adaptive Psychological Processes

A

They promote the welfare and reproduction of organisms that engage in those processes. ex: perception = recognize predators, language = communicate and cooperate with others, memory = avoid solving the same problems over and over, emotion = react quickly to events that have life/death significance, promote social bonds

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13
Q

Why does the mind occasionally function so ineffectively in the world?

A

People often operate on “auto-pilot”, behave automatically, relying on well-learned habits that they execute without thinking. ex: saying sorry when bumping into an inanimate object

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14
Q

** Procrastination **

A

students who procrastinate: less stressed months before, but super stressed right before deadline; students who don’t procrastinate: more stressed months before but less stressed right before deadline

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15
Q

Nativism

A

The philosophical view that certain kinds of knowledge are innate or inborn ex: Plato believed language was innate

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16
Q

Tabula Rasa

A

“blank slate”

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17
Q

Philosophical Empiricism

A

The view that all knowledge is acquired through experience ex: Aristotle believed language was acquired

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18
Q

Rene Decartes’s belief of the mind

A

The physical body was a container for the non-physical thing called the mind

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19
Q

Dualism

A

The body and the mind are fundamentally different thing, ie. the body is made of material substance and the mind/soul is made of immaterial/spiritual substance

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20
Q

Pineal Gland

A

Decartes suggested the mind influences the body through the pineal gland, largely alone in this view

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21
Q

What is the problem with dualism?

A

How mental activity can be reconciled and coordinated with physical behaviour, ex: How does the mind tell the body to put a foot forward, but say ouch when we step on a nail?

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22
Q

Thomas Hobbes’s idea of mind and body

A

Mind and body aren’t different things at all, rather, the mind is what the brain does; ie, looking for the place where the mind meets the body is like looking for the palce in a TV that the picture meets the flat panel display

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23
Q

Franz Joseph Hall

A

Thought the brains and minds were linked by size rather than by glands. He examined the brains of animals/people who died with disease and compared to healthy brains and observed mental ability often increases with larger brain size and decreases with brain damage

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24
Q

Phrenology

A

A now defunct theory that specific mental abilities and characteristics, ranging from memory to the capacity for happiness, are localized in specific regions of the brain. Despite a initial large following, the theory was quickly discredited.

