What I would like you to do is to find a PERSON from chapter 7 that you are interested in and search the internet for material on that PERSON. Please use 3 or more quality resources.
Once you have completed your search and explorations, a) I would like you to say WHO your PERSON is, b) how exactly HE OR SHE fits into the chapter, and c) why you are interested in THIS PERON. Next, I would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your PERSON, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about it. At the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. Keep in mind that it will be easier if you keep it to one topic.
Additional instructions: For each URL (internet resource) you have listed. Indicate why you chose it and the extent to which it contributed to your post.
I am interested in John Dewey and have chosen to write about him from chapter 7. This person fits into chapter 7 in that he was involved with people at the Chicago school of thought based on Functionalism as well as he was mentioned in the chapter, for creating his own school in 1896 that focused on a hands on approach to education rather than repetition, drill and memorization.
One of the websites I found on John Dewey gave a brief overview of Dewey’s life, education and his travels. It also showed how important education, woman’s suffrage as well as, progressive education. Dewey was well traveled, He had traveled to the USSR and toured their schools. He also went to Turkey to discuss educational policy.
In my research on John Dewey, while he did make contributions to psychology he is best known for his publications on education. He is also well known for his politics that focus on two main elements. Schools and civil society, this civil society theme goes along these lines. In order for our government and society to continue on an work effectively. Citizens need to be educated in schools so that that can from a coherent public opinion and be able to communicate effectively amongst themselves, politicians and the legislature.
Dewey is also known for his informal education approach. He is known for thinking and reflecting which a primary role is for educators. It is also a theme in the slogan for UNIs teacher Education Program, which is “teaching/educating for reflective practice”, this theory is a basis for our educational system in the US and the UK. John Dewey was well known for Democracy and Education ideas and for his contributions to psychology.
http://dewey.pragmatism.org/ - This provided information on Dewey for his contributions to Psychology/.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey - I used this source because it provides a broad range of information from his themes of democracy, and schools while linking it to his other contributions in other fields of study. This source also provides detailed biographical information that is helpful in understanding his accomplishments.
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-dewey.htm - This source focuses on his education contributions and provides a few citations for publications that Dewey made on his two most important philosophy’s, Democracy and Education.
The person I chose to research was John Dewey. When I read about his reflex arc in the book it really interested me. My interest in his reflex arc is what made me want to research him more. I also wanted to see what other things he has contributed to the field of psychology and see learn more about him in general. He fits into the chapter as one of America’s first psychologists who jumped on the functionalist bandwagon by being a part of Chicago University during its rise to psychological prominence.
Dewey was born and raised in Vermont. In 1879 Dewey graduated from the University of Vermont. After his graduation he went into teaching for a few years he soon realized that this was not the job for him. He then went and received his doctorate from Johns Hopkins, soon after he accepted a faculty position at the University of Michigan which was not the best fit for Dewey either. He then joined the University of Chicago for a little while but after conflicts with the faculty he moved on. However, he did develop his strong sense of pragmatism and empirical philosophy at the University of Chicago. Some of his greatest accomplishments came in the years to come being elected president of the American Psychological Association, and the American Philosophical Association.
One of Dewey’s most recognizable contributions to psychology is the reflex arc. In this Dewey challenges the notion that reflexes are the sum of several steps or of disjointed parts. At the time reflexes were thought of as a stimulus, the body processing the stimulus, and then the reflex or the body reacting to it. Dewey thought of it more as a coordinated whole in which the body’s reflexes are always changing, reacting and adapting to the environment. He also thought of a reflex as not just a reaction but also a learning experience in response to a positive or negative experience.
