Epistemology & Personal Theories

Question 1

Epistemology

Answer 1

Philosophy: the theory of knowledge, especially with regard to its methods, validity, and scope. Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion.

Question 2

Objectivism

Answer 2

Philosophy: the belief that certain things, especially moral truths, exist independently of human knowledge or perception of them.

Question 3

Empiricism

Answer 3

Philosophy: the theory that all knowledge is derived from sense-experience. Stimulated by the rise of experimental science, it developed in the 17th and 18th centuries, expounded in particular by John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume.

Question 4

Pragmatism

Answer 4

Philosophy: an approach that assesses the truth of meaning of theories or beliefs in terms of the success of their practical application.

Question 5

Interpretivism

Answer 5

A sociological approach that emphasizes the need to understand or interpret the beliefs, motives, and reasons of social actors in order to understand social reality.

Question 6

Associationism

Answer 6

A theory in philosophy or psychology which regards the simple association or co-occurrence of ideas or sensations as the primary basis of meaning, thought, or learning.

Question 7

Law of Effect

Answer 7

The law of effect is a psychology principle advanced by Edward Thorndike in 1898 on the matter of behavioral conditioning (not then formulated as such) which states that “responses that produce a satisfying effect in a particular situation become more likely to occur again in that situation, and responses that produce a discomforting effect become less likely to occur again in that situation.

Question 8

Classical Conditioning

Answer 8

Psychology: a learning process that occurs when two stimuli are repeatedly paired: a response which is at first elicited by the second stimulus is eventually elicited by the first stimulus alone.

Question 9

Gestalt Theory

Answer 9

Gestalt psychology, gestaltism or configurationism is a school of psychology that emerged in the early twentieth century in Austria and Germany as a theory of perception that was a rejection to the basic principles of Wilhelm Wundt’s and Edward Titchener’s elementalist and structuralist psychology.