Please read chapter 7. After reading chapter 7, please respond to the following questions:
What were two things from the chapter that you found interesting? Why were they interesting to you? Which two things did you find the least interesting? Why? What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding the history of psychology? Finally indicate two topics or concepts that you would like me to cover in more depth in class.
Include a list of the terms and concepts you used in your post. (example - Terms: positive reinforcer, extinction, reinforcer, discriminative stimulus...)
Let me know if you have any questions,
--Dr. M
Two things that I found interesting from this chapter were the concepts of connectionism that he developed from the mazes with the chickens and the puzzle boxes. Connectionism is emphasizing the development and strengthening of connections between stimulus situation and responses that became stronger with trial and error. Thorndike first made the distinction with connectionism with the mazes he had the chicks go through. When he first placed the chicks in the maze they do a wide variety of behaviors and not know what to do, until they realized that one behavior is (to figure out how to get out) was the behavior needed to get out of the maze. After some trials, once the chicks were placed in the mazes they didn’t perform all those different behaviors anymore. They would perform the important one to get out. This same reaction happened and was noticed with the cats in the puzzle boxes. I found it interesting how the cats would quickly put connections together onto what behavior was needed to get out. They then were possibly placed into a different box, with a different method of getting out, but they put connections together from the previous behaviors to notice what behavior needed to be done to get out of this particular box.
I found the concept of structuralism to be least interesting along with the introspective habit. Structuralism focused on identifying the structural elements of human conscious experience, primarily through basic laboratory and introspective methods. I just don’t find structuralism as interesting and intriguing as functionalism. I like to know and understand how things are and how they work, rather than just see them for what they look like and the qualities they obtain. I also wasn’t too interested in the introspective habit. This was the dissociative ability to make mental notes about an experience while the experience was occurring. I just thought this was a basic concept that people did whenever they experienced something. It is a great ability, but I just feel that it’s a common occurrence among people and their abilities.
I feel that the concept of functionalism is the most important aspect of this chapter. Functionalism is the study of human conscious experience from an evolutionary perspective, concentrated with studying the adaptive value of various mental and behavioral processes. I also feel the concepts of law of effect and law of exercise are important to take away as well, because they are important to functionalism. Law of Exercise is the connection between stimulus situation and response would be strengthened with practice. Law of Effect is based on rewards and how more effective they are than punishment is in producing learning.
I would possibly like more understanding in the reflex arc and S-O-R model
Terms: Structuralism, Connectionism, Introspective Habit, Law of Exercise, Law of Effect
I found Titchener's structural elements of the human conscious experience pretty interesting. Sensations, images, and affections were the three types of elementary mental processes and they all have features or attributes. The attributes for sensations are quality (what distinguishes one sensation from another), intensity (strength of stimulus), duration (period of time), and clearness(more or less clear sensation).The attributes for images are the same as sensations, but different because Titchener believed there were two fundamental qualities being pleasantness and unpleasantness, that tie in with sensory elements and feelings and emotions. I'm in a psychology of music class and these are important attributes for music as well. It's pretty weird how somehow all of my psychology classes are tied in together. Some people find music to be pleasant which is a great sensory element.
I also found Dewey's reflex arc to be quite interesting because it's natural and we do learn from experiences such as the child and the candle flame. The three components is the stimulus and sensation, processing the idea, and our repsonse to our actions. I agree with this. As a child, my parents would always tell me things that were safe and things that were dangerous and even though I was told not to do something, I would still do it and it usually resulted badly, but because of my experience, I did learn the meaning of sensations towards certain objects. Such as one time, my mom took cookies out of the oven and I really wanted one, and she told me not to eat one, but I still did and burnt my mouth, well I learned to wait every time she made cookies, until I knew they were cool enough to eat. Everyone has these experiences with different things in life, and it all ties in with the reflex arc.
Two things I wasn't all that interested in were independent variables and dependent variables, and the manuals. Although the variables are important for manipulating and finding out the best results for experiments, I always get the two mixed up. The manuals for students and teachers were very important for learning how to work in the labratory, but I found it quite boring. Everything back then was important in psychology, but functionalism is still very important since we are always adapting to new ways, and changing out behaviors to those ways.
After reading about introspection and Titchener's structuralist system, I was a little confused, only because it seems like something Freud would say about the unconscious being the largest part of our brain. Apparently, it's hard to reflect on a conscious experiment at the same time and we must rely on our memory which becomes retrospection instead. I know this kind of contradicts my liking for Titchener's structural elements because obviously those are about introspection and also about his experiments in the manuals but i would like to learn more about this as well.
terms: attributes, reflex arc, functionalism, introspection, independent variable, dependent variable
I found psychological functionalism to be very interesting. Functionalism, which focuses on the study of human conscious experience from an evolutionary perspective, concerned with studying the adaptive value of various mental and behavioral processes. Chicago functionalist came up with an idea called Reflex arc, which was the basic unit of behavior , broken into 3 parts: stimulus producing sensation, the central processing producing an idea, and the motor response. Dewey came up with the approach called progressive education, which emphasized learning by doing.
I also liked Woodworth and his studies on transfer, the S-O-R model, and him coming up with the concepts of having a dependent and independent variable in research. Transfer is defined as the learning of 1 situation on learning in a second situation, aka, learning Greek will help you learn math. Studies showed only if there are similarities between subjects. The S-O-R model proposed by Woodworth examined that you cannot just understand the stimulus and response in learning behavior, but also understand the organism as all are different.
I found structuralism to be very boring. It is a school of psychology associated with Titchener that focused on identifying the structural elements of human conscious experience, primarily through basic laboratory and introspective methods. I didn't find it interesting because it is all just labeling and has no practical value.
The systematic experimental introspection was also not very interesting. Developed by Kuple and Titchener, it was introspection which experience of complex mental events was followed by detailed introspective descriptions.
I think learning about Woodworth is most helpful in learning the history of psychology. He came up with focusing on the organism in studies and he even developed the extremely important concept of independent and dependent variables.
I would like to learn more about structuralism and Thorndike so I might understand and be more interested in them.
Terms: Functionalism, Reflex arc, Dewey, progressive education, Woodworth, S-O-R model, transfer, independent variable, dependent variable, structuralism, Titchener, systematic experimental introspection.
