Lecture 1 - Black colleges, indigenization, etc.

Question 1

What is the definition of psychology?

Answer 1

> study of being human

Question 2

What is the definition of the “Big P” in psychology?

Answer 2

> formal, institutionalized, discipline of Psychology (academic departments, journals, organizations, etc.)

Question 3

What is the definition of the “little p” in psychology?

Answer 3

> psychological subject matter (people’s feelings, thoughts, behaviours, etc)

Question 4

What is the definition of “reflexivity”

Answer 4

> confounding of the agent and object of study in psychology so that

1) the knowledge produced by the agents (and their characteristics)affects how objects respond while being studied

2) the knowledge produced by psychology applies as much to theagents as to the objects

Question 5

What is an “agent” and what is an “object”

Answer 5

> psychologist doing the research;

> object = typically humans

Question 6

Social constructionism involves:

Answer 6

> Factors outside of psychology affect the definition and practise of psychology, the type of knowledge generated, how this knowledge is received

Question 7

Psychology and psychologists exist within a web of other factors… what are they?

Answer 7

> social, political, cultural.

Question 8

An example of an “agent” and an “object” (reflexivity)

Answer 8

> Agent: Horace Mann Bond (1904-1972), African-American psychologist, intelligence testing: (a vocal critic of intelligence testing)

> Object: Black children performed worse on IQ tests when the test was administered by a white tester than a Black tester

> (Self-fulfilling prophecy, if they believe that the administer thinks they can’t perform they will have issues performing well).

> Pointed out the importance of context.

Question 9

What is “the” psychology experiment?

Answer 9

> Leipzig Model, Germany, Wundt- experimenter was also a subject- equal status btw experimenter and subject

> Paris Model, France, medical context- experimenter in control- subject recipient of treatment or manipulation

Question 10

What is indigenization?

Answer 10

• originated in Germany and exported in the late 1890s
• early 1900s, US psychology became bigger than European psychology
• American brand is better documented
• Psychology originates from specific cultures, imports aspects of psychology from other cultures
• Psychology and psychology are not universal

Question 11

What is indigenous psychology as a movement?

Answer 11

> a movement against the homogenization of psychology, mainly in developing countries that emerged post-WW2, gaining international attention in the 1980s

> “self-conscious attempt to develop variants of modern professional psychology that are more attuned to conditions in developing nations than the psychology taught at Western academic institutions”

> led to both superficial and fundamental changes in psychological research

> in U.S., this can be seen in the rejection of the German experimentalism andthe development of an American functional psychology

Question 12

What is the main takeaway for indigenous psychology?

Answer 12

> knowledge is rooted in ecological context

Question 13

What are 10 assumptions of Western Eurocentric/north American psychology

Answer 13

1. individuality
2. reductionism
3. experiment-based empiricism
4. scienticism
5. quantification/measurement
6. materialism
7. Male dominance
8. “Objectivity”
9. Nomothetic laws
10. rationality

Question 14

What is Historiography?

Answer 14

Techniques and principles used in historical research; actual writing of history

Question 15

What are issues in historiography?

Answer 15

1. Lost or suppressed data
2. Data distorted in translation
3. Self-serving data

Question 16

Provide an example of an agent and a object

Answer 16

• Intelligence Testing
• Horace Mann Bond (1904-1972), African-American psychologist
• Black children performed worse on IQ tests when the test was administered by a White tester than a Black tester

Question 17

why so few women in the history of psychology?

Answer 17

• unable to attain a PhD
• could not secure full time academic positions (or only positions limitedto teaching colleges)
• 1920s focus on hiring men* excluded from informal network sharing societies (e.g. SEP)

Question 18

Times of change for women in psychology

Answer 18

• civil rights act of 1964 (in the U.S.): illegal to discriminate based on sex
• APA special division 1976
• Psychology of Women Quarterly
• changing demographics

Question 19

CPA: Status of Women

Answer 19

• 1975, CPA creates task force on the Status of Women* addressed four major issues:
• Status of women in psychology
• Education and training of women in psychology
• Sex bias in psychological research
• Psychological services for women
• April 1976, it made over 100 recommendations to the CPA board; in1977 a report was published in a special issue in CanadianPsychological Review

Question 20

Findings of the CPA board?

Answer 20

• Women were less likely to be hired
• More likely to hold positions in applied settings
• More likely to receive lower salaries
• Less likely to hold rank of full professor or senior admin positions
• Promoted at slower rates* Published less

Question 21

racialized & stigmatized groups

Answer 21

• under-representation
• gains post WW2
• In 2010, 13% of faculty members in the US were minorities; but 28% made up graduate students

.* Jewish psychologists

• Gestalt psychologists
• 1930s especially difficult
• Black people

Question 22

APA: Academic Psychology Workforce

Answer 22

• academic workforce
• racial/ethnic minority representation increased 8% to 22%, 1995-2015
• tenured faculty
• racial/ethnic representation increased 7% to 20%
• academic leadership
• increased 11% to 24% between 2003-2015

Question 23

Racialized people in psychology

Answer 23

• Dr. Cecil Sumner, the first Black American to earn aPhD in Psychology, June 1920

Question 24

Applied Psychology at Black Colleges

Answer 24

• emergence of colleges in the US post civil war
• WW1 and higher education training
• under-funding and needs of Black communities led to focus on applied psychology
• focus on similarities, not differences

Question 25

Offering of Psychology Degrees

Answer 25

• late 1930s, only four Black schools offered psychology as a major
• hence, limited opportunity
• emphasis on educational psychology
• limited training in experimental psychology and statistical methods
• curriculum, inclusion of Black psychology courses

Question 26

Formal Organization

Answer 26

• APA Division 9, Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPISSI)
• 1963, Division 9 presents a proposal to study the training and employment needs of Black psychologists and ad hoc Committee on Equality and Opportunity in Psychology (CEOP)*

> 1967, recommendations

Question 27

Association of Black Psychologists

Answer 27

• 1968, APA convention, the association was formed (ABPsi)
• 1969 APA convention
• 1973 National Conference of Levels and Patterns of Training in professional Psychology
• Dr. Joseph White, founder of the Association of Black Psychologists (watch video in instruction sheet)

Question 28

Black Psychology

Answer 28

• 1970s, “Africentrally-principled discourses and spiritual rejuvenation”
• notable figures:
• Na’amAkbar, Clinical Psychologist – African-centered approach to psychology
• Wade Noble wrote African Psychology (1968)
• Joseph Baldwin wrote The African Personality in America (1992)
• Kenneth and Mamie Clark, ‘the doll Studies’

Question 29

Kenneth and Mamie Clark

Answer 29

• The Doll Studies, 1939 and 1940 publications
• (and many more publications)
• 1954, Brown vs. Board of Education