Another one of Dewey’s contributions would be his progressive views on education. During his time as a teacher he grew to strongly dislike the traditional approach to education. He saw that education was too strict, ridged, and regimented. He thought that this style of education fostered a dislike for learning rather than positively influencing the learning process. In turn Dewey developed a progressive new way of helping kids to want to learn. He implored psychologists everywhere to jump on his bandwagon and use what they have learned to help their students. Dewey thought that if students were more able to interact with their environments it would make the learning environment more enjoyable. He also encouraged critical thinking situations for his students as well as more active learning processes for his students.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey- i used this link to get background information on Dewey.
http://www.brocku.ca/MeadProject/Dewey/Dewey_1896.html- i used this link to increase my knowledge of Dewey’s reflex arc
http://pilgrimboy.hubpages.com/hub/An-Examination-of-John-Deweys-Experience-and-Education- this link i used to help me to better understand Dewey’s new educational processes
I choose to research Edward Thorndike because I am interested in his educational psychology ideas. I remember learning about his cat experiments in Intro to Psychology, but that is it; I want to learn more about him. Thorndike fits into the chapter because he was a functional psychologist in the early 1900s. He was a Columbia University Functionalists who studied individual behaviors of animals, notably cats and chickens, as well as humans and their development.
Thorndike is best known for his work with animals, but his passion was for educational psychology. Thorndike was in many ways ahead of his time when it comes to his research in educational psychology. He made most of contributions to this field after working with animals. Thorndike believed students had individual differences that should be accounted for during education in the separation of students based on ability. I think it is interesting that this argument is still being fought today between the traditionalists, pro ability separation, and progressives, pro whole group instruction. He was so interested in ability he created intelligence tests which would become the foundation for standardized intelligence test used today. He believed people who had higher abilities were able to form neural bonds between a stimulus and response more quickly than people with lower abilities. Thorndike believed these differences stemmed from genetics which led him to become a supporter in the eugenics movement to remove lower abilities from the gene pool. Thorndike made discoveries that changed the way we do things, but he also was subject to the times he lived and not all of his theories hold true today.
Besides intelligence testing, Thorndike also divided intelligence up into three parts: abstract, mechanical, and social intelligence. Today we call this multiple intelligence theory, coined by Dr. Howard Gardner in the 1983. Thorndike was an educational progressive, trying to change what students were taught. He wanted students to have some control over what content they would be learning; including vocational courses and physical education, which were popular at the time.
Thorndike was also influential in teacher preparation. He lectured on what was known about human variation and nature including theories on behavior and learning, still important to teacher education programs today. One such theory was positive reinforcement in which a desired behavior is rewarded. Thorndike saw this as the best teaching method especially when compared to negative reinforcement, punishment for problem behavior. Differing from his more progressive counter parts, Dewy, Thorndike believed the best way to learn was through memorization and repeated practice; which would strengthen the stimulus-response relationship.
While studying Thorndike I learned just how influential he has been in the evolution of teacher preparation. With how influential Thorndike has been in educational psychology, I was surprised I hadn’t heard more about him. Even know I can relate every one of my educational classes to something Thorndike believed or theorized about.
http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2509/Thorndike-Edward-L-1874-1949.html
This site was used as a reference for Thorndike’s research and beliefs relating to educational psychology; specifically his teaching of teaching preparation.
http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Thorndike/education.htm
This is an article written by Thorndike concerning educational psychology.
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
I used this site for its good time line of Thorndike’s life and achievements.
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml
This site was used for Thorndike’s work with intelligence tests and theories.
I chose to do Harvey Carr, and he fits into the chapter because he contributed to the evolution of Chicago functionalism by influencing his students in the doctoral program in which he directed over a hundred doctoral dissertations. I chose to look into him more because the section on him in the textbook was rather small and maze learning was really the only item the author talked about Carr contributing to so I was curious of any other work he may be known for.
Carr earned his a bachelors degree in psychology from the University of Colorado in 1901 and finished his masters degree the following year. He went to the University of Chicago for his doctorate where he studied experimental psychology with John Dewey, James Angell, and John Watson eventually receiving his Ph.d in 1905 with his doctoral dissertation being on a visual illusion of motion during eye closure. Carr wasn't very interested in the problem of nativism and empiricism which he saw as insolvable so he focused on statements of phenomena and their conditions. A few years later he returned to the University of Chicago to replace John Watson in his work of animal psychology. He would stay at the University of Chicago until his retirement. Carr eventually became chairman of the Department of Psychology in 1919 which he would aslo hold until his retirement. During his time as chairman, the department awarded 150 doctoral degrees. Several years later in 1926, he was elected president of APA, and in 1937 he was elected president of the Midwestern Psychological Association.