The first thing I found interesting in chapter 7 was Dewey's educational reform known as progressive education. I find it interesting because it says that the classroom rote learning, drill and practice, and strict dicipline. It's interesting because this reminds me of almost every class that I have taken at UNI. I agree with Dewey when he says the classroom is a place to avoid rather than a place to learn because much of the classrooms aren't filled with anything other than a computer, desks, and a chalk board to facilitate learning. There aren't any colors, posters, or anything creative in hardly any of the rooms here at UNI. I find it intersting also with this that Dewey states what they are still teaching us today in our teaching classes. He says that children learn by interacting in their environment, exploring on their own, and to be actively involved in their learning. As I am attending this school to receive a teaching degree, it really makes me laugh that even now, as college students, we are told all these ways to teach and learn, but hardly any of it is implemented by the teachers at this university. I like this class because it does exactly what Dewey describes. We get to search the web on our own, we get to describe interest in what actually interests us and therefore we learn more because we want to, not because we have to memorize it and forget it after we are tested on it.
The second thing that I was interested in was Titchener's third technique of introspective habit. I find it interesting because of how true it is. When you are recalling things it tends to be biased because you aren't actually visualizing the stimuli right in front of you. This introspective habit took care of that and essentially made people become machines. I also find it interesting because people had to be highly trained to do it and I wonder how exactly you become "ready" to say that you have the introspective habit. Although it isn't used anymore today it is an intersting topic because it makes sense, but is difficult to do.
One thing that I was not interested in was Thorndike's trial and error learning. It is pretty self explanatory that when you try something and it doesn't work, you probably won't try it again. What made it important was that it involved the use of animals which aren't as intellectual as human beings. The other thing that I wasn't interested in was James R. Angell. He was important in reaction time, imagery, and sound localization, but I felt the text book slowed down and only made Angell seem like an undershadow of Dewey. He was his student, then worked for him and eventually becamse chair of the psychology department at Minnesota. Eventually he became Yale's president. Overall I just did not find him as important as the other gentlemen the text book described.
I feel that the section on John Dewey and progressive education was the most important part to the history of psychology. He understood the importance of education and reformed it entirely into something that works. Although today some teachers might need a little brushing up on their progressive education. I find it interesting because every one of the people we learn learned from experiences, involving themselves in the environment, and being very involved in their learning.
I would like to learn more about ethology and what kinds of different experiments today are used with animals. I would also like to learn more about independent and dependent variables as described by Woodworth. I found them interesting, but just a little confusing.
Terms: John Dewey, progressive education, E.B. Titchener, introspective habit, Thorndike, trial and error learning(trial and accidental success)James R. Angell, ethology, independent variables, dependent variables, Woodworth
One topic that I found interesting in Chapter 7 was trial and error learning (trial and accidental success). It’s really interesting how much times have changed. In the chapter it mentions putting a cat into a box contraption and it is faced with numerous puzzles. At first the animal is going to respond with random confused acts. Eventually they will accidentally respond correctly, letting them out of the cage. This will create a “stamped in” pleasurable consequence memory for the creature. I also found it interesting then when a cat that experienced the first box was placed into another box, different from the first, it was able to learn more quickly than a cat that had no previous encounter. To me, this suggests that our conscious mind can help us problem solve future events from the past.
One thing I did not find very interesting in Chapter 7 was Titchener’s idea about behaving properly in front of women. I didn’t find this very interesting because it is already well-known that women did not have as many rights as men during this time. It makes sense that they weren’t allowed to attend his meetings. Women were looked at as gentle creatures, and they still are today, except with more rights. Another thing I did not find very interesting was the topic of structuralism. Structuralism focuses on identifying the structural elements of human conscious experience through basic laboratory and introspective methods. I just didn’t find this as interesting because it’s something that I have already learned about. It’s important, just not that fascinating.
I think Edward Thorndike’s idea of connectionism is very important in Psychology. His cruel cat experiments were not the most favorable thing for some people, but it led to a huge finding in comparative psychology. He also studied how individuals adapted to their environments and how this knowledge could be applied to improve human condition. This is important to me because today we still make connections and learn from mistake, rewards, etc.
Two things I would like you to go over more in class are ethology and different experiments that were going on during this time period.
I found the way that Titchener used introspection to be interesting because he changed the way introspection was performed. Titchener was a structuralist and believed that we must understand the structure of the mind before we can begin to investigate the functions of it. Titchener used introspection to understand inner mental processes. The problem with introspection is that you cannot complete a mental process while performing the process of introspection on yourself. He devised a new method called systematic experimental introspection. This occurred when observers would provide detailed accounts of what was happening in their head while performing a task. He relied on memory, which eventually evolved introspection into retrospection. He used fractionation to make the memory process easier. His most important technique was called introspective habit, which means that people can get into the habit of looking at their actions introspectively, making it easier to perform these experiments. Through perfecting this process, he hoped to cut down on stimulus error, which was when participants would report stimulus details as opposed to things detailing the conscious process.
The second thing I found interesting was connectionism. Thorndike was one of the first comparative psychologists and animal researchers. He placed cats into boxes he created himself. He found that at first they performed many behaviors (clawing, biting, scratching) to get out of the box before accidentally doing the right action to escape. Thorndike then observed that after completing the right action, the wrong actions slowly went away and they learned to escape faster after each trial. He called this trial and error learning, but his model is called connectionism. When the cats repeated the correct response to Thorndike’s given stimulus, they were demonstrating his Law of Exercise. He also believed that rewards were more beneficial than punishments (Law of Effect).
One thing I found uninteresting was Woodworth’s research on transfer. He found that subjects who completed an original task, then a task similar to it then dissimilar. He found that the more the tasks have in common the better they do on the second one.
I also found the topic of progressive education to be uninteresting. Dewey wanted to change the way education worked. I found it uninteresting because I didn’t see how it fit into the chapter and little was said about it.
I think the most important part of this chapter was the basic concepts of the functionalists, because I feel that much of what we do in psychology is work to answer why we do what we do. I was confused about the S-O-R Model and reflex arc.
Terms: structuralism, functionalism, systematic experimental introspection, introspective habit, stimulus error, reflex arc, progressive education, connectionism, trial and error learning, transfer, S-O-R Model
The chapter starts out talking about structuralism and functionalism. Structuralism describing the structure of each individual component of anatomy and organize it accordingly. So if you are talking about the brain structuralisms would break down the brain and categorize each component. Contrastingly functionalists are concerned with how each part works in keeping the individual alive. Also how each part helps us adapt to our environment. Titchener was a structuralist. Thorndike was a functionalist. I found reading the differences in functionalism and structuralism interesting.
