slide 1chapter 1 - the science of psychology chapter 1 the science of psychology

Chapter 1 - The Science of Psychology Slide 1

Chapter 1

The Science of Psychology


The concept of “intelligence” is like the concept of “magic”,it only holds any validity when we don’t know how its done

What about the will, the soul, or consciousness?

Early in human history, humans would attribute souls orwills to almost anything … a behaviour termed “animism”

In fact, we still fall into those habits today:

> Zippy & Ralph> Thunder and Lightening

The Philosophical Roots of Psychology


However, once we “understand” the true causes of certainevents … the attribution of a soul often disappears

So what of human behaviour? If we ever completelyunderstand the causes of human behaviour, will there beroom left for a human soul?

Rene Descartes (1596-1560). Believed that the humanbody, and many of its responses, could be thought of as a highly complex machine

However, Descartes also believed that humans possessa soul and free will … a concept called dualism

> what if we assume no soul? No free will?


John Locke (1632-1704) went a step further then Rene in assuming that even the mind could be thought of as a machine

He also strongly advocated the practice of empiricism, the pursuit of truth through observation and experience

Contrary to the notion of innate ideas, Locke assumed thatall knowledge was acquired through experience alone

Basically, Locke and others (e.g., Berkeley, see text) wereattempting to understand “learning”, and we are still tryingto understand that today

The notion that the mind can be thought of as a machine, andthat humans are no different from animals, in one termedmaterialism (James Mill, 1773 - 1836) … and it remains thedominant scientific assumption to this date


The Biological Roots of Psychology

Although Descartes notion of the body as a hydraulic machinedid not hold up, Luigi Galvani (1737-1798) and several unnamed frog matyrs) did support the notion of the body as an “electric” machine

Johannes Muller (1801-1858) was the first to systematicallystudy human anatomy and in his “Doctrine of Specific NerveEnergies” noted that the basic message sent along all nerveswas the same: an electrical impulse

What differentiates between impulses is where they arise, andwhere they go

Leads to the implication of specialized brain regions


The implications of Muller’s work were confirmed by ablationstudies performed by Pierre Florens (1774-1867) … the resultof removing part of the brain depends on which part is removed

Paul Broca (1824-1880) was the first to apply this logic tohumans when he performed an autopsy on a stroke victim andclaimed to find the “speech center” of the brain

> Check out “Broca’s Brain” by Sagan

Gustav Fritsch & Eduard Hitzig (1870) added further evidenceusing electrical stimulation studies … body appeared to be mapped on the surface of the brain

> Steve, Fig 2.8 from CD> mention the Phrenology phenomenon


Other “stage-setting” contributions

Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894) championed the notionsof objective investigation and precise measurement

> speed of nerve impulses

Ernst Weber (1795-1878) showed that people’s ability todiscriminate between similar weights (or flashes of light)followed a natural function of the difference between theweights (or lights)

> thus, subjective states could be measured and seem to follow natural laws … psychophysics


The Birth and Early Years of Psychology

The first “Psychologist” was Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920). Hebelieved that all things, including the mind, could be studied scientifically. His text book “Principles of Physiological Psychology” was the first ever Psychology textbook.

Wundt believed that via introspection, one could come to understand the ideas and sensations that formed the buildingblocks of consciousness … this school of Psychology is calledStructuralism

His approach died out because of difficulties observers had inreporting low level sensations, unaffected by experience


Partially as a consequence of the ideas of Darwin (1809-1882)psychologists began to focus on process of conscious activityrather than on its structure

This new school of Psychology was termed Functionalism asit assumed that thinking performed a function, that being toproduce useful and adaptive behaviours

One of the strongest proponents of functionalism was WilliamJames (1842-1910) … his ideas are still a major influence

Differences from Structuralism> focus on mental operations, not mental structures> processes studied as part of the biological activity of the organism … evolutionary history and value> studies the relation between the environment and the response to it


During the rise of functionalism, another person was doing researchlargely on his own … despite this Hermann Ebbinghaus (1850-1909) had a large impact on experimental psychology

Ebbinghaus wanted to study memory and forgetting with the samescientific rigor that others had studied sensation (e.g., Fechner)

Used nonsense syllabus as stimuli (e.g., FIK, LOP) in order to prevent contamination by previously learning

Specified procedures that would allow memory (and forgetting) tobe measured in precise ways, rather than relying on introspectionand common sense

> e.g., unlearning procedure … contrast with structuralist


Into this mix we now add a young neurologist named SigmundFreud (1856-1939) who became especially interested in behavioural and emotional problems … formulating hispsychodynamic theory of personality

This really marked the beginning of clinical psychology, andpsychiatry. His influence in these areas is still huge today

His work was based on observation of patients, not on experiments.The medical model is prevalent in his views of disfunction

His ideas we a mix of structures and functions … and he stronglypushed the notion of unconscious influences on behaviour

We’ll hear plenty more on his later in the course


The next trend or school in Psychology was behaviouralism, andit went much further in limiting the subject matter of psychologyto only the relation between people’s environment, and theirbehaviour … argued that “mental events” which cannot be directly observed cannot be studied scientifically and had no place as part of psychology

Examples

Law of Effect Thorndike (1874-1949)Classical Conditioning Pavlov (1849-1936)Establishment as a School Watson (1878-1958)

Behaviourism is still an active school of psychology, and one of the most famous behaviourists died quite recently (Skinner, 1904-1990)


Gestalt Psychology stressed the fact that sometimes the “whole”of a percept is more than the sum of its parts (Wertheimer, 1880-1943).

Humanistic Psychology is a school of psychology that focusseson human experience, choice, creativity and positive growth

Pushes a greater emphasis on understanding those qualities thatmake us human

Problem … investigating these things in an objective manner


Breaking the Chains of Behaviourism

Recently (i.e., since the 60s) researches began to again believe thatthe “mind” can be studied scientifically.

This cognitive revolution relies strongly on the use of indirect methods of measuring cognitive processes and structures

For Example:




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Due to recent advances in brain imaging, biological factorsunderlying psychology have undergone a renaissance thatcontinues on

Some Cognitive Psychologists are skeptical of what is gainedfrom these methods, whereas others are combining some of these techniques with cognition procedures … forming a newfield of psychology termed Cognitive Neuroscience

The contrast brings up an interesting distinction between“what” the brain does … and “where” in the brain it is done

The New Biological Revolution

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