Please read the chapter assigned for this week.
(Reading Schedule:
After reading the chapter, please respond to the following questions:
Of the various aspects of History & Systems presented in the chapter, which did you find the most interesting? Why? Which did you find least interesting? Why? What are three things you read about in the chapter that you think will be the most useful for you in understanding History & Systems? Why? What are some topics in earlier chapters that relate or fit in with this chapter? How so?
Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.
Make a list of key terms and concepts you used in your post.
Let me know if you have any questions.
--Dr. M
The most interesting material I read from this chapter is the concept that is psychology really all one unified subject, or should psychology be created into many psychologies. I really never thought of all divisions that psychology has and this section about whether it is a unified subject or many divisions really interested me. I personally did not know that there were 56 divisions to psychology according to APA. There really wasn’t any least interesting material I found. I mean this chapter wasn’t that most interesting all around I felt, but it still had some important information.
The first important information I found in this chapter was the growth and diversity that has occurred in psychology. Women and minorities have increased their creditability and progress in psychology. Women actually outnumber men in undergraduate psychology majors these days. Women outnumber men 2 to 1. Blacks have also been given more opportunities to achieve in psychology these days then back in the early times of psychology. The second thing I found interesting was the trends that have been increasing in psychology. These trends are; accelerated study of the relationship between the brain and behavior, vigorous return of evolutionary thinking, research brought about by the capacities of modern computers, increased professionalization of psychological practitioners, and increased fragmentation of psychology. The third important thing I feel is important is that topic about how psychology has many divisions and should be questioned as if it is one study or many divisions of studies.
Terms: I really didn't use terms at all in this reading activity.
I found the story of Eleanor Gibson to be the most interesting part of the chapter. As a woman in the early-mid 1900's, she was discriminated against by professors and schools even though she was an intellectual. Despite many setbacks, she persevered and eventually helped break barriers for women. She was named the Susan Linn Sage Endowed Professor of Psychology in 1974, Professor Emeritus in 1980, and received the National Medal of Science in 1992. Her study of depth perception of infants helped create the concept of a visual cliff and she argued for a theory of organism-environmental interaction.
I found everything fairly interesting in this chapter, but the idea of psychologists having so many different fields and departments that COMPETE I feel is kind of dumb. I understand that there are multiple ways to describe behavior, but I don't think any single way is correct.
I think everything was fairly important to learning the history of psych in this chapter. It had the future of psychology and told of how both minorities and women are breaking barriers in a predominantly white-male field.
Terms: Gibson, visual cliff
I found the story of Gibson to be interesting. She was awarded the National Medal of Science, when she was researching at a time when women were discriminated against in the field of psychology. She tried to work under Yerkes at Yale but he said he did not allow women in his laboratory. She married one of her professors, but could not be hired at Cornell with him because of antinepotism rules Cornell had. Because of this she had to work unpaid as a research associate, which is when she did some of her most important work on the visual cliff in depth perception. Eventually she was able to be hired on as a full professor and continued to teach and do research at Cornell. She was a woman who persevered through the discrimination and had a successful career.
I also found the lives and research of Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark to be interesting. The research they performed was a critical part of the Brown vs. Board of Education ruling that said the separate but equal law was unconstitutional. They studied black and white children in the North and the South. They put black and white dolls in front of the children and asked them which ones were good and bad, and which ones looked like them. Often the children saw the black dolls as bad. Kenneth Clark testified about this study during the hearings for the case. Kenneth Clark also went on to be the first and only black president of the APA so far.
I actually did not find anything uninteresting in this chapter. It was fairly short and I enjoyed reading all the information in it.
I think knowing about all of the differing ways to study psychology now is important in understanding the history of psychology. Throughout this class we have seen where two different psychology theories and their professors have differed with each other. One example is the argument between professional psychologists and experimental psychologists and which is the more important form of psychology. I agree with Koch who said psychology should be called psychological studies, because there are such vast differences between to different branches of psychology. It is important to know the history of psychology to be able to better understand the reasons for the differences. Also with psychology being so fragmented, sometimes the history of psychology is the only thing that binds all the psychologists together.