I really liked the section on Thorndike’s Connectionism. He studied comparative psychology. He began studying chicks. He would place them in a maze and at first they would make all kinds or racket and jump at the walls of the maze. Eventually they learned to self soothe a bit. They would learn to complete the maze. He also did this with Cats and puzzle boxes. He published the work and titled it: “Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals.” While studying cats in puzzle boxes he noticed that the cats were using something called “Trial and Error Learning” or trial and accidental success. He believed that the cats learned to make connections and by trial and error were eventually able to escape. He calls this Connectionism. The cat goes crazy, making all kinds of ruckus, clawing until eventually it hits the right string with his paw and is able to get out. Then the cat makes that connection and is able to get out of the box faster the proceeding times. Thorndike made 3 boxes. The third box had all three mechanisms of the other two combined into one. One the cat had successfully gotten out of the first two boxes, the cat couldn’t do multiple things to get out of the third box. This shows that the cat could not use what it “learned” from the first to boxes to get out of the third. No complex reasoning. I wonder what would happen if they did this with dogs. Cats usually won’t learn tricks, but dogs will. I wonder if a dog would have been able to do this?
Overall, I found all the sections on Titchener to be a bit of overkill. He had some major contributions but I feel that it could have been described in less pages. He had many contributions to Cambridge. He wrote The Manuals for drill lab courses. He was the editor of The American Journal of Psychology. He and his students published a lot of studies in this journal which gave Cambridge some laboratory experience. He translated a few books into English so that the American scholars would be able to read them. Later the book mentions he may have gotten into trouble for plagiarism with this? I didn’t quite understand that. He started a group at Cambridge called the Experimentalists. He was able to organize the group so that they could go to different places and see different researchers work and talk about it together. It was a way for them to share information. Titchener had problems with introspection. Introspection is when researchers would give reports of what their brain was doing while they completed a task. Titchener thought this was not an accurate way to do this because he didn’t think you could perform the task in the same way and reflect on it at the same time. He came up with three solutions to this. 1. Rely on memory (introspection becomes retrospection) 2. Breaking the experience into stages. 3. Introspective Habit. While this is all interesting I felt that it was killed by the mass numbers of pages that needed to be read to obtain the information which made me not as engaged in the information.
I also feel maybe I took for granted Dewey’s progressive education. The book says that he felt that schools weren’t doing a good job teaching things basically because there isn’t enough interaction. He created a laboratory school where he hired psychologists to use their skills to teach the best. He felt kids learn by interacting and being creative and most of all by doing. I agree with this. I learn best by actually getting my hands dirty and doing it. Overall though, I didn’t find this that interesting. Maybe I feel this way because currently this is more common sense. I also feel that it is hard to teach the amount of students that most schools have in a classroom this way.
Things to cover for Tuesday: S-O-R model, reflex arc
Introspection, Titchener, Structuralism, Functionalism, The Manuals, Experimentalists, Comparative Psychology, Thorndike, Connectionism, progressive education, Dewey, Trial and Error Learning.
I think the most important things in this chapter and to psychology would be structuralism and functionalism—obviously because that’s what the chapter was about! Structuralism was described as like anatomy where the structural psychologist analyzes the human mind and body into it’s elementary parts, meaning each part of ourselves can essentially be broken down into very small parts. Functionalism was explained like physiology—because a physiologist examines how the parts of our body operate and what they do to keep our bodies alive, the functional psychologist examines how our mind operates to help our bodies adapt to different environments.
One of the first things I didn’t find as interesting were titcheners “manuals.” This was Mostly just because it took me a few times to read and get through it. In the late 1800’s and early 1900s there was no clear set instructions on how to proceed in a laboratory for either teachers or students, so titchener’s solution was to make manuals—or basically guide books on how to conduct experiments and other things in a lab. His first manual was published in 1901 and it involved basic sensory, perceptual and affective processes, it was named the “Qualitative Expiriments.” His second manual was published in 1905 named “quantitative experiments” and was filled with psychophysics and reaction time procedures.
Another thing I didn’t find as interesting at first were Thorndike’s Law of effect and Law of Exercise, which are what he thought to be the basic processes of learning. The law of exercise is that the connection between stimulus situations and response grows stronger with practice. And the law of effect was basically the same as skinner’s concept of operant conditioning. I don’t think these things were explained very well which is probably what didn’t make it as interesting to read.
I found titchener’s 3 basic types of elementary mental processes to be very interesting. These were sensation, images, and affections. He believed that sensations were the basic elements of perception, imagnes were the basic elements of ideas and affections (or feelings) were the basic elements of our emotions. He also said that they each had various attributes, sensory and images both had the attributes of quality, intensity, duration, and clearness, wheras affetions just had pleasentness or unpleasentness.
I also found titchener’s “systematic experimental introspection” to be interesting, where observers would give detailed reports of their conscious thoughts and events while completing a task (mental tasks like word association).
Two things I would like to understand better would be the concepts of transfer learning and dewey’s theory on reflex.
One topic I found to be interesting from the chapter was progressive education. John Dewey was responsible for progressive education which was an approach to education in which the students were made into active learners. They would essentially learn by actually doing something. Dewey wanted to help students succeed and believed that everyone had an equal chance to do so in the classroom. Because he was not a fan of the conventional approach to education (rote learning, drill and practice, and strict discipline), he created a “Laboratory School” which helped find how students learned best in the classroom. What he found was that students learn best by doing. Students learn by interacting with the environment and the school should encourage them to be actively involved. The reason I found this interesting is because of how much Dewey was concerned with the education of children. He did what he could to help students become the best learners they could be.
The second topic I found to be interesting was trial and error learning. Trial and error learning (aka “trial and accidental success”) was an explanation made by Edward Thorndike for the behavior of the cats in his puzzle boxes. The cats would escape by trying different things until they found the one that worked. The cats would have trouble escaping at first, trying many different ways. Eventually, the cats would perform the successful behavior by accident, and then sooner or later would find the correct behavior every time. This learning is sometimes referred to connectionism because the cat learned to make connections between stimuli in the boxes and the successful escape responses. I found this topic interesting because it shows us how animals can learn things. When a new situation is exposed the animal must learn how to react.
One topic that was less interesting from the chapter was structuralism. It was E.B. Titchener’s “structural psychology.” Just reading the definition of structuralism from the book is somewhat boring. It focuses on identifying the structural elements of human conscious experience, primarily through basic laboratory and introspective methods.
Another topic I found to be less interesting is ethology. Ethology was less interesting to me because it is simply the study of animal behavior in its natural surroundings. The chapter didn’t discuss it much so it seemed pretty simple and broad. Maybe learning about it a little more would help me to become more interested in it? but not sure.
From the chapter, I believe that understanding what an independent and dependent variable are essential in understand the history of psychology as well as psychology in general. Experiments play a huge role in psychology and without them we would be making advances. Two of the key ingredients in an experiment are the independent variable (variable that is being manipulated) and the dependent variable (variable being measured). Robert Woodworth came up with these terms.
