Lecture 5: The Rise and Fall of Behaviourism: 1900-2000

Question 1

hoe stond psychologie in 1900

Answer 1

wel echt als een science nu

Question 2

wat was de dominant method (vooral in usa)

Answer 2

introspection

Question 3

waardoor werd psychologie gezien als een soft science in 1900

Answer 3

door dingen als spiritualism, mesmerism, phrenology… dingen die keer op keer fout werden bewezen.

Question 4

wat was een belangrijke stroming aan het begin van de 20e eeuw (1900)

Answer 4

positivism (Comte)

Question 5

• Positivism is popular at the beginning of the 20th century.
• The thesis: Science is ultimately the way to truth
• Objectivity of knowledge must be guaranteed
• This relates poorly to the fact that introspection is still the dominant methodology

Answer 5

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Question 6

wie was Bridgman

Answer 6

• The theory of relativity turns physics upside down
• The basis lies in Einstein’s persistent question: how do we establish through
  measurements that two events are simultaneous?
• The Newtonian intuition of absolute time appears to be wrong!
• The physicist Bridgman wants to save physics from another revolution like this by clearly
  attaching all concepts to measurement procedures

Question 7

door wie was william james eerder al beinvloedt

Answer 7

darwin

Question 8

er was een soort disbalans in 1900, mensen wilden psy graag als harde science zien, maar hier was ook kritiek op. ook was er al heel lang geen nieuwe bevinding (zoals bv in de biologie).

Answer 8

oke

Question 9

we mean by any concept
nothing more than a set of
operations; the concept is
synonymous with the
corresponding set of
[measurement] operations”

Answer 9

bridgman (wilde dus alles operationaliseren!)

Question 10

3 ingredienten voor behaviourism

Answer 10

1. hard vs vague
2. a time of revolutions
3. humans are animals

Question 11

dus de operationalisation of Bridgman =

Answer 11

we should define everything in terms of how we measure them.

= concepts should be reduced to measurements

Question 12

waar kwam bridgman niet zo ver

Answer 12

binnen de filosofie

Question 13

wat was kritiek op bridgman

Answer 13

– Length can be measured with multiple different procedures, so no unique definition of length
– Operations cannot be “synonymous” to concepts

Question 14

maar… Bridgman werd wel heel populair binnen de psychologie

Answer 14

yay

Question 15

Boring:

Answer 15

maakte Bridgmans ideeen populair met: intelligence is what the intelligence test measures

Question 16

pavlov’s classical conditioning=

Answer 16

Neutral stimulus (NS; tone) is linked to unconditioned stimulus (US; food) provoking an unconditioned response (UR; salivating)

After a while, the NS becomes a conditioned
stimulus (CS) and is followed by a conditioned
response (CR; salivating)

Question 17

thorndike was een student van…

Answer 17

james

Question 18

thorndike studying animals
because he cannot find
children to serve as subjects

Answer 18

oke

Question 19

wat had thorndike bedacht

Answer 19

law of effect (behaviours followed by a reward are more likely to be repeated)

Question 20

wat is instrumental conditioning

Answer 20

wat skinner later operant conditioning noemt: a procedure in which a reinforcement, such as food, is delivered contingent upon a response

Question 21

hoe leidde de evolutie theorie tot behaviourism

Answer 21

• Biology is successfully studying animal behavior
• Nobody ever asks a dog what it thinks of anything
• Apparently behavioral science in biology doesn’t need introspection…
• So why should that be necessary with people?
• Can’t we just let psychology revolve around behavior?
• And even remove any dependence on ‘mental states’?

Question 22

dus wat waren de 3 oorzaken + gevolgen die ook weer leidden tot behaviourism

Answer 22

1) hard vs. vague: positivism (science brings truth and requires objectivity)

2) time of revolutions: operationalism (concepts should be defined through mechanisms)

3) learning theory (based exclusively on stimuli and behaviour, inspired by animal research)

Question 23

wie was de eerste behaviourist

Answer 23

watson

Question 24

No more introspection; only
behavioral analyses in terms
of reinforcement and
punishment, a psychology without consciousness

Answer 24

oke

Question 25

wat was de key ding van behaviourism (hoe leg je het in een zin uit)

Answer 25

kijken naar observable behaviour, stimulus response associations.

Question 26

wie schreef het eerste journal article

Answer 26

watson

Question 27

wat was john watson

Answer 27

een behaviourist en empiricist (geloofde in tabula rasa)

Question 28

“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.”