Carr believed his work represented functionalism in a way that was no longer necessary to argue against structuralism, and functionalism had become a recognized position and theory within psychology to a greater extent than structuralism. Edna Heidbreder wrote: "The work of Carr represents functionalism when it had settled down and become a recognized school, and was no longer a renaissance and a reformation." Carr believed that functional psychology should be the only American psychology. He saw other versions of psychology being proposed at the time such as behaviorism, Gestalt psychology, and psychoanalysis as only dealing with limited aspects of the overall field of functionalist psychology. Carr wrote a popular textbook in 1925 in which he presented functionalism in his ideal, refined form. In the textbook Carr did not deny consciousness and subjectivity, as Watson had done in his version of behaviorism, but he paid them little attention. Instead he preferred to talk of the adaptive activities of the organism and their conditions. These were analyzed in terms of causal relations between stimuli and responses, which were studied objectively and, if possible, experimentally. Carr stated, "Personality, mind, and self are conceptual objects that can be studied only indirectly through their manifestations." Carr's functionalism differed from behaviorism in that mental processes existed from which behavior could be understood as a manifestation or result of the mental processes. However, this did not include animals as well as behaviorists believed. In his APA presidential address he wrote: "I am somewhat of a behaviorist in the field of animal psychology, although I do not class myself as such so far as human psychology is concerned." Carr defined the subject matter of psychology as mental activity including processes such as memory, perception, and will. He described the function of mental activity as to acquire, retain, organize, and evaluate experiences. He thought those mental activities would use those experiences to determine one’s actions. Carr only accepted data from introspective and experimental methods, and like Wundt, he believed the literary and artistic elements of a culture could provide information on the mental activities that produced them. Carr had a passion for space perception, but was disappointed that throughout his career only five theses on the topic were performed by his students. He worked on space perception throughout his career and produced a textbook on the subject near the end of his career. Carr performed several studies of rats in mazes in which he compared normal rats with others who were deprived of one of the five senses. He learned that vision made the biggest difference while they all had a small contribution. Carr had a very cautious attitude about results of experiments and studies. He questioned whether the results of experiments either indicate 1) absolute reality, 2) values that are concealed by varying conditions, 3) errors exist, or 4) results are averages convenient in stating results. Other items he questioned throughout his career include range of attention, curves of forgetting, the existence of emotion, memory, attention, and much of the vocabulary used by psychologists. He felt words had been taken from popular vocabulary and had come to imply the existence of reals, but he never did make any suggestions of substitutes that psychologists could use to express their work.
http://www.jstor.org.proxy.lib.uni.edu/stable/1418404 - This article was very good because it gave a nice summation of Carr's life from fellow psychologists and was published in the American Journal of Psychology the year after his death.
http://www.igs.net/~pballan/Carr.htm - This article does a nice job of describing some different elements of work that Carr completed and also includes quotes from some of his published work.
http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/datelines_harveycarr.html - This site does a nice job of pointing out many of the important moments of Carr's life and career.
I chose to look more into Thorndike and his research about the Law of Effect. He fits into our chapter because he would have been considered a functionalist during his life. He was more focused on the reason for things and not the basic what they were. I found his study he did with cats was really interesting.
Thorndike’s experiment focused on the specific response given by hungry cats. He found that when the cats were first placed inside the contraption the cats would frantically try to get out of it to the food. He noticed that the cats used “trial and error” to find their way out. If they found a response that led to the reward of food they were more likely to repeat it. The amount the cat spent in the box gradually decreased over time. Thorndike said, “When particular stimulus-response sequences are followed by pleasure, those responses tend to be ‘stamped in'; responses followed by pain tend to be ‘stamped out’" (muskingum.edu). Thorndike concluded that animals learn through trial and error or punishment and reward. These learning techniques are all enforced by the Law of Effect, “immediate consequence of a mental connection can work back upon it to strengthen it” or weaken it as well (Muskingum.edu). If this is how cats learn things, how does this relate to humans?
I found this very interesting because I’m studying the development of humans from birth until death. We discussed Skinner’s theory of punishment and reinforcement. Parents typically use this technique to teach their children throughout their lives. Reinforcement will also cause a behavior to increase and punishment will also cause a behavior to decrease. There are two kinds of each type, positive or negative. Positive reinforcement is the best way for children to learn. If you can reward them every time they do something good, that specific behavior will be repeated. Just as in Thorndike’s experiment with the cats, they continued the behavior if they were let out and given food.