Two concepts I would like to cover more in class would be social Darwinism and systematic experimental introspection. Social Darwinism was associated with Herbert Spencer and is the idea that evolutionary forces were natural and inevitable and that any attempt to disrupt them was misguided and doomed to failure. Systematic experimental introspection is associated with Titchener and Kulpe and is a more detailed type of introspection that the experience of complex mental events was followed by detailed introspective descriptions. I would like to learn more on these two topics.
Terms used: Progressive education, John Dewey, trial and error learning, connectionism, Edward Thorndike, structuralism, ethology, E.B. Titchener, independent variable, dependent variable, Robert Woodworth, Social Darwinism, Herbert Spencer, Systematic experimental introspection, and Oswald Kulpe.
One thing that was kind of interesting was reading about Titchner. I did him for my topical blog but it talked about a few more things than what I found. I learned more about his club called the Experimentalists. Who were an informal group that met every spring for a couple of days to talk about different experiments and research. Women weren’t allowed in this group, something that was debated by people like Clarke and Whitmer.
It also defined structuralism which is to analyze the human mind and organize it into elementary units, and functionalism which is the study of how the mind serves to adapt the individual to the environment. Titchner felt synthesis was included in the structure of structuralism and that how structures combine and connect was an important thing to study. He included systematic experimental introspection which was detailed reports of the conscious events occurring while completing a task. There were three solutions to the problems with introspection: 1. Rely on memory 2. Break the experience into stages 3. Introspective habit: this was something participants needed to be highly trained for and essentially become introspective machines. He thought this would help avoid the stimulus error which was a tendency to report stimuli and not the experience.
There were three structural elements of human conscious and experience.
1. Sensation which was a basic element of the more complex perception
2. images which was a basic element of the more complex ideas
3. affections which was a basic element of the more complex emotions.
The basic elements could not be broken down further but each had specific attributes. For sensation and images it was quality, intensity, duration and clearness, as well as many more but Affections were different . They had quality, intensity and duration as well as two fundamental qualities. They are pleasantness and unpleasantness.
During Titchner’s time drill courses were developed. These were courses where the students repeat classic studies in order to become acclimated to the lab. Edmond Sanford Clarke wrote the first text about this.
Another interesting thing was reading about Herbert Spencer. It was actually he who coined the term “survival of the fittest” and came up with social Darwinism. This implied that forces were natural and inevitable and those who won the battle for limited resources are the fittest. Believers of this theory felt that the government should not help the poor because they did not win anything.
Something that was uninteresting was learning about Harvey Carr. He basically developed a more consistent maze with the same number of choices and length of each pathway and cul de sac so that tests would be more reliable.
In the same boat and equally as uninteresting was Edward Thorndike. He is known for his puzzle boxes and work with cats. I’ve already learned about his trial and error learning and his law of effect. But his Law of Exercise, which states that connections between stimulus sitation and response would be strengthened with practice, was new. He felt that the two laws vovered most learning.
Robert Woodworth was important to the history of psychology because he distinguished between experiments and correlational research and used the independent and dependant variables for the first time the way they are used today. He said experimental research manipulate the independent variable where as correlational research measures two or more character and computes the correlation. And most important he found out that correlation is NOT causation! Which is still emphasized today!
One thing I would like to cover more in class is John Dewey. He wrote a paper that is considered the start of fundamentalism in America. He felt the reflex arc had three separate components. 1. Stimulus producing sensations. 2. Central processing and 3 act or motor response. He felt the arc was more of a continuous circuit. I don’t really understand this concept and would like more information
Another thing I’d like to cover is Robert Woodworth. The transfer of training was a bit confusing, on if it is dynamic psychology or if that is something separate.
I found the overall themes of structuralism and functionalism to be the most interesting topics in this chapter because how our ancestors studied the mind is very interesting to me.
Structuralism is an approach to psychology that is focused on identifying the structural elements of human conscious experience. This may sound a little dry at first but with further research it starts making more sense. Structuralism is mainly tied to psychologist E.B. Titchener. The main goals for structuralist psychology were to achieve a complete analysis of the adult mind and show how elements could be combined into more complex phenomena. Titchener also stated that the main elements of conscious experience are sensations, images, and affects. Also sensations and images have the attributes of quality, intensity, duration, and clearness.
Functionalism was more popularly studied in America. Functionalism is a study of psychology that is focused on the study of human conscious from an evolutionary perspective. What this means is that functionalist psychologists study how the mind serves to adapt the individual to the environment. Functionalism began to grow over the years and included such topics as Harvey Carr’s maze learning and Thorndike’s work with puzzle boxes.
Two topics that I found the least interesting were the Law of Effect and the Law of Exercise. I understand that it is about how practice makes perfect but the way they worded it in the book seemed confusing to me.
I would like you to discuss the S-O-R model and ethology in class because I don’t think I learned everything that I should have by reading the text.
Terms: structuralism, functionalism, human conscious, Titchener, attributes, Law of Effect, Law of Exercise, S-O-R model, ethology
One of the things I found interesting was the difference between structuralism and funtionalism according to E. B. Titchener. In order to explain them he makes comparisons to the field of biology. He draws similarities between structuralism and anatomy, where anatomy breaks the body down into basic components, structuralism breaks the mind down into elementary units that are fit for studying. He then draws a parallel between functionalism and physiology. Physiology, he explains, studys how various body parts function together. In this way functionalism studies how the mind helps the individual adapt to its environment.
I also found the concept ot Transfer interesting. there was the belief at Universities that by studying one topic, even though it was unrelated, would help with learning a different topic (e.g. studying greek to boost learning in zoology). Robert Woodworthand Edward Thorndike did research on this to see if it was true. They found that studying similar items would help when studying eachother but with unrelated items it made no difference. They drew this from their studies of cat's ability to escape from similar boxes.
As a side, I also enjoyed Titchener's ways to fail Laboratory Psychology. It was humorus and really brought a human element to all of the men we are studying. It also draws a tie into being a student today.
I found uninteresting the Reflex Arc that was studied by Funtionalist John Dewey and believed by physiologist. The Reflex Arc deals with three phases when it comes to the reflex which are: the stimulus producing sensation, the central processing production of an idea, and the act or motor response.
Another thing that did not spark my interest as mcuh was introspective habit. This concept was coined by Titchner and explaines the phonemenon of how it is possible to take mental notes while making observations while also writing notes as the same time.
I would like to go into the Laws of Effect and Excercise. I would also like more insight into
Connectionism.
The two things I found most interesting in the chapter was the section over Dewey and Thorndike’s puzzle boxes. I found the section on Dewey interesting because he is someone that I have not really learned about in terms of psychology before. His ideas about the reflexes and going against the idea of the reflex arc, seem to make more sense than the ideas that were used before his. I agree with him on his theories and think of it more of a continuous thing rather than something that occurs in parts. As for Thorndike, I have learned of his practices with the puzzle boxes before, but I still find them to interesting. The trial and error learning that came out of his puzzle box trials is what intrigues me the most; probably because I feel that this method is one of the main ways in which people, as well as animals, learn.