Answer 28

watson

Question 29

Watson essentially repeats many of the ideas of the British Empiricists:

Answer 29

* The Tabula Rasa thesis is in fact a direct copy of John Locke * The learning theory of the behaviorists is very close to that of David Hume

Question 30

* Behaviorism is designed as an absolutist system * Much of the content, however, has withstood the test of time well * In psychotherapy behaviorist concepts (conditioning, extinction, exposure) for example, are still widely used * Also a lot of learning theory is rooted in behaviorism

Answer 30

oke

Question 31

wat hoorde bij Skinner

Answer 31

radical behaviourism

Question 32

radical behaviourism=

Answer 32

total ban on the use of terms that refer to mental states, all human behaviour can be understood as S-R associations, what is not measurable should be left out of science (did not deny these mental states, but just stated that they did not belong in science).

Question 33

thoughts, etc. * Note that Skinner didn't deny that these things exist; he just insisted that they didn't belong in science 27B.F. Skinner (1904-1990) * Radical Behaviorism: total ban on the use of terms that refer to mental states; all human behavior can be understood as S-R relationships * What is not directly measurable has to be left out * So: a psychology without dreams, expectations, thoughts, etc. * Note that Skinner didn't deny that these things exist; he just insisted that they didn't belong in science

Answer 33

oke

Question 34

wat dacht skinner over free will

Answer 34

free will is an illusion. man is not an actor but a lens, a point where influences come together. behaviour is the outcome.

Question 35

waar dacht skinner dat de 'I' naar toe verwees

Answer 35

naar the person as a whole (not a mind or a brain) -> an input output mechanism.

Question 36

wat dacht skinner over homunculus?

Answer 36

dat er geen homunculus is, not even in the brain?

Question 37

waardoor kwam de kritiek op behaviourism

Answer 37

toen Skinner probeerde te schrijven over language in S-R associaties

Question 38

hoe schreef skinner over language

Answer 38

1) child starts with imitation 2) then learns complex sentences through reinforcement and punishment 3) end result = very complex S-R associations based on language behaviours. a child who masters language is therefore a sort of well trained pigeon

Question 39

wat zijn de 3 hoofdpunten van chomsky

Answer 39

skinners theory is... - much more vague than skinner presents - unable to explain the complexity of language - does not do justice to the learning process we see in children

Question 40

wat is de input altijd van skinners theorieen

Answer 40

a stimulus in the physical environment

Question 41

wat is de output altijd van skinners theorieen

Answer 41

observable behaviour in response to the stimulus

Question 42

Skinner's theory is supposed to be more objective because the terms he uses (stimulus, response, reinforcement) refer to observable things and behavior. wat is chomsky zijn reactie hierop?

Answer 42

nonsense: - if we take these terms literally, they hardly apply - if we take these terms metaphorically, they become just as vague

Question 43

Skinners theory is just as vague as traditional theories:

Answer 43

- skinner wants a lawful relationship: one stimulus always gives one response - however, people can respond differently to a red chair (chair, wood, red, sit) - dus: if the chair is the stimulus, there is NO lawfullness - what is we make the property of the chair the stimulus? -> the redness of the chair - but... then it is no longer objective, because we only know what the stimulus is after you say red

Question 44

wat is het voorbeeld van response strenght van chomsky

Answer 44

- in animal experience: strength is measured by pitch, stress and quantity - but what about verbal behaviour of humans? - strong response would then be: WOWOWOWOWOWWO - but if we were to make a response like a soft wow also count, the concept would be vague again.

Question 45

wat was Chomsky zijn kritiek op reinforcement

Answer 45

- reinforcement should explain the response - to explain all responses, the concept reinforcement should be so vague that there is always some reinforcement - 'X is reinforced by Y' is the same thing as saying 'X wants Y'

Question 46

in short: the 3 examples of why Skinners terms are not correct if they are taken literally, and vague if they are metaphorically

Answer 46

1. chair (meerdere responses mogelijk, en niet meer objectief als je het hebt over de roodheid van de stoel) 2. response strength (animal experiments meten pitch etc, mensen zouden dan WOWOW moeten schreeuwen voor een sterke response, en als wow geaccepteerd wordt dan is het niet meer objectief/vague) 3. reinforcement (another way of saying 'wanting', vaag concept)

Question 47

chomskys argument dat skinner niet de complexiteit van language kan uitleggen=

Answer 47

skinner is limited to behaviour, but language requires intentions. you cannot use the behaviour of the listener to explain the intention of the speaker

Question 48

wat was het argument van chomsky dat skinner's theorie het complexe leerproces van kinderen niet goed weergeeft

Answer 48

- parents are not precise enough in punishment en reinforcement - children dont do mimicry - children can understand an infinite number of sentences - children learn language spontaneously - the type of mistakes children make does not seem to suggest they learn by trial and error

Question 49

hoe legt hij chomsky het argument van kinderen uit adhv een voorbeeld

Answer 49

“The man who is tall is happy” “Is the man who is tall happy?”