Terms: Gibson, visual cliff, Brown vs. Board of Education, Kenneth and Mamie Clark, professional psychologists, experimental psychologists, psychological studies
I thought the most interesting part of the chapter was on Eleanor Gibson. In June 1992, she was awarded the National Medal of Science which is the highest honor a president can offer to a scientist. She performed research that involved a variety of topics from the development of depth perception to basic processes involved when reading. Only nine people had been awarded this before her. She was also greatly associated with what is called the “visual cliff” which is used to study depth perception in infants. The reason I thought this was interesting because it is nice to see a woman be so successful in psychology. Women had a very hard time in the history of psychology until more recent dates. I think it is interesting how times have changed and how a woman can now be recognized as making contributions while in the past they were rarely allowed to be in the psychology field.
There was not much to this chapter and what was there for the most part was pretty interesting. One part that seemed a little less interesting would have simply been when it talked about the American Psychological Association and how it has expanded over time. It is pretty cool how it expanded quite a lot over time, but this topic was just a little duller and less interesting to me.
Three things that I thought are more important from the chapter for understanding the history of psychology are the fact that psychology is a collection of disciplines, knowing about minorities in psychology, and the trends in modern psychology. First, knowing that psychology consists of a variety of different aspects is important because the field is not simply psychology or one kind, but instead includes many different approaches and views. Some of these include experimental psychology, developmental psychology, industrial/organizational psychology, clinical psychology, school psychology, rehabilitation psychology, behavior analysis, history of psychology, psychopharmacology and substance abuse, psychological hypnosis, psychology of religion, health psychology, international psychology, and many more. It is important to know that each of these individual types of psychology help to make up the entire field of psychology. Each type works together and each one builds off of another to help advance the whole field. Sigmund Koch recommended that the term psychology be replaced by “psychological studies.” History of psychology includes understanding all of these parts because all of them have made psychology what it is today.
The second topic important in the history of psychology, knowing about minorities in psychology, is important because we must know how psychology started and who it all involved. Women of course are included as a minority in the history of psychology, but also included are minorities of different ethnic groups. Minorities including blacks have not made significant gains in psychology in the past and not even as much in the present either. For example, in 1991, only fourteen percent of all bachelor’s degrees, eleven percent of master’s degrees, and nine percent of doctoral degrees were granted to minorities. Even though there are fewer minorities who have been acknowledged in the history of psychology, they have still made contributions. Kenneth B. and Mamie Phipps Clark were included among these individuals. They studied the self-esteem of black children and made a contribution to psychology. I think it is important we recognize these people as well. They are part of history just like everyone else and should be given just as much credit.
A third topic that is important in knowing the history of psychology is the knowing that psychology’s history helps us to understand contemporary trends in psychology. These five trends include the accelerated study of the relationship between the brain and behavior, the vigorous return of evolutionary thinking, significant changes in research brought about by the capacities of modern computers, the increased professionalization of psychological practitioners, and the increased fragmentation of psychology. Without understanding history of psychology and where each of these trends originated, we cannot fully understand what each of these mean.
Some topics from previous chapters that relate to this chapter are Stanley G Hall and his genetic psychology and the work of Mary Whiton Calkins. Hall’s genetic psychology meant the study of the evolution and development of the human mind, and included comparative, abnormal, and especially developmental psychology. This relates to the chapter because of how psychology is one. Even farther back in time, different parts of psychology were used as one to study new things. Mary Whiton Calkins’ work consisted of paired-associate learning and self psychology. This relates to the chapter because she was a woman who made a contribution to psychology and its history. Women and minorities were discussed in this chapter as well. Other women who made contributions to psychology are Christine Ladd-Franklin and Margaret Floy Washburn.
Overall, this chapter refreshed my memory from what we have been reading over this semester. It included an overview on some previous topics that we have discussed and it was very helpful.