The parts I found least interesting occurred within the section over Titchener. I think this might be because there was a lot of information about him and his work that was put forth in the chapter. I also do not feel that I am completely familiarized with the differences or even the similarities between structuralism and functionalism within the world of psychology. Since I am not fully aware of those two topics it was difficult for me to follow along with the reading over Titchener’s work since it dealt so much with structuralism.
I think the most important thing to take away from this chapter in understanding the history of psychology is that structuralism and functionalism played a big part in the development of the new psychology. It is stated in the text that although structuralism basically fizzled out with the death of Titchener, it still went on to be the basis or an assisting factor in the development of the other ‘basic’ forms of psychology.
I would like to go over structuralism and functionalism. I have always struggled with the difference between these two and being able to fully understand them. Maybe real life situations or examples might be helpful?
Terms: Titchener, Dewey, reflex arc, Thorndike, puzzle boxes, structuralism, functionalism, new psychology, trial and error learning
The things that interested me was the concept of connectionism and the experiments involved. Connectionism is often referred to Thorndike's model of learning,it emphasizes on the development and strengthening of connections between stimulus situations and responses that became stronger with trial and error learning. These distinctions were made by Edward L.Thorndike after doing several experiments. These included mazes with chickens and cats and puzzle boxes. The mazes with the chickens showed that when they were first placed in the maze there was multiple behaviors present and they showed uncertainty in what they should do. They eventually would establish a way to get out of the maze and after several trials they would not exhibit so much confusion. The cat trials also resulted in similar findings. Once they found out what was needed to be able to escape the box the behavior was then repeated and they applied what they learned when they were transferred to different box that contained different methods of escape.
Structuralism was another major issue in this chapter. I did not find it as interesting as the connectionism or functionalism,which is focused on the study of human conscious experience from an evolutionary perspective and is concerned with studying adaptive value of various mental and behavioral processes. Structuralism is focused on identifying the structural elements of human conscious experience and primarily through basic laboratory and introspective methods.
One thing I would like to learn more about in class would be the S-O-R model.
Terms- Structuralism, Connectionism, Functionalism, Thorndike
Functionalism is a school of psychology that was favored by most early American psychologists. It focused on the study of human conscious experience from an evolutionary perspective and was concerned with studying the adaptive value of various mental and behavioral processes. Functionalism was mainly associated in Chicago and Columbia and called America's psychology. John Dewey established Chicago as a center of functionalism. He published an article called The Reflex Arc Concept of Psychology. It discussed the reflex arc and how he believed that the reflex is an integrated, coordinated whole that serves the function of adapting the organism to its environment. Another functionalist is James R. Angell. He focused on reaction time, imagery, and sound localization. He was the most visible spokesperson for functionalism by popular introductory textbook. He also described the function of consciousness to be in allowing the individual to solve problems.
Structuralism was mainly surround by a man named E.B. Titchener. He created his own manuals on laboratory practice which were filled with qualitative experiments and quantitative experiments. It guided students and teachers in drill courses. He also had a primary goal for psychology which was to analyze human consciousness into it basic elements or structural components. He would do this thru experimental research. He also developed three solutions to the problem of introspection. The first was to rely on memory and turn introspection into retrospection. The second was to break the experience into stages. The third was most important, it was to acquire an introspective habit, which is the ability to make mental notes about an experience while the experience is happening. He insisted that his observers be highly trained and wanted to avoid as much stimulus error as possible. Stimulus error is the tendency to report products of conscious experience instead of the conscious experience itself. He also developed three types of elementary mental processes: sensations, images, and affections.
important terms- structuralism, functionalism, drill courses, observer, stimulus, error, reflex arc,
I found Titchener's research on structuralism to be interesting. Structuralism analyzes human conscious experience into its elemental units, then shows how these units could be synthesized into mental processes.He said that structuralism is just like anatomy. Exp: anatomist organizes knowledge about the body into structures, so a structuralist would analyze the human mind and organize it into its elementary units.He also said that psychology must also understand the process of synthesis which is how the mental elements combine and connect into more complex phenomena. He also said that psychology must understand explanation which means understanding how the nervous system produces the various sensory, perceptual and cognitive phenomena.
Functionalism was also interesting.It is more like physiology and the physiologist examines HOW the various parts of the body operate and the functions they serve to help keep the individual alive.
Connectionism was interesting, but not my favorite. Thorndike pioneered connectionism. WHen cats were placed into his puzzle boxes, they would display random acts of behavior: clawing, biting and screeching. These behaviors woudl be repeated because they would generally lead to escape. However, these failed behaviors would eventually lead to extinction and the successful behaviors would occur earlier and earlier.
Some topics I would like covered in class would be the ethology section (would be interesting to talk about in class?), and structuralism. I think I understand it but a refresher would be nice.
terms: functionalism, structuralism, connectionism, Thorndike, Titchener
Functionalism was a huge part of american psychology. James and Hall are considered to have made the push away from structuralism towards functionalism. They were heavily influenced by Darwin and was taught at Chicago and Columbia.
john Dewey went to Chicago to teach, and during his time there he published about the reflex arc. It was thought of in 3 separate components- stimulus producing sensation, central processing producing and idea, and the act or motor response. It's basically a basic unti of behavior. Dewey thought the reflex arc should be thought of as more continuous. Dewey also invented progressive education, which is learning by doing.
Functionalism agreed primarily with the theory of social Darwinism. Social Darwinism believed that "evolutionary forces were natural and inevitable and that any attempt on the part of humans to alter these forces was misdirected and harmful".
Edward Thorndike was a Columbia functionalist and developed "Trial and Error Learning". He put his cats in puzzle boxes over and over documenting their activities and the different in the time it took them to succeed from the previous attempts. The cats learned the connections between each stimuli when they made an attempt to escape learning which was positive and negative. This is referred to as connectionism.
One thing I found interesting was functionalism movement. Functionalism was a broader way to look at psychology compared to structuralism. The main universities where functionalism was studied were at Chicago and Columbia. John Dewey was the professor at Chicago. He came up with a theory that went against that of the reflex arc. The reflex arc spit up a reflex into three components. Dewey said that a reflex was more continuous and should be thought of wholly instead of different parts. Dewey what to study behavior more as a means of discovering why humans do certain things. Dewey was also big on education and worked toward reform in it by studying the best environments in which children learn.