Everything throughout psychologies history seems to tie together. It really is important for us to study the history of psychology. It is important that these theories can be retested and proven or disproven.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vk6H7Ukp6To: This is an actual video of Thorndike doing his experiments with the cats. This gives you a better idea of the actual experiment instead of just words.
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm: This website gave more information about Thorndike’s experiment and his findings.
Developmental Psychology, McGraw Hill: This book had a section about the development of children. Skinner specifically talks about reinforcement and punishment.
A person that caught my attention in this chapter was Edward Thorndike. Thorndike fits into this chapter because he was a functional psychologist. I find him really interesting because of his animal studies with chicks and cats.
Thorndike used Watsons puzzle box (he used monkeys) and used cats with a floor pedal instead of a door latch. Thorndike is well-known for his learning experiment with cats. Thorndike built a puzzle box and placed cats in it to see if they would have any insight on getting out. He found that the well-practiced cat could easily find the latch and push open the door. The first time cat however learned by trial and error. Since it was a floor latch, Thorndike watched and waited for the cat to accidently step on the pedal and open the door. After the first time the cat started to learn where tos tep and what to push to get himeself out of the cage and to the reward (food). This is one of Thorndikes experiments that led him to his law of effect. The law of effect states that a response to a situation that is followed by a reward strengthens the chance of doing it again. It also states that a resonse followed by uncomfortableness weakens from doing that action again. Thorndike used a learning curve while assessing the actions of the cats in the puzzle box. The general shape of the curve is an S, showing poor numbers at first than going up and maxing out once its totally learned. Thorndike applied his animal studies to the human child. He noticed if a child hates doing math, but is rewarded than it makes it easier to do.
Thorndike had his own ideas on education. His view was that the man is a social being who must learn to adapt to his environment to suit his/her own needs and that of their community. The product of education creates well adjustsed children in school. The early years of a child are most important because this is when the stimuli is drilled in a forever remembered in the child and the way they learn.
http://www.simplypsychology.org/edward-thorndike.html
This website had a video of how Thorndike used his graphs and showed how he would have performed his cat and puzzle box learning experiment.
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml
This website had some clear information on exactly who Thorndike studied under and what his contributions were.
http://www.psywww.com/intropsych/ch08_animals/thorndikes_puzzle_box.html
This website had a diagram of Thorndikes puzzle box and had a lot more information on his learning theories and experiments.
http://www.sntp.net/education/leipzig_connection_4.htm
This website had a lot more information on how Thorndike felt on education and how he applied his animal expeiriments to children and their education.
After reading chapter 7, I wanted to learn more about John Dewey. His thoughts on the reflex arc and progressive education were great contributions to psychology, and I wanted to know how he came to these ideas. I also liked that he was an activist for women’s suffrage, an unpopular stance for men at this time. I liked the functionalist movement as well, and John Dewey was a major part of it.
John Dewey was born on October 20, 1859 in Burlington, Virginia. He attended the University of Vermont, and graduated in 1879. He then became a schoolteacher for a short time, both at the high school and elementary level. He realized that level of teaching was not for him, and enrolled at Johns Hopkins University. At Johns Hopkins, he was able to study with great minds including George Sylvester Morris, Charles Sanders Peirce, Herbert Baxter Adams, and G. Stanley Hall. He received his Ph.D. from the School of Arts & Sciences at Johns Hopkins.
Because he did not find elementary and secondary levels of teaching right for him but still wanted to teach, he accepted a position as a member of the University of Michigan faculty. After Michigan, he moved on to the newly created and attractive University of Chicago There he started the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools.
Disagreements with other faculty forced him to resign from Chicago, and he took a position at Columbia University. He stayed there until his retirement as a professor of philosophy. He was also president of the American Psychological Association in 1899 and the president of the American Philosophical Association in 1905. The United States Postal Service honored Dewey with a Prominent Americans series 30¢ postage stamp as well.