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25
What parts of phrenology are right and which are wrong?
Brain damage does indeed impair the function of certain functions of the brain depending on which parts are damaged. Different parts of the brain are specialized for specific psychological functions. The size of bumps/indentions on the skull does not reflect the size of the brain regions underneath it.
26
Broca's area
A small part on the left side of the brain. Paul Broca had a patient that had damage to this part of the brain who was unable to speak and could only say "tan", yet could understand everything spoken to him and could communicate using gestures.
27
What was the significance of Broca's patient?
Crucial insight that damage to a specific part of the brain impaired a specific mental function, demonstrating that the brain and mind are closely linked. At this time, many people accepted Descartes's idea that mind was separate form but interacts with the body.
28
Physiology
The study of biological processes, especially in the human body.
29
Hermann von Hemholtz
Developed method of measuring speed of nerve impulses in frog's leg, which he adapted for human studies. Applied stimulus to different parts of the leg and recorded reaction times.
30
What was found from Hemholtz's experiment?
People took longer to respond when the toe was stimulated vs the thigh, and the difference in reaction times allowed speed of nerve impulses to be measured.
31
Why was Hemholtz's experiment significant?
Showed that mental processes don't occur instantaneously and that reaction times could be a useful tool in studying the mind and brain.
32
Wilhelm Wundt
Hemholtz's reasearch assistant, taught the first course in physiological psychology, wrote book Principles of Physiological Psychology, opened first laboratory devoted exclusively to psychology. Concentrated on the relationship between elements of consciousness.
33
Consciousness
A person's subjective experience of the world and the mind.
34
Structuralism
The analysis of the basic elements that constitute the mind. Involved breaking down consciousness into elemental sensations and feelings.
35
Introspection
The subjective observation of one's own experience.
36
How was introspection analyzed?
Observers presented with a stimulus (generally colour or sound) and asked to report introspections (like brightness, loudness), raw sensory experience. Also attempted to describe feelings associated with elementary perceptions (which clicks were more pleasant?)
37
Raw Sensory Experience
Ex: looking at a page of the book and describing a series of black marks, some straight and some curved against white background.
38
Describe Wundt's button test
People were told to press the button when a tone sounded. Some were told to concentrate on percieving the tone while others were told to concentrate on pressing the button. The latter had faster reaction times. Both groups had to register the tone in their consciousness (perception) but only the slower ones had to interpret the significance of the tone.
39
Edward Titchener
Studied with Wundt for 2 years, then came to USA and set up psych lab in Cornell University. Focused on identifying the basic elements of consciousness.
40
Functionalism
The study of the purpose mental processes serve in enabling people to adapt to their environment.
41
What inspired Jame's thinking?
Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.
42
Natural Selection
Charles Darwin's theory that the features of an organism that help it survive and reproduce are more likely than other features to be passed on to subsequent generations.
43
How does functionalism relate to natural selection?
Mental abilities must have evolved because they helped people solve problems and increased their chances of survival. James reasoned that consciousness must serve an important biological function and the task of psychologists is to understand what those functions are.
44
G Stanley Hall
Studied under both Wundt and James, focused on development and education, strongly influenced by evolutionary thinking. Founded American Journal of Psychology (first psych journal)
45
What was Hall's theory?
As children develop, children pass through stages that repeat the evolutionary history of the human race.
46
Hysteria
A temporary loss of cognitive or motor functions, usually as a result of emotionally upsetting experiences
47
Jean Martin Charcot and Pierre Janet discovered what?
Symptoms in hysteria patients disappeared when put under hypnosis, but reappeared when woken up again.
48
How was Freud influenced by work with hysteric patients?
He developed theories to explain their strange behaviours and symptoms, theorized that seemingly lost memories revealed their presence in an unconscious mind.
49
Unconscious
The part of the mind that operates outside conscious awareness but influences conscious thoughts, feelings, and actions
50
Psychoanalytical theory
An approach that emphasizes the importance of unconscious mental processes in shaping feelings, thoughts, and behaviours.
51
Psychoanalysis
Bringing unconscious material into conscious awareness to better understand psychological disorders
52
Why was psychoanalytical theory so controversial?
Implied that understanding a person's thoughts, feelings, and behaviour required a thorough examination of one's early sexual experiences and unconscious sexual desires.
53
**Traits of Freud's followers**
Most trained as physicians, did not conduct experiments in laboratory, did not hold positions at universities, developed ideas in isolation from research-based approaches
54
Why are Freud's ideas less influential today?
His view of human nature was dark, emphasized limitations and problems. Post WWII America was positive and upbeat and Freud was out of step with the times. Also, they were difficult to test and a theory that can't be tested is of limited use; psychologists began to have serious misgivings about his theory.
55
Humanistic Psychology
An approach to understanding human nature that emphasizes the positive potential of human beings. Therapists and clients were on equal footing, vs psychoanalyst and patient
56
Behaviourism
Advocated that psychologists restrict themselves to the scientific study of objectively observable behaviour, because it is difficult to establish with much certainty what is going on in people's minds. Sometimes known as stimulus-response (S-R) psychology.
57
The Animal Mind
Written by Margaret Floy Washburn in 1908, reviewed what was then known about perception, learning, and memory in different animal species. Argued that nonhuman animals have conscious mental experiences.
58
Ivan Pavlov's experiment
Found that the sound of the tone was a sti,ulus that influenced the salivation of the dogs
59
Response
An action or psychological change elicited by a stimulus
60
Burrhus Fredrick Skinner's experiment
Built a "conditioning chamber" (what would be come to known a "Skinner box"). The box had lever that would dispense food. Once the rat discovered the bar, the rate of pressing would increase dramatically until the rat was no longer hungry. This was evidence for the principle of reinforcement.
61
Reinforcement
The consequences of a behaviour determine whether it will be more or less likely to occur again.
62
Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971) and Walden II (1948/1986)
Written by Skinner in which he laid out vision of utopian society in which behaviour was controlled by judicious application of the principle of reinforcement. Claimed that our subjective sense of free will is an illusion and when we are exercising "free will" we are actually responding to present and past patterns of reinforcement, that is, our sense of "choosing" is an illusion
63
Why was behaviourism replaced?
1. It ignored mental processes and found itself unable to explain things like how children learn language 2. It ignores the evolutionary history of organisms it studied; ex: why do rats learn to associate nausea with food more quickly than with a tone or light?