I also found Edward Thorndike’s puzzle box learning interesting. Thorndike studied how cats would learn to get out of puzzle boxes that he made. What I found interesting is that Thorndike never made very complex boxes. He first studied chicks getting out of simple mazes that he made from books. In his studies with the chicks he found that after a while they were able to stop the useless actions of trying to get out, like jumping at the wall, and could easily make it to the exit. He was different at the time because he directly studied the animals instead of using stories about what he heard animals had done to prove his theories. He made the boxes for the cats by himself, and in all honesty they look like junk, but they are important pieces of the history of psychology. He found that the cats would eventually be able to figure out what they had to do to get out, using something like trial and error, which is sometimes called connectionism. The cats did not imitate others if they would watch one successfully escape and were not able to use complex reasoning by combining the different response into one sequence to get out.
Two things I found uninteresting were Titchener and structuralism. Titchener seemed like a pretty stuck up guy to me. He thought his way was the best way and had a very narrow perception of psychology. Titchener taught at Cornell and only liked to surround himself with people like him, which is why he created the experimentalists group. He would not allow any women into it though because he thought then the men could not discuss things in an informal setting. He helped to expand the laboratory at Cornell and taught his class as drill courses. Instead of diving head first into lab work, students were taught how to use all the different instruments and different aspects of a psychology laboratory.
Structuralism looks at breaking down the structures into units and analyzing it. Titchener said a person cannot study something without looking at how it is made up first. Structuralism was like the foundation. He used introspection in his experiments to study this. A person had to be trained in introspection, which meant a person would write out in detail what was going on in their head. Using this method meant only a few people could be studied, which left a large amount of the population unstudied. This was another way in which Titchener was narrow-minded.
I think functionalism was the most useful in understanding psychology because it is the start of how psychology is looked at today. Two things I would like you to go over are the Law of Effect and the Law of Exercise related to Thorndike.
Terms: Functionalism, Structuralism, reflex arc, trial and error, connectionism, drill courses, introspection
Something that I found to be interesting from chapter 7 was E.B. Titchener’s thoughts of structuralism. He said that structuralism is comparable to biology in the fact it is just like anatomy in that the purpose is all about analysis. Someone studying anatomy separates the body and their knowledge about the body into component structures, and a structural psychologist analyzes the human mind and organizes it into smaller, elementary units. Versus the idea of functionalism which is comparable to physiology in how a functional psychologist studies how the mind helps an individual adapt to their environment, while the physiologist studies how the various parts operate and how they function to keep someone alive. I found this to be interesting because it is almost like it is disputing the thoughts that psychology isn’t a real science. By comparing it to “hard” science then it is easier to see how it is important and how parts of the brain are just as important, if not more important, than individual parts of the body. Another thing that I thought was interesting was Edward L. Thorndike’s learning model called connectionism. Connectionism emphasizes the development and strengthening of connections between stimulus situations and responses that became stronger with trial and error learning. Trial and error learning is another concept of Thorndike’s that he used to explain how the cats figured out how to get out of the box; they tried various behaviors until they finally figured out how to get out. Even though I know that it is important to have independent and dependent variables and to know the difference I found it to be an uninteresting part of this chapter. I feel like almost every class I have been in since coming to college has talked about independent/dependent variables and it wasn’t as interesting as other parts. I think that functionalism and structuralism are both important for psychology. I also think that Titchener and Woodworth are important parts of learning psychology. I would like to hear more about ethology and the S-O-R model.
Terms: Titchener, structuralism, functionalism, Thorndike, connectionism, trial and error learning, independent variable, dependent variable, Woodworth, S-O-R Model, ethology
The most interesting idea in the chapter for me is Thorndike and his discovery and coining of the term Connectionism. This is a type of trial and error learning or trial and accidental success if you were to ask Thorndike himself. The reason that this is so interesting to me is because it implies that animals, in fact, do have at least some degree of intelligence, memory, and problem solving capabilities. The main tool he used for his experiments was called "The Puzzle Box". It is a maze-like box that animals attempt to escape from. Thorndike came to his conclusions because after every attempt to escape the puzzle box, the animals became more effective after each trial.
Another interesting thing in the chapter is reading about Titchner's contributions to the field. His definition of the field excludes women, children, and the insane. This is an overwhelmingly large portion of humankind. While it was not uncommon for men to be dominating factor in science and other fields, I find it a little overwhelming to think about such a large population being left out of psychology. What Titchner DID contribute to psychology is experimental psychology. I feel that if nothing else, that contribution alone was enough to give psychology a push toward becoming a respected science.
One thing that I didn't like about the chapter is that the difference between structuralism and functionalism is described very briefly and only with a simple analogy. This is also what I would like to know more about because the only thing I'm worse at understanding than dates and people is schools of thought. I just have a hard time remembering and distinguishing them.
Terms: Thorndike, Puzzle Box, Intelligence, Connectionism, Trial and Errory, Titchner, Psychology, Experimental Psychology, Functionalism, Structuralism
Well besides not being drawn to anything in this section the biggest topics disused were functionalism and structuralism, so if nothing else I will discuss these subjects further. Structuralism was described by titchener as just like anatomy. There purpose being to analyze. So a structuralist would analyze the human mind. While functionalism was more like physiology. This is when psychologists studies how the mind serves to adapt to the individual to the environment. Titchener then realized that with all the psychology happening in Leipzig that the new study of physiology would be a new route. After joining school at cornell he began to write manuals. These manuals were known as drill courses which were laboratory procedures. The structuralist system was dominated by the topics of sensation and perception. Functionalism on the other hand agreed primarily with the theory of social Darwinism. Social Darwinism believed that evolutionary forces were natural and inevitable and that any attempt on the part of humans to alter these forces was misdirected and harmful. The last main topic to discuss is Connectionism. Thorndike and his cat puzzle boxes concluded that connectionism was basically set forth by trial and error learning. Thorndike basically put aside that cats had problem solving and reasoning and it was just overall trial and error.
More on Structuralism. E. B. Titchener was from cornell university who already began working in the lab to draw more apon structuralism. Titcheners structuralist system was the science of the structure of the human mind. Titchener often associated with the name introspection. Introspection was an important procedure in Leipzig. Introspection thought it is impossible to have a conscious experience and reflect on it at the same time. His three solutions was first to rely on memory, the second was to break the experiences into stages, and then commonly involved was stimulus error. this was the tendencey to report events by describing the stiumuli present. like observing a tree , you would observe the sensory elements. The structural elements of the human conscious is by the sensations, images, and affections. Sensations were the basic elements of the more complex process of perception.
