Lecture 3 - Comparative Psychology & Early Behaviourism

Question 1

Morgan

Answer 1

Morgan criticised Romanes for:
- Ignoring previous opportunities for an animal to learn some behaviour
confusing objective (testable) and subjective (non-testable) inferences from behaviour to mental events
- Being too ready to explain an animal’s behaviour in unnecessarily complex terms

Question 2

Morgan’s Canon

Answer 2

1. Brief observation not enough to understand animal mind; systematic study needed
2. Simple psychological processes can interact with environment to produce highly complex behaviour.

Question 3

Thorndike

Answer 3

Did experiments on trial-and-error learning.

Thorndike’s puzzle boxes for cats and dogs.

Question 4

Thorndike’s Puzzle Boxes for Cats and Dog

Answer 4

Tested cats and dogs placed in box with various kinds of devices for opening the door to the food outside.
No detectable differences between species.
There is no forgetting over time (once you acquire these skills you don’t ever lose them)

Question 5

Thorndike’s Connectionism: law of effect and S-R theory

Answer 5

Of several responses made to the same situation, those which are accompanied or closely followed by satisfaction to the animal will, other things being equal, be more firmly connected with the situation, so that, when it recurs, they will be more likely to recur.
In making this claim, Thorndike was denying that animals learn to associate their actions with their consequences.

Question 6

Watson

Answer 6

Main idea was ‘consciousness’ with no thought (thinking but not looking).
Claimed that classical conditioning produces conditioned emotional responses.