In John Dewey’s famous article, "The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology," he challenges the traditional stimulus-response understanding of the reflex arc, and suggests a "circular" account in which what is a "stimulus" and what is a "response" depends on how a person perceives the situation. Others before him thought the stimulus, sensation, and response were separate actions, but he argued that a person can be stimulated differently based on previous experiences.
John Dewey’s other major contribution was to educational reform in America. His thoughts on pragmatism have impacted education in all levels, not just at the elementary stage, in many ways. He believed that education must engage with and enlarge a student’s experiences. He also thought of learning as thinking and reflection, using judgment and not purely knowledge to learn from. His main concern was with a student’s interaction with environments for learning. He believed students should take an active role in their education in order to experience all that they are able to. He also had a passion for democracy- educating so that all may have a chance at success in life.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey - This website gave a good biography of Dewey’s life and works.
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-dewey.htm - This website talked mainly about his contributions to education.
http://www.bgsu.edu/departments/acs/1890s/dewey/educ.html - This source briefly described Dewey’s progressive education ideas.
I was interested in John Dewey’s association with progressive education more so than the reflex arc. His approach to classroom education seemed to be a little more informal and lower key while still trying to promote learning and growth. This is something that I had always strived to promote in my brief classroom time, and was blown away to learn that his idea was so old and revolutionary for the time period. The first website I found helped build on this idea but showed that knowledge was not the only thing that Dewey tried to promote. He was more interested in teaching the students to become adults who would make judgments indiscriminately on human choices and problems. I think that instead of choosing one of these over the other it is important to try and relate and integrate these two ideas together into an effective classroom. One aspect is important to help kids become responsible well rounded adults and the other helps them develop foundation of knowledge and information. I was intrigued by the fact that it was a psychologist that was promoting such social/educational reform at such a time when they were not openly being accepted. The second website I found showed that Dewey and his ideas were at the forefront when it came to changing the way the school system worked. Instead of uniformity Dewey was telling you to promote cultural diversity and instead of educating dutiful citizens it was looking to promote citizens who were more critical in their thinking. Lastly it was important to make sure we acknowledge just revolutionary this man and his ideas really were, he was making claims and trying to change the machine at a time when that was rather taboo. Dewey and his colleagues were making strides and producing ideas/ that are still very useful and relevant in today’s society. And to me those are the most interesting kind of people to learn about because you can tell they will be around for some time.
http://www.bgsu.edu/departments/acs/1890s/dewey/educ.html: This website gave a brief overview of Dewey’s ideas but then showed that he was also interested in judgment promotion.
http://www.uvm.edu/~dewey/articles/proged.html: This website illustrated several specific ways the progressive education idea was implemented and how it differed from the traditional way people viewed education.
http://www.albany.edu/~dkw42/s2_dewey_progr.html: Here they give us examples of just how revolutionary his ideas were at the time and just how influential Dewy was to the cause.
The person that I am interested in researching is Edward L. Thorndike. I am interested in his work on educational psychology. He fits into this chapter because he studied functional psychology in the early 20th century. He appears in other chapters that talk about behaviorism. This connects him to other chapters.
Thorndike was born in Williamsburg, Massachusetts. He graduated from The Roxbury Latin School in 1891, in West Roxbury, Massachusetts. He attended Wesleyan University in 1895 where he earned his bachelors degree. Later on he went to Harvard University where he received his masters. Finally he attended Columbia University where he earned his PhD. His education took him into the world of psychology. He was most interested in the study of learning. He worked a lot with behaviorism and was the first to use the animals in study. He taught psychology at the Teachers College of Columbia.
One of Thorndike’s major contributions to psychology is his puzzle boxes. These devices focus on figuring out animal intelligence. I think that watching his studies would have been really cool. It is neat to see how smart an animal is when it is put in a situation where it has to think for its survival. In his experiments they illustrate that a cat that has been in the puzzle box for more trials does better than a cat that is not in the puzzle box as often. This makes sense to me because after countless repetitions, cats will figure out the puzzle box faster.
Thorndike was also interested in intelligence testing. Thorndike thought that students who had high brain capabilities were able to connect a stimulus and response faster than people with lower brain capabilities. Thorndike’s work with intelligence tests became popular around the country. They are used in schools and also in the military.