Functionists such as Dewey focused more on the reflex arc. The reflex arc is the stimulus producing sensation, central processing producing an idea, and the act or motor response. Dewey argued the relex is conceived as an integrated coordinated whole that serves the function of adapting the organism to the enviornment. The tradition reflex arc would analyze the event into a seris of stimulus responses. for example a flame, or grass, or glass. Henry Carr began using the mazes, known as the Carr mazes. But throndike was the one who revieved credit for most off it. Thorndike was interested in studying how individuals adapted to their environments and how the knowledge could be apllied. with the puzzle boxeshe first realized that the bats behavior seemed random, as a series of attempts to escape. eventually the correct response occured by accident. THis was known as trial and error learning.
One area of this chapter that caught my interest was Titchener's Structural System where his goal was to analyze human consciousness into its basic elements or structural components. Anything dealing with understanding how the human mind works is interesting to me, so with this experiment aiming to understand the process of synthesis (how the mental elements combine and connect into more complex phenomena) more I had no choice but to tune in closely. Titchener believed there were three goals he was after during his experiments, and those were Analysis, Synthesis, and Explanation. These three combined would give him and everyone else the answer they were seeking. Titchener's experiment required his colleagues to give experimental introspections (detailed reports of the conscious events), but he was aware that this was not very reliable because it is impossible to reflect on an experiment as it is happening. He came up with three solutions for this issue. They were: Rely on memory alone, reducing the memory load by breaking the experience into stages, or to acquire an introspective habit. He required all of his observers to be highly trained so that stimulus error (tendency to report the stimuli presented instead of the conscious experiences) could be avoided.
Another of this chapter I found interesting was "Thorndike on Puzzle Box Learning". I found this interesting early on because he was a critic of most comparative psychologists and it's always interesting to read about what one person that chooses to be different from the rest thinks is wrong and attempts to change. He felt that most people were too quick to consider animals geniuses because all they do is document the positive things they do that makes them seem smart, but neglect recording how many times they failed before they accomplished their goal. He accused the psychologists of his day of only studying one case and declaring a final conclusion, so he said he would control the entire experiment including the environment the animals were in and the methods they could choose from to escape. Pretty much what his experiment was back then with the cats is what we call "Trial and Error Learning" in everyday life today. He put the cats in the same boxes over and over documenting their activities and the different in the time it took them to succeed from the previous attempts. The cats learned the connections between each stimuli when they made an attempt to escape learning which was positive and negative. This is also referred to as connectionism.
At the end of his experiment, Thorndike rejected the idea that cats were capable of complex reasoning. They showed no evidence of combining everything that they had learned through the trials in a behavioral sequence nor did they show any evidence of observational learning. Then he assumed the Law of Effect and Law of Exercise were two consequences of the Puzzle Box Studies. After some altering of these laws, he came to the conclusion that (LoE) rewards are more effective than punishments in producing learning, and (LoEx) repetition was often unnecessary for higher forms of learning.
I also found it interesting that although he criticized other psychologists experiments so much, it was reported that he never learned how to used a typewriter or how to drive a car. His son also says he doesn't recall ever seeing his father fix anything. These are 3 things you would expect someone who composes experiments and criticizes a lot to do easily.
One thing that I thought was interesting was John Dewey's take on the reflex arc. Early on when Bell and Magendie had studied the reflex arc they thought it was separate components that created the overall event or feeling. "The stimulus producing sensation, central processing producing an idea and the act or motor response." This was the thought of Bell and Magendie. Dewey on the other hand thought of the reflex arc as a whole system that you learn from and then adapt to the environment. Dewey gave the example that the "arc" is more of a circuit that is connected pathway. He also explained Bell and Magendie's idea of the reflex arc as if a child seeing a candle flame and reaching for the flame, feeling the heat and retracting their hand, therefore the child's mind had to process what he was feeling, but Dewey put it another way. He said it was "oversimplified a complex action." Dewey said that the child feeling the heat and pain of the candle flame created a learning event, that the child will remember not to touch the flame again. Another thing I thought was interesting was Dewey's reform and creating progressive education. He had an excellent point that the classroom should not be a place to loathe, but be a place that you want to go. He created a laboratory school that allowed children to learn by being hands on. As an education major I totally agree with this, only if other teachers could figure this out. Overall I enjoyed reading about Dewey and his ideas and concepts. I didn't really enjoy reading about Titchener. I just found his studies to be somewhat on the boring side. I'm glad he had a theory on how the body operates, but I feel like there have already been so many others that have studied how the body works. I didn't really like reading about all his education and how he went from one college to another to another. I thought Dewey's idea about education was useful to understanding psychology and how some classes adapted this idea, like a chemistry class in high school where you performed mild yet mind blowing experiments. I found structuralism and functionalism to be covered a lot, yet I don't really find myself fully understanding it. So maybe those could be something you could clarify in class.
Terms: John Dewey, Bell and Magendie, Titchener, reflex arc, progressive education, functionalism, structuralism.
Titchener’s work was very interesting to me for the first part of the chapter. He was a man who relied solely on experiments. He sought to break down the human mind into its smallest, most manageable parts and constructed cognition out of these pieces. Titchener did a lot for the field of psychology through his work. Before him, the field of psychology was not considered to be a concrete science. It was thought to never be able to compete or be compared with Chemistry, Physics, and biology. However, because Titchener was so dedicated to an experimental approach he helped to make it into a measurable field of science. However, it was later discovered that a lot of his theories/experiments had a lot of errors. He formulated a theory called systematic experimental introspection. This was a type of evidence gathering device in whish observers (the people being experimented on) would give detailed reports of the conscious events occurring while completing some task. This type of research required a lot of tedious training, which ultimately led the person to be biased in any type of research they participated in. One problem that Titchener’s experimenters learned to overcome was stimulus error, the tendency of describing the stimuli they’re being presented rather than the conscious experiences they’re having because of the stimuli. Sitting directly opposite Tittchener and his beliefs was James Angell, the functionalist. Angell, by no means invented the idea of functionalism but he was a key proponent who brought it to prominence. He made a clear distinction; structuralists were interested in the ‘what?’ of consciousness, functionalists were interested in the ‘how?’ and ‘why?’ of consciousness. Angell also totally disregarded Titchener’s analogy of structuralism to anatomists because one measured material objects and the other mental processes. Angell said that that basically all topics of interest to psychologists could fit under the broad umbrella of functionalism because it behooves us to understand the functions of consciousness and how those functions develop. Some examples were an interest in failures to adapt leads to a study of abnormal psychology and an interest in how some individuals adapt better than others leads to a study of individual differences. Angell also legitimized the thoughts of functionalism through his book The Province of Functional Psychology. Through all of his hard work Angell had excelled functionalism to be at par with structuralism.