Question 50

wat is chomsky zijn stand dus over language

Answer 50

language is innate, he is a nativist, proposes language acquisition device (LAD)

Question 51

met wie komt chomsky daarmee overeen

Answer 51

plato en descartes

Question 52

* Chomsky explains the innate system by an evolutionary change in humans * Although the system seems very complex, it's probably something simple * But we can't omit this system from the explanation of language just because it seems so complex

Answer 52

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Question 53

waarom is chomsky een rationalist

Answer 53

hij dacht: * Linguistics should let go of the assumption that the meaning of language can be found in the observable outside world * Instead, the meaning of a word is a mental concept: it’s in our head =Rationalism

Question 54

* 8 years later (1967), Chomsky writes that his review is more of a critique on behaviorism than on Skinner’s work specifically * And even more generally, it can be seen as a critique on empiricism: “an account of the development and causation of behavior that fails to consider the structure of the organism will provide no understanding of the real processes involved”

Answer 54

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Question 55

"the remarkable capacity of the child to generalize, hypothesize and “process information” in a variety of very special and apparently complex ways which we cannot yet describe or begin to understand, and which may be largely innate" “It is clear that what is necessary in such a case is research, not dogmatic and perfectly arbitrary claims”

Answer 55

chomsky

Question 56

wat is recentelijk bewijs tegen chomsky

Answer 56

* The LAD is quite controversial; there is no “language organ” in the brain so how does that work? * And how “poor” are the stimuli that children get? They hear thousands of language expressions a day * Recent research with neural networks suggests that certain aspects of grammar can be learned inductively

Question 57

* Chomsky shows that behaviorism fails in obtaining objectivity: we cannot get around intentions, beliefs & feelings to explain behavior. * This tension, of those who try to achieve a “hard science” to understand the mind, versus those who argue that such “objective” approaches miss out on fundamental characteristics of the mind, will pop up again and again in history

Answer 57

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Question 58

Turing:

Answer 58

* English mathematician who cracks the Enigma code of the Nazis * Turing shows how to make a machine do calculations * Proves that such a machine can handle all calculable functions * This also includes all standard logic: the Turing machine thus can “think” a bit

Question 59

Boolean algebra

Answer 59

* Mathematical implementation of logic * True sentences are given the value “1”, false sentences the value “0” * In logic, the truth of compositions (“p and q”) is a function of the truth of the elementary statements (“p”, “q”) * In Boolean algebra the truth value of compositions is calculated by mathematical operations on the elementary parts * E.g.: the value of “p and q” equals the value of p multiplied by the value of q * “p and q” is thus only true (“1”) if p and q are both true (both “1”), because only then you get 1x1=1 (in all other cases you get 0)

Question 60

who discovered modus ponens

Answer 60

aristotle!!!!!!1 my baby

Question 61

* Aristotle discovered that certain forms of reasoning always give true conclusions from true premises: logic * Example modus ponens: If p then q p q * Is always valid, regardless of the meaning of p and q! Because the meaning of p and q doesn’t matter, a machine can do it as well. Turing applies this insight from Aristotle

Answer 61

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Question 62

the computer analogy =

Answer 62

* The Turing machine shows how a psychological process (reasoning) can be performed by a machine. This results in the computer analogy: Mind:Brain = Software:Hardware The mind as the software program that performs reasoning.

Question 63

* The question of how the mind relates to the brain goes all the way back to Plato * Descartes' dualism dominates until the 20th century: the mind interacts with the brain. * Turing gives a new possibility: the mind is implemented in the brain, like a program is implemented in a computer

Answer 63

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Question 64

* If thinking is indeed nothing more than implementing logic, then a computer can also think * Could a computer also develop consciousness? * This question continues to occupy philosophical minds to this day

Answer 64

oke

Question 65

* Chomsky shows stimulus-response theory is insufficient to understand complex behaviour such as language * Therefore, to understand complex behaviour, we need to construct theories about what goes on inside the black box * The development of digital computers provides a framework for doing this, in which the mind can be seen as a program that performs information processing * This leads to a new organizing principle: the computer metaphor, in which mind:brain=software:hardware * The study of this information processing in humans becomes known as cognitive psychology

Answer 65

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Question 66

dus de turin gmachine showed....

Answer 66

how a psychological process (reasoning) can be performed by a machine. could the mind work like that too??? is the mind implemented in the brain, like a software programme in hardware?

Question 67

* Behaviorism briefly satisfies the need for an objective, hard science * However, falls short in the analysis of complex behavior; specifically language * The downfall of behaviorism is primarily scientific in nature: there are good arguments against it * Also important: Behaviorism in many ways is also a winner * Can the analogy of the mind as computer program keep the brain at distance?

Answer 67

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