What also interested me about Thorndike was his work with educational planning. One of his most famous points was the theory of positive reinforcement which a desired behavior is rewarded.
I think that Thorndike’s work is worth paying attention to and should be appreciated because he did a lot of different studies and made a lot of contributions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Thorndike
This site presented good background information on Edward Thorndike.
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
This site gives other details about his background and provides good information about his life’s work.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BDujDOLre-8
After reading chapter 7, I wanted to learn more about Edward Thorndike. Thorndike fits into this chapter because he was a functionalist psychologist. I am interested in Thorndike because the theory of Law and Effect with different animals about their behaviors. I love animals, and knowing how this one theory was proven that animals learn the trial and effect theory.
Edward Thorndike was from Massachusetts, and he became interested in psychology after reading William James book on Principles of psychology. He started his education at Harvard, but for personal reasons went to Columbia University to finish up his degree.
Thorndike used puzzle boxes with cats, chicks, and dogs. He switched up his experiments with different animals. The puzzle boxes were used to detect certain animal behaviors by using the Law and Effect with trial and error. This theory was very controversial because he experimented with different animal behaviors. He used hungry cats for his puzzle boxes theory, and he would observe them to see how long it would take them to get out of the box without being fed.
After he started feeding the cats, he observed that by feeding them the cats would take less time to get out of the box. Thorndike would observe many cats to see which ones could react to the feeding or stimuli the fastest. This theory is still studied today.
Another contribution for Thorndike did was create the three theories of intelligence, and they were abstract, mechanical, and social. These three intelligences would explain human behavior. He also created the theory of connectionism. Connectionism was the bonds between the neural bonds and stimuli with response. This theory would people with higher intellect would form better bonds then people with lower ability.
After doing more research about Thorndike and all of his contributions to the field of psychology, I think his theories have been right and still are debated today with other psychologists.
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm- this website gave background information about Thorndike and details about the Law and Effect theory.
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml- this weebsite gave more detail about the intelligences and why he thought these intelligencew would prove what kind of intellect everyone has.
http://faculty.coe.uh.edu/smcneil/cuin6373/idhistory/thorndike_extra.html- this website gave more information about the Law and Effect Theory and why he studied animal behavior.
I am interested in learning more about Edward L. Thorndike (1874-1949). Thorndike was born in Massachusetts in the town of Williamsburg. He received his Bachelors at Wesleyan University, his Masters at Harvard University, and his Ph.D at Columbia University. Thorndike was well known for comparative psychology, but was especially known for his connectionism.
Thorndike fits into chapter 7 because this chapter covers structuralism and functionalism. These are both related to behavior and Thorndike was known for his studies of behavior. I am interested in Thorndike because I like learning about animal behavior and intelligence.
Thorndike’s first study was over the intelligence of baby chicks. He would create simple mazes that were formed by placing books on end. Thorndike would then observe and see if they could complete the maze. Thorndike concluded that they initially made a lot of noise, jumped at the walls or were to just get lost instead of trying to escape. Although this happened at first, Thorndike observed that the baby chicks would soon eliminate these useless behaviors and found their way out of the maze. After doing the maze experiment on baby chicks, Thorndike applied to Columbia University receiving fellowship. He was awarded $700 a year in aid and he soon then expanded his research to many different species.
Thorndike was known for using animals in his psychological research and experiments. By doing this he was to create a theory of learning. His dissertation in college was actually about animals, which was in fact the first dissertation ever completed using nonhuman subjects of research. His dissertation was called "Animal Intelligence: An experimental Study of the Associated Processes in Animals. Thorndike’s main interests were whether animals could learn through imitation and observation. This lead Thorndike to create puzzle boxes for his experiments with animals. Each of these boxes were pulled open by a weight attached to a string. When an animal pressed a lever or button the string would then pull the door open for the animal to escape and were given food as a reward. While observing this, Thorndike would record how much time it took the animal (usually a cat) to escape from the puzzle box. Slowly the time would decrease showing that the cat was becoming smarter to the solution of escape. This eventually led Thorndike to his trial and error explanation of learning. Thorndike’s trial and error learning states that the animal will make connections between certain stimuli in the boxes and then would emit successful escape responses. Sometimes Thorndike's model of trial and error is called connectionism.