Terms used: Eleanor Gibson, visual cliff, clinical psychology, school psychology, Sigmund Koch, Kenneth B and Mamie Phipps Clark, Stanley Hall, genetic psychology, Mary Whiton Calkins, paired-associate learning, self psychology, Christine Ladd-Franklin, and Margaret Washburn
The first major topic in this chapter is women and minorities. Eleanor Gibson
started out at smith college found her love for psychology and with that love she married one of her teachers. She faced tough times because she was a women. things got better in the 60's and 70's when the womens movement became prominant. Minorities like women and blacks found significant gains after World War II. Kenneth B. and Mamie Phipps Clark , on May 17, 1954 the supreme court concerning a suit against the board of education in topeka, said taht "in the field of public education the doctrine of 'separtate but equal' has no place. The "Brown v. Board of Education ruling reversed that it was not legal for there to be separate public facilities for whites and blacks. Kenneth B. Clark and Mamie, did studies with children and racial identification and preference. Mamie went on to provide psychological services for homelss black children.
The future in psychology seems very bright. The question of if there is one field of psychology or multiple fields? different psychologies include: experimental, developmental, behavior, health, international, etc.
terms: Gibson, Brown vs Board of education, Kenneth and Mamie clark
The section on Minorities in Psychology's History interested me the most, because I'm a minority majoring in Psychology. Seeing that in 1991 only about 10% of the Psychology degrees belonged to African Americans wasn't too shocking to me, because earlier today I found out that African American males only make up 7% of the Degree that I'm aiming to achieve (Masters in Social Work). This let's me know that I can possibly be a difference maker in the percentage of minorities that seek psychology as a major. I also wasn't surprised that African American's intellectual abilities were questioned back in the day, but I know that's not the case today. I must say that I love being a minority in a lot of situations, because it makes me stand out that much more when I succeed at anything that I do. Not even just in the race category, I was an all conference basketball player in High School, and I was also the shortest on the all-conference list. So when I had exceptional games it looked that much better when I made great plays. So I'm a minority in more than one category. So there is truly no specific story about minorities defeating odds in whatever they do that I can say stands out, because I enjoy reading about all of them. But I must say that President Obama's story will be my favorite down the road, because I can honestly say that I never thought I would live to see the day that the United States elected an African American President. What makes this story more exciting was that his election was my first time being able to vote and I participated in the process of voting him into office. I know this story has nothing to do with the history of psychology, but it speaks on why this section of minorities moving up in the world of psychology stands out the most to me.
If I have to choose one section that was least interesting I'd have to say "Psychology or Psychologies?" (even though it is somewhat interesting) I'd choose this section because we read about the advancements in psychology in every other chapter so some of the stuff we read does get repetitive. But truthfully, pretty much anything I read about in psychology classes is interesting to me because it teaches me the history of the major I've decided to advance my career in. It's always necessary to learn the history of anything that is going to be important in your life (from people to favorite activities).
The section on Women and Psychology in some earlier readings relate to this chapter because "minority" doesn't always refer to just race. Women are minorities in many fields also. Minority simply means a "group" that is the lower percentage of a population. I think that it's unfortunate that women are still a minority in a lot of situations today. They aren't discriminated against nearly as much today as they used to be, but the numbers in many situations don't really show this that well.
I find this chapter very interesting because psychology has changed so much in the area of diversity. It is great that more minorities and women are entering the field of psychology and many such as Eleanor Gibson has contributed highly to it. Eleanor became the leading developmental psychologist known for her research on depth perception on "visual cliffs" studied in infants and " broke the negative stereotypes of "woman-as-scientists." Now, there are more woman studying psychology in colleges than men and it's interesting to see that in my classes there are mostly woman and a few men.
Like women, minority groups such as Jews and African Americans also faced discrimination in psychology. Kenneth B. and Clark made a contribution to psychology by doing studies on self esteem of black children. They did studies that included putting black and white dolls in front of children (black and white) and most said the black dolls were "bad." Every once in a while a black child would consider the white doll as "bad" and the black dolls as "good." All these studies contributed to the Brown vs Board of Education case.
I didn't really find anything too boring in this chapter because it was short and easy reading.
This chapter is very important in the history of psychology on how it developed for women and minorities and because of the important people who have influenced and affected psychology, it has given a lot of women and minorities a chance at excelling in something important.