64
Max Wertheimer
Focused on illusions. Used the experiment in which two lights were flashed quickly on a screen. When flashes were slow, two lights could be distinguished, but when they were faster, they were perceived as a single light moving back and forth
65
Illusions
Errors of perception, memory, or judgment in which subjective experience differs from objective reality
66
Gestalt Psychology
A psychological approach that emphasizes that we often perceive the whole rather than the sum of the parts
67
Sir Frederic Bartlett
British psychologist, focused on memory. Tried to discover how quickly nonsense, three letter sylables could be memorized and recalled. Found that participants often remembered what should have/expected to happen instead of what actually happened
68
Jean Piaget
Swiss psychologist studied perceptual and cognitive errors to gain insight to nature and development of human mind. Ex: clay in mounds
69
Kurt Lewin
Argued that person's behaviour in world could be predicted best by understanding the person's subjective experience of the world (ex: watching soap opera is meaningless unless one thinks about the character's experiences). Realized that it was not the stimulus but rather the person's construal of the stimulus that determined person's behaviour.
70
Cognitive Psychology
The scientific study of mental processes, including perception, thought, memory, and reasoning. Influenced by the advent of computers.
71
Donald Broadbent
First to study what happens when people try to pay attention to several things at once. Observed pilots can't attend to many different instruments at once and must actively move focus of their attention from one to another.
72
George Miller
Pointed out that we can pay attention to, and briefly hold in memory, about seven (give or take two) pieces of information.
73
Noam Chomsky
Pointed out that even young children generate sentenced they have never heard before, and therefore cannot possibly be learning language through reinforcement. This critique of Skinner's theory signaled end of behaviourism's dominance and helped spark the development of cognitive psychology.
74
Karl Lashley
Performed series of studies in which he trained rats to run mazes, surgically removed parts of their brains and measured how well they could run the mazes again. He couldn't find a percice spot where learning occurred, but found that the more brain removed, the more poorly a rat performed.
75
Behavioural Neuroscience
An approach to psychology that links psychological processes to activities in the nervous system and other bodily processes; developed from research area called physiological psychology
76
Cognitive Neuroscience
A field of study that attempts to understand the links between cognitive processes and brain activity
77
Evolutionary Psychology
Explains mind and behaviour in terms of the adaptive value of abilities that are preserved over time by natural selection (ex: lab rats still associate nausea with food before light b/c in nature, nausea is usually caused by food, and their ancestors knew this)
78
Sociobiology
Established evolutionary psychology as an identifiable presence in psychology
79
Social Psychology
The study of the causes and consequences of sociality. (ex: Hawthorne effect)
80
German Scientists
Immigrated to America during Nazi regime; influenced by Gestalt theory, first to generate theories of social behaviour that resembled the theories generated by natural scientists, and were the first to conduct experiments to test these theories
81
Examples of how historical events have influenced social psychology?
Holocaust -> problems of conformity and obedience | Civil rights movement -> sterotuping, prejudice, racisim
82
Cultural Psychology
the study of how cultures reflect and shape the psychological processes of their members. One of the first to pay attention to the influence of culture was Wilhelm Wundt
83
When did cultural psychology begin to emerge as a strong force?
When psychologists and anthropologists began to communicate with each other about their ideas and methods during the 80s and 90s
84
Absolutism
Holds that culture makes no difference for most psychological phenomena (ie: honesty is honesty and depression is depression, no matter where one observes it)
85
Relativism
Psychological phenomena are likely to vary considerably across cultures and should be viewed only in context of a specific culture
86
APA
American Psychological Association, formed by William James, G Stanley Hall, and five other psychologist July 1892.
87
APS
Association for Psychological Science (formerly American Psychological Society), formed in 1988 as an organization that focused specifically on the needs of psychologists carrying out scientific research
88
Marry Calkins
First woman to serve as president of the APA, studied under William James
89
Kenneth Clark
First president of minority group, studied the development effects of prejudice, discrimination, and segregation on children
90
Rene Decartes (class)
Rationalism, truth through reason, knowledge is innately present; the world and man as a machine, behaviour controlled by environmental stimulation, reflexes; man is unique b/c he possesses a mind; dualism, mind =/= matter, mind controlled by movement of body and body provides mind w/ info about environment. Garden Fountains, philosophy **bringing rationalism into thinking to explain things
91
Hermann von Hemholtz (class)
Investigated speed of elec. transmis. in nerves. | philosophy -> imperical biology => testing theories
92
Ernst Weber (class)
Measured magnitude of human sensation; Just Noticable Difference, distinguishing difference in stimuli follow orderly laws Biology
93
Wilder Penfield (class)
Canadian @ McGill Uni; brain surgery and mapping, exposed brain and stimulated certain areas Biology
94
William Wundt (class)
1st psychologist, 1st lab, decided to study consciousness
95
Structuralism (class)
Edward Tichener; analyze consciousness into basic elements, building blocks
96
Functionalism (class)
William James, study function or purpose of consciousness, consciousness is fluid and can't be broken into parts, mental activity is not isolated; cup of water from stream
97
Behaviourism (class)
Abandon consciousness, study only observable behaviour
98
Ivan Pavlov (class)
Behaviourism, Classical conditioning; dogs can be trained to salivate to auditory cues
99
John Watson (class)
Behaviourism, Relates observable behaviour to observable event in environment, only verifiable material should be looked at No way to study things that can't be measured
100
Clinical Psychology (class)
Sigmund Freud, treated people with hysteria, developed psychoanalysis; unconscious vs conscious; personality and behaviour and mental behaviour function of unconscious; identity and ego; sex and aggression
101
B F Skinner (class)
Behaviourism is back! Reaction against Freud, behaviourism and conditioning, the Skinner Box All behaviour is governed by external stimuli, freedom is an illusion
102
Cognitive Psych (class)
Reaction against beahviourism, processes involved in info processing
103
Biological Psych (class)
Donald Hebb; the organization of behaviour, canadian, neural networks
104
Intelligence Measurement: Francis Falton (class)
took weight, height, strength, ability to detect JND
105
Intelligence Measurement: Alfred Binet (class)
Looked at educational and psychological concepts
106
Intelligence Measurement: Stanford-Binet (class)
Translated Binet's to English, second most used today
107
Intelligence Measurement: Army (class)
Needed to decide rank of people, posed problem to foreigners
108
Intelligence Measurement: Raven's Progressive Matricies (class)
non verbal test, still used sometimes today
109
Intelligence Measurement: Wechsler's Scales of Intelligence (class)
two test, one for adults and the other for children, verbal and performance concepts, most widely used today

+PSY 120 (9 decks)

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