History Flashcards
Philosophical Traditions: Plato
Nativist (Nature)
when it comes to nature vs nurture
Philosophical Traditions: Aristotle
Empiricist (Nurture)
when it comes to nature vs nurture
Philosophical Traditions: William James
Rules of the Mind
Experiences links ideas in the mind
links are physically formed in the brain
Experimental Psychology: Ebbinghaus
Took Empirical data (quantitative numbers)
Experimental: manipulated independent variables to observe outcome of dependent variables
Ebbinghaus experiement
used himself as test-subject studying nonsense words
found an exponential forgetting curve- rapid initial forgetting, that slows down as time continues
happens in all animal kingdoms
Experimental psych: Pavlov
measured saliva produced by dogs when eating
discovered classical conditioning
studied laws of association
experimental psych: Thorndike
Placed cats in “puzzle box”
cats eventually escaped by accident but once it learned how to do it, it repeated the behavior
created law of effect
law of effect
behaviors with positive effects are repeated, behaviors with negative effects are not
discovered by Thorndike and puzzle box
linked learning to natural selection of behavior
Before Behaviorism
Primarily based on Freudian psych
Methods based on dream analysis and introspection (thinking about your internal self)
Subjects were humans bc no one else was like us
Human motivation driven by our subconscious drives
All of it was ridiculed bc there was no “hard science” and had a lack of objective and progress
Behaviorism: Watson
started behaviorism
thought that we are a product of the experiences we have gone through
Behaviorism is focused on…
it is observable, objective, and quantifiable. Mental processes such as dreams, feelings and the subconscious are not directly observable therefore cant be studied scientifically
BLACK BOX
empiricism (nurture)
evolutionary perspective- how our behavior has kept us and other animals alive
quantitative- put behaviors into number form
law of effect- our behavior based on our past experiences. want to repeat good rewards and discontinue bad ones
The reign of behaviorism: Tolman
Tolman led into cognitive psych
rat will take forever to go through maze the first time
learns the fastest way
when fastest way blocked, he remembers the next fastest way right away
no prior association between the stimulus (food) and the response (novel route)
rat built cognitive (mental) map
caused issues with behaviorism bc it was all about memory and the black box
Cognitive approach is based on…
mental processes
sees the mind like a comp with hardware and software
nuanced evolutionary perspective- specializing in communication, reasoning and planning
intrinsic motivation- do things for internal drives and motivations
Cognitive approach: Miller
tested the digit span- read list of numbers, wait, recall numbers
recognized we have a limit in our memory system
objective measurements to understand the mind as a computer