Terms: Brown vs Board of Education, Eleanor Gibson, visual cliff, Kenneth and Clark
I really enjoyed reading about Eleanor Gibson. Her journey from not being allowed to work in a laboratory to being awarded the National Medal of Science by George Bush. She was the creator of the visual cliff. The visual cliff was used to study depth perception on infants. In the 1960s and 1970s was when the women’s movement started. The Civil Rights ct of 964 prohibited discrimination against women and minorities.
I found it amazing that in the 1980s only 1/5 of faculty in graduate departments for psychology were women and now it is 1/3.
I found the study that Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark did called, “Racial identification and preference in Negro Children” to be very sad. They had 4 dolls, black and white and asked children which ones looks bad, or looks like them. They also asked which one they liked to play with. They also had them color dolls to make them look like themselves. The study concluded that African American children suffered effects of segregation such as low self esteem. The children consistently felt the darker skin dolls were bad. They and they would color the dolls much lighter than their actual skin tone when asked to make them look like themselves. This made me sad. I am glad this isn’t as big of an issue as in the past.
The second part of the chapter wasn’t as interesting to me. It essentially gave a summary? It also talked a lot about modern psychology, which I read but don’t feel I need to regurgitate.
TERMS: Eleanor Gibson, Visual cliff, Civil Rights act of 1964, Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark, Racial identification and preference in Negro Children,
One topic that I found interesting in this chapter was the growth and development of Psychology. Over the last half of the twentieth century the study of Psychology has grown tremendously. It is suggested that Psychology was once thought of as being unified, but over time people questioned is this has ever been a coherent discipline. There have been many disagreements throughout history over where Psychology stands when comparing it to Philosophy and physiology. In Chapter 12 and 13 there were quarrels among psychologists and the APA but during 1945 certain things were reorganized that clarified specific psychology classes. This is interesting to me because it shows that over time Psychology has evolved into very specific classifications that were not always known of.
One topic that was less interesting to me was about minorities in Psychology. This was less interesting to me because we have learned about this numerous times and in different classes. Women, minorities and African Americans have not always had the same rights as white men. That pretty much sums up the main point, although there is much more to it. I enjoy learning about certain individuals who have struggled and still came out successful at the end.
Three things that will be useful from this chapter are…
1. Understanding the five major trends in Psychology. They are increased interest in neuroscience, the development of evolutionary psychology, the expanding impact of computers, and increased level of professionalization, and increased specialization. This is important to understand because it is easy to combine trends together and not keep the main ones in their own separate category.
2. Koch’s idea of there being a set of psychological studies. This is important to understand because modern psychology is characterized by increased specialization in all areas.
3. Eleanor Gibson’s story about overcoming the typical stereotypes during her time is important to understand because it could provide inspiration to others that might not believe in their own abilities.
Terms: Psychology, unified, APA, minorities, neuroscience, specialization, Koch, Eleanor Gibson
The thing I found most interesting from this chapter was the section about Eleanor Gibson. I found the information about women in psychology throughout this book to be interesting. Eleanor Gibson received the National Medal of Science from George Bush for her work in psychology. She’s most famous for her work in depth perception and her discovery of the “visual cliff”. She also performed research into the processes involved in reading. She was the first woman member of the Society of Experimental Psychologists. Although she made much advancement in psychology during her career, she was poorly received in the beginning. She was interested in working under Yerkes when she first started her studies in psychology. He quickly turned her away and she began to assist in Clark Hull’s research. These injustices began to fade in the 1960’s and 70’s with the emergence of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This prohibited discrimination against minorities and women.
The thing I found least interesting from this chapter was the list of trends in contemporary psychology. This described a few things happening in psychology today. We’ve recently became more interested in studying the relationship between the brain and body (neuroscience). Evolutionary thinking has returned accompanied by an emphasis on the environmental factors of evolution. Technology has provided lots of room for advancement. Professionalizing psychology has remained important throughout psychology’s history and remains important today. Finally, psychology has begun to be fragmented and split into new, specific subdivisions.
The three most important things from this chapter were the advancements made by women and minorities, the current focus of psychology today, and the departmentalization of psychology. Psychology has moved away from a unified force. There are several interdisciplinary fiends that have developed that require specialization by psychologists. Developmental, experimental, I/O, clinical, school, rehabilitation, behavior analysis, history of psychology, psychopharmacology and substance abuse, psychological hypnosis, psychology of religion, health, and international psychology are just a few of the 56 different divisions of the APA.
Terms: Gibson, visual cliff, SEP, Civil Rights Act, contemporary psychology
Something that I thought was interesting was the thought asking is the field of psychology just one type of psychology or are there many different entities? This is something I had never even considered, but after reading it this question makes sense, there is definitely more than one level to psychology. I also thought that they work that Eleanor Gibson did was interesting. I have taken many developmental classes and have learned all about the “visual cliff.” However, it wasn’t until reading this chapter I even knew who had come up with the idea! I also find her interesting because of the simple fact of just how broad her range of research was! I would consider the least interesting part of this chapter to be when it talked about the APA and how it expanded. It was just a little more boring than the rest of the material. I think that knowing the trends of contemporary psychology is important for knowing the past, present, and future of psychology. The five trends are the accelerated study of the relationship between the brain and behavior, the return of evolutionary thinking, significant changes in research brought about the capacities of modern computers, increased professionalization of psychological practitioners, and increased fragmentation of psychology. I think that Eleanor Gibson’s honor of receiving the National Medal of Science from President Bush, and being one of only nine other psychologists is definitely something worth knowing! This chapter did an overview of a few things from the entire book, I like how it would reference back to whichever chapter it had been stated in before.
Terms: APA, Eleanor Gibson, visual cliff
I found the study that the Clark's did, the "doll studies" on white and black children in the north and the south to be interesting because it showed how segregation affected these children and how they saw themselves. The black children were affected by seeing white children as better than them and that has a long lasting affect on them. I didn't particularly find anything uninteresting in this chapter since it was as short as it was. Three things that will help me understand HS more is the future of psychology and to keep in mind where it is heading in the future. I often forget when reading that this book is about the past and there is more to come from psychology. The study of psychology is constantly growing and things are discovered every day. Another thing to remember is that studying psychology isn't strictly limited to white males. After reading this chapter it reminds me that there are minorities studying psychology too, not just white men. Reading the previous chapters that is pretty much limited to who studies psychology. The most important thing to remember is that psychology is constantly developing so by the time I'm done writing this blog I'm sure my information will be out of date. In the previous chapters there has been some readings about women, but not about minorities too much so it was nice to read more about minority contribution.
Terms: Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark, Doll Studies
My book, the 2nd edition, did not have a chapter solely dedicated to Women and Minorities. Therefore, I was given permission to speak about what we discussed today in class. My individual portion of the book dealt with IQ scores, created by William Stern. With his creation of this he made sure to offer cautionary advice. His advice was "to base any pedagogical estimate upon the IQ alone for practical purposes is indefensible". What he meant by this was that if you only look at IQ testing and scores then you are being foolish because the scores alone, while helpful, do not help us come to any conclusive decisions. Despite his best efforts, America's education system did not listen to him. They based some major educational decisions on IQ scores and intelligence testing. The result of this was the exclusion of many racial minorities and women. The education system weren't the only ones to ignore his advice. Lewis Terman was responsible for making outrageous claims about minorities based on IQ scores. The funny thing is that in all of his testing he had no ethnic minorities present, and yet he determined that "There is no possibility at present of convincing society that they(minorities) should not be allowed to reproduce, although from a eugenic point of view they constitute a grave problem because of their unusually prolific breeding". What he was saying there is that he wished that a form of eugenics could take place to cut out those who are mentally inferior, however, his problem was that minorities were having a lot of kids which made his suggestion impossible. My other page dealt with the Mulatto Hypotheses which had two camps. In one camp they suggested that individuals who are racially mixed were inferior to those of “pure” blood. In the other camp they believed that racially mixes persons were superior to those of “pure” blood. This came from various theories that were discussed in class today but I didn’t fully comprehend. To sum up the book that was discussed today I would say that the title fit the content very well, Even the Rats Were White. Even if you only look at my little 4 page section of the book it is enough to give you a bitter taste of psychology’s past. From what I heard other people read it was just as bad or worse. The one reading that got me the most was when at a cultural fair of sorts they looked at various ‘strange’ ethnic groups. After looking at and testing these people they determined that they were sub-human and even put one of them in a cage at the zoo. It doesn’t get much darker than that. Thankfully, psychology has come a long way since then and if anyone did that now-a-days they would be thrown in jail for a very long time. It brings some interesting thoughts to mind. If I were alive at that time would I have simply gone along with the ‘modern’ research and findings of the time or would I stand against it? It also makes me consider today in the field of psychology are there any types of atrocities like this? It might not be so extreme but it could be oppressing the minorities around us that can’t stand up for themselves. I was very thankful that we got a chance to read this book today and that I am able to post about it.