Harvey Carr was a very boring individual and he contributed next to nothing to the functionalism movement. The title of his section of the chapter was The Maturing of Functionalism. However, I saw little to no evidence for Carr contributing to this. Carr did invent a sort of standardized maze, aptly named the “Carr Maze”. He also had a substantial influence on his students during his long stay at Chicago with higher education. His biggest contribution that I saw he did was coin the phrase for ‘mature’ functionalism. In essence it stated that functionalism had always been more of an attitude than a systematic theoretical position. This attitude was that there was great value in studying individual differences, animal behavior, developmental/abnormal psych, and to look for practical applications of psychological principles. Aside from coining this phrase and making it clear for all to see, it seems as though Harvey Carr contributed little of value. Another uninteresting part of the text for me was the focus put on the Chicago and Columbia functionalists. I didn’t really understand why it was important where these psychologists came from. From Chicago they had John Dewey, with his reflex arc and progressive education, James Angell, who defined and set apart Functional Psychology from the Structuralists-focusing more on the how and why rather than the what, and Harvey Carr, with his mazes and stating that functionalism is an attitude and not a practice. From Columbia they had Edward Thorndike, who studied comparative psychology with puzzles for cats and had a fight with Wesley Mills on the ‘naturalness’ of his studies, and Robert Woodworth, who is responsible for creating the idea of ‘independent and dependent variables’ and the S-OR model (focusing on the stimulus, the organism being affected, and the response). All of these men were important, so why did it matter what schools they came from? It doesn’t.
This chapter helped to point out that throughout the history of psychology there were plenty of instances where there were fundamental differences in the field. The structuralists and functionalists regarded the other as being very far from the correct train of thought. However, through continued experiments, research, and experiences they both came out next to each other and have since been used together in eclectic psychology theories. One of these focused much on the essential elements of the brain, thoughts, and how the mind works. The other sought to apply what they could understand of psychology to practical matters, rather than simply pick apart the mind. Together these helped forward the movement of psychology.
I didn’t really understand what they were talking about with regards to Titchener’s thoughts on “imageless” thoughts and how that conflicted with his findings. I also did not clearly understand John Dewey and his idea of the reflex arc. It used to be referred to as three separate components of reflexes: the stimuli produces sensation, central processing produces an idea, and then the act/motor response. Dewey argued that human actions, such as reflexes shouldn’t be broken down into such elementary aspects. Psychologists should be more concerned with how the functions help the organism survive in their changing environment.
From what I read and what we discussed on Tuesday, I thought theory of structuralism vs. functionalism was the most interesting. When dealing with structuralism, it seemed really easy to understand what Titchner thought about structuralism. “Structuralism is like anatomy, the purpose is to analyze.” Taking anatomy for a term in high school I felt that I could really connect with Titchner. Every week we would do an experiment based on observing and gathering information; very similar to the experiments that Titchner and his students performed. “Organize it into its elementary units,” from this passage I concluded that Titchner simply meant that it would be a lot easier to classify the measurements in certain system. For example, today we organize all of our measurements in two different classifications either standard or metric. From page 217 to 221 I thought was really amazing when reading about structuralism. It first opened up at me as I was reading about analysis and how it wasn’t the sole purpose through experimental research. It told me how the process of synthesis and the mental elements combine and connect into more complex phenomena. “Learns to formulate the laws of connection of the elementary mental processes,” I thought was a great statement by Titchner. He then started elaborating his procedure into systematic experimental introspection. He figured that observers would give detailed reports of the conscious events occurring while completing some task. It was amusing how Titchner was able to identify a problem with the introspection. I thought this was the climax of the reading for me. In order for Titchner to fix the problem he came up with three solutions.
1. Relying on memory, while delaying the introspective. Introspection had to become retrospection and introspective examination becomes post mortem examination.
2. Reducing the memory load was to break the experience into stages.
3. His most important technique was to acquire the introspective habit.
• The result of extensive practice with introspection was a dissociative ability to make mental notes about an experience while the experience was occurring.
When comparing to Titchner and Dewey, I didn’t think all the other scientist were that interesting to read about. I feel I really learned a lot from Titchner and Dewey; it seemed like they pulled me into their experiments. In John Dewey’s experiments I found that the reflex arc is strictly based on behavior which is separated in three components: the stimulus producing sensation, central processing producing an idea, and motor response. And his progressive education which is making significant contributions to educational reform and launching the movement were really interesting. I would like to know more about Thorndike’s connectionism and his puzzle box learning. I also would like to know more about Robert S. Woodworth and what is S-O-R model actually was.
Terms: systematic experimental introspection, introspective habit, reflex arc, progressive education
American Psychologists were all mostly influenced by the theory of evolution. Functionalism was heavily stressed for better understanding of how people's minds worked when it came to adapting to their environments. This also brought along structuralism which was similar to functionalism, just more in depth with putting everything functionalism represented into a better perspective explaining why and how things happened.
Functionalism looked at individual differences, animal behavior, development, and abnormal behavior, and then practically applied it to psychological principles. This movement was widespread, especially in the US, but it was most popular at University of Chicago and Columbia University. Darwin’s work had a major influence on a lot of functionalists. Dewey was one of the best known functionalists who worked in the Chicago school of functionalism. One of his most prominent theories was his work with the reflex arc. In this theory previous psychologists broke down the reflex into three simple parts: stimulus that causes a sensation, processing leads to a thought/idea, and the motor response. Dewey felt that breaking the reflex down was useless, and he proposed his own ideas on reflexes. He believed that the reflex was a coordinated whole that functioned by allowing us to adapt to our environment. He also states that he believes the reflex is more of a continuous circuit than an arc, which as a beginning and end. Another major contributor to functionalism was Thorndike, who worked with the Columbia functionalists. One of his major contributions was his theory of connectionism. This theory is also called trial and error learning, and focuses on his research with cats. He basically found that when placed in the puzzle box the cats displayed several, seemingly random, acts until one of the acts is beneficial. After being repeatedly placed in the box, the cats begin to learn which act works the best to achieve their goal, and this act begins to take place earlier each time they are placed in the box. While this work was done with animals, it is an example of how working with animals can be applied to overall psychological principles. Humans exhibit the same trial and error learning that Dewey observed in the cats.
Structuralism is compared by Titchener to anatomy because it’s main purpose is analysis. Structural psychologists analyze the human mind and seek to organize it into elementary units. Titchener was perhaps the most prominent structural psychologist. He did a lot of work in the field, but one of his main ideas was that there were three types of elementary mental processes: sensations, images, and affections. Sensations were what he considered the basic element of the more complex process of perception, images were the basic components of thoughts or ideas, and affections were the basic components of emotions. Titchener was also well known for his technique of introspective analysis, or introspective habit. This technique was used to train observers to use introspection and avoid stimulus error, which is the tendency to report the stimulus present instead of the conscious experiences that come about from that stimulus. Essentially introspective analysis required his observers to only report introspective descriptions as opposed to simply stating what the stimulus is.