After doing the puzzle box experiments, Thorndike proposed two general principles labeled as the Law of Effect and Law of Exercise. Thorndike’s Law of Exercise mainly proposes that the connection between the stimulus and the situational response would strengthen with practice. The Law of Effect shows that rewards are more effective than punishments while trying to produce learning. Thorndike concluded that practice may make perfect, but it all depends on what level of learning is being applied for the situation.
Although Thorndike is very intelligent, his work was not without controversy. Comparative psychologist Wesley Mills criticized Thorndike's research. While criticizing Thorndike's research, Mills stated "enclose a living man in a coffin, lower him, against his will, into the earth, and attempt to deduce normal psychology from his conduct." Thorndike then replied that Mills should do the same research and studies himself, he would discover that little panic had occurred. In all, Thorndike stood strong behind his research.
As for different intelligence tests that Thorndike invented, his work contributed to the United States Army. He created Alpha and Beta tests that now are similar to today's ASVAB tests. The Alpha tests measured soldier’s ability to read, and the Beta test showed a series of pictures to measure the soldier’s problem solving skills. Thorndike also created aptitude tests for children.
In 1940 Thorndike retired from Columbia University dying 9 years later.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Thorndike
Gives information on the different studies Thorndike conducted.
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml
Gives information on human intelligence and a little background information on Thorndike
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesmz/p/edward-thorndike.htm
Information about the early years of Edward Thorndike
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
Information about the theories of Thorndike
I picked Edward Thorndike and his research on the puzzle box. I picked this because Thorndike was different from everyone else. Instead of studying the mind of humans he went after animal minds. Do they have imaginations or not? Are they smart? Things like this. Plus, I love animals, so why not so some research on it.
A little background. Edward Lee Thorndike was born August 31, 1874 in Lowell, Massachusetts to a Methodist minister. In 1891 Thorndike graduated from Roxbury Latin School. He got his bachelor's degree at Wesleyan University in 1895, his masters at Harvard in 1987 and his Doctorate at Colombia University in 1898. In August of 1900 he married Elizabeth Moulton. The two of them had five children. Thorndike spent most of his life and a sub-division of Colombia University. He helped in creating many different intelligence tests.
Onto the good stuff. Thorndike was the first to publish a psychology book that had nothing to do with humans at all, but with animals. That book was called “Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study on the Associative Processes in Animals”. The question that Thorndike had was whether or not animals could learning with either their imitation or by observation. Thus, he did the research to find out!
What he did was take these puzzle boxes that where 15 inches wide, 20 long, and 12 in height. In each of these boxes there would be a door that could be opened by pulling on a string (or stepping on a latch) that was attached to the door. The animal of choice was cats. If the cat pulled the string that was attached to the door it would open. Each time a new cat went in he would time their speed. Over time the cats would learn, or pick it up quicker and that time would reduce. When the cats got out of the box they were rewarded with food. The food was a helper to finding the way out, they would smell it (usually fish) and go after it.
At first the cats would wonder around the cage and meow constantly. They did not try to escape at first. Finally the cats would figure out that if they stepped on a certain thing or pull on the string they would be freed. Once the cats had a turn he tired a different approach. He had one cat watch another cat as they made their way through the puzzle. To no surprise to me, there was no different between the times of those cats who watched other cats than to those who did not. I think it would be a lot harder to get a cat to watch another cat…
Thorndike tired this with other animals but was not successful. What he found was that when an animal stepped on the button (usually on accident) the animal would become faster and faster each time they went through as they learned the secret to escaping. He also found that the difference in animals usually learned of the escape way in the same way, but in difference of speed.
This">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Thorndike-->This had some information about the puzzle box. Along with some background information.
">http://www1.appstate.edu/~beckhp/puzzlebox.htm--> This one is short. Got a little information out of it.
I’m">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fanm--WyQJo-->I’m moving up in the world! I finally used a youtube video. This talks about the puzzle box and the cats. It pretty much shows you how two different cats got out of the box.