Interesting in this chapter was learning about Eleanor Gibson, who was the first woman to earn the National Medal of Science award. She created the visual cliff and used it to study infants. This involves an apparent but fake drop from one surface to another and was used to determine if infants have depth perception.
Also interesting was learning about Kennith B and Mamie Philips Clark. Kennith Brown was involved in the Brown vs Board of Ed decision to reverse an earlier judgement to have ‘separate but equal’ situations involving black and whites. Mamie did a doll study which researched the aversive effects of segregation on blacks. Different skin-colored children were asked to pick a doll that they thought was the ‘best’ and which one they thought was the ‘dirtiest’ and uniformly children of all races picked the white dolls to play with and the black dolls as ‘dirty.’
Kennith Clark was also made APA president and started the Board of Social and Ethical Responsibility for psychology which later turned into the Board of Ethnic and Minority Affairs. The APA also started the policy that they would not hold meetings in cities that engaged in discriminatory practices.
Some other things I learned about minorities in class were that in the 1950’s members of the KKK walked around freely while psychology was teaching that everyone was the same, regardless of skin color. This was really disappointing to me. Classification of mullatto individuals were also of great interest during this time.
Francis Sumner was the first African American to receive his PhD in psychology. Blacks traditionally needed an extra year in their undergraduate education and took at least twice as long to obtain their graduate degree. The Association of Black Psychology was created in 1968 in order to better jobs and treatment of blacks. They started historically black colleges which I think was pretty cool. Ruth Howard was the first black woman to get her PhD in psychology at the University of Minnesota.
Back to the chapter, I also learned that trends in contemporary psychology included accelerated study of the relationship between brain and behavior, as well as there being a vigorous return to evolutionary thinking. The book said that there were a lot of people who leaned toward nature and then a lot that leaned toward nurture. My biopsychology teacher insisted that the two work together but since I’ve become a psychology major at UNI I’ve heard opinions that lean toward one or the other as well. There were also significant changes in research that was brought about by the capacities of modern computers, this includes the ANOVA as well as programs like SPSS (thank goodness!)
Terms used: Doll study, visual cliff.
As I was glancing down the pages of chapter 15 I realized that psychology has shown vigorous growth during long term existence as independent discipline and, as it has grown, the interests of psychologists have become more specialized. Throughout most of its history, leading psychologists were and male, a situation that is now changing, especially as more women enter the field. When speaking of minorities, Jews and African Americans have also faced discrimination throughout psychology’s history. Blacks in particular had to confront the prejudices deriving from the early twentieth century belief in the inherited racial superiority of white males and the social policy of separate but not equal schools. It doesn’t say it in the book, but there was a lot more than just Jews and African American that were discriminated in our country. Indians for one were really discriminated for their culture and the way they lived and looked at life. Immigrants such as the Irish were discriminated just as bad as blacks because they were very poor and most of them were catholic. People would discriminate against Mexicans/Latinos due to the fact that they couldn’t speak English and people looked at them as being very dirty. When dealing with the five trends of modern psychology; increased interest in neuroscience, the development of evolutionary psychology, the expanding impact of computers, and increase level of professionalization, and increased specialization, each cannot be thoroughly understood without knowing something about history.
I found the most interesting section of chapter 15 to be the section on Eleanor Gibson. Elanor Gibson was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1992. She is the creator of the "visual cliff" which was used to study depth perception in infants. I found it interesting because her life as a psychologist wasn't easy. At one point she went 16 years unpaid to be a research assistant, only living on research grants. I found it interesting because being a woman in psychology throughout the 20th century would be damn near impossible to get anything done. It is important to note though, that she was a psychologist during many of the women's right movements that allow her to be able to be remembered today. She is an example of a highly talented scientist who faced barriers to advancement simply because she was a woman.
The chapter was relatively short so it was hard to find something that was not interesting in this chapter.
The things that are most important to the history of psychology in the chapter are the minorities in psychology's history, trends in contemporary psychology, and the future of psychology and how it will change. The importance of minorities in psychology is important because of how it has changed over time. In the past you view a white male and their theories and practices are all that were viewed as important and minorities weren't even thought about in the world of psychology. Many minorities today have made contributions in the history of psychology. Many Jews remained psychologists during hard times in their lives and faced a lot of segregation. Kenneth B and Mamie Phipps Clark are two black psychologits educated at Howard University. They focused their studies on letting children pick dolls that had different skin colors and genders. Many of the children picked the white ones because the black ones were "bad".
Trends in contemporary psychology is important because it is an overview of what psychology focuses on. The accelerated study of the relationship between the brain and behavior, The vigorous return of evolutionary thinking, significant changes in research brought about by the capacities of modern computers, the increased professionalization of psychological practicioners, and the increased fragmentation of psychology. The future of pscyhology is important because it has never stopped growing, nor will it stop. It has demonstrated growth again and again and there is only more and more to learn and uncountable measures of study to get into.
Ways that this chapter relates to previous chapters is throughout the whole book. This is the final chapter so much of what we covered is summed up in this chapter. The womens stories ties into this chapter by stating how hard it really was for women to become known in the field of psychology along with minorities.
terms: Eleanor Gibson, visual cliff, minorities in psychology's history, Kenneth B. Clark, Mamie Phipps Clark, Howard University, trends in contemporary psychology, future of psychology
Eleanor Gibson was very interesting. She was the creator of the "visual cliff" used to study depth perception in infants. She went to Yale in 1935, where she experienced being shut down by Yerkes who said he didn't;t allow women in his lab. She refused to leave Yale and convinced Clark Hull to to let her earn a doctorate under him. Her husband eventually got a job at Cornell, where she chose to be an unpaid research associate, earning money by winning a series of competitive and prestigious research grants. She was made full professor in 66.
Kenneth and Mamie Phipps CLark, helped to strike down the concept of separate but equal education for blacks and whites in Brown Vs Board of Education. They're best research is known as the "doll studies" which test early school age black and white children from North and South. they were shown dolls, female and male, with light skin and dark and asked questions like "show me the doll you'd like to play with". Found that black kids preferred white dolls and considered black dolls to be "bad".
Terms: Gibson, Yerkes, visual cliff, Clark Hull, Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark, Brown Vs Board, doll studies
I found the most interesting thing in this chapter to be once again the topic on women in psychology. Women have often been left out in so many subjects of study and it is nice to see how they are allowed to evolve things such as the study of psychology. This chapter adds to the information displayed by chapter6 on Mary Calkins, Margaret Washburn, and Christine Lass-Franklin. Eleanor Gibson was discussed in this chapter. She was given the National Medal of Science for her research on many topics ranging from depth perception development to basic processes such as reading. She faced many boundaries but eventually developed numerous things from her research. One of them was the visual cliff. Also, she argued for a theory of organism-environmental interaction that as grounded in a developmental approach. Another interesting topic in this chapter was minorities in psychologies history. Two of these individuals are Kenneth B. and Mamie Phipps Clark. They were known for their doll studies. Which tested young black and white children to chose from an assortment of dolls that were either dark skinned or pal and asked which they want to play with, which were bad, and what looked like themselves.
key words- Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark, Doll Studies, Eleanor Gibson, Visual Cliff
This just reminds me of the homage I must pay to those that took a stand and did what they were told they never could do. I've learned so much about the Civil Rights Movements and MLK and what they did to give me THIS opportunity to be where I am today, but also I respect deeply the African Americans that did the unthinkable (at their time) by pursuing their Masters Degrees in Psychology and making it possible for more minorities to do the same