I found a lot of interest in John Dewey while reading chapter 7. He fits into the chapter by being included in the section on “The Chicago Fundamentalists. He took a leading role in making Chicago a center of functionalism with the help of his paper “The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology.” I chose to do more research on the life and contributions of John Dewey because while reading the chapter I found a lot of interest in his educational reform and his activism for women’s suffrage.
John Dewey was born in 1859 in Burlington, Vermont. He began attending the University of Vermont in 1875. While attending this school, he found interest in political, social, and moral philosophy. After graduating the University of Vermont he became a high school teacher in Oil City, Pennsylvania for two years. He then entered John Hopkins University to pursue a graduate education in philosophy. He graduated from John Hopkins and took a teaching position at the University of Michigan.
After a few years of teaching, Dewey then moved to the University of Chicago. He was appointed to head the Department of Philosophy, and founded the School of Education. He emphasized the difference between education and schooling. He used the school to see if education could integrate learning with experience. The school gained support from parents who were enthused that the curriculum emphasized their children’s experiences. After disagreements with faculty members, he began a position at Columbia University. He remained here until his retirement.
Dewey made many contributions to the field of psychology, as well as to society as a whole. He wrote 40 books and more than 700 articles. . He was a supporter of women's suffrage and the Settlement House movement of his friend Jane Addams. He took part in the presidency of the teachers' union, sponsorship of the ACLU, and also supported the ‘Outlawry of War’ movement in the interwar years.
Today, Dewey is still referred to, and his work is looked at in regards to current issues. Concerns regarding problems of unemployment, homelessness, and the lack of medical services for the poor have increased interest in a “communitarian” moral and political philosophy. Dewey is considered on of the philosophers who fit this description, and = scholars are looking back to his work for insight.
He is also still considered on of the most important people in regards to education. He believed that education must interact with experience in order for students to learn successfully. Many educators still look to Dewey’s work for inspiration when working with students.
http://www.bgsu.edu/departments/acs/1890s/dewey/dewey.html This website talks a lot about Dewey's life and experiences in his own education and career. It also tells
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dewey-political/ I used this site to cross-check information, and also get a better grasp of his views.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKKdCWTKATA This video gave a visual aspect of his life and work.
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-dewey.htm, http://www.johndewey.org/welcome-john-deweyorg/ I used these site to see how his views on education are still used today.
The person I found to be most interesting was Edward Lee Thorndike. He was born in Williamsburg, Massachusetts on August 31, 1974 to a Methodist minister, Edward Roberts Thorndike and his wife, Abbie Ladd Thorndike. He received his B.A. at Wesleyan University, moved onto Harvard University to receive his M.A. and received his PhD from Columbia University where he spent most of his life. He married Elizabeth Moulton two years after graduating from Columbia. They had five children together.
What he is most known for (or what I know him most for) is his research on cats and puzzle boxes. He was one of the first to use animals in psychological experiments whereas most were using humans at that time. The puzzle box experiment demonstrated that animals learn similarly the way humans do; both have an s-shaped learning curve. While it is similar, there is a large difference in speed, in that humans learn much more quickly than cats do. This experiment also established the theory on trial and error learning. The cat would essentially fuss around in the puzzle boxes and happen upon the device that would free them. Eventually they would figure out what it was and they would escape more quickly each time until it leveled off. This also displays operant conditioning (behaviorism) in that when the correct behavior was emitted, they were freed, reinforcement, also known as the law of effect. The law of effect defined by about.com states, “responses that are immediately followed by a satisfactory outcome become more strongly associated with the situation and are therefore more likely to occur again in the future. Conversely, responses followed by negative outcomes become more weakly associated and less likely to reoccur in the future.
He is also known for writing the Alpha and Beta tests for the military during World War I. These tests determined qualification for enlistment into the United Stated military. The Alpha test was written using multiple choice questions written in sentence format. Thorndike found that many of the men testing had difficulties with reading and writing so he developed the Beta test. The Beta test, rather than using written sentences, used pictures and diagrams which men enlisting found much simpler to do. Today the ASVAB is used instead.
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesmz/p/edward-thorndike.htm
I used this site to learn more about Thorndike’s theory of law and effect and trial and error learning.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Thorndike
I used this site for information on Thorndike’s early life and his puzzle box studies; also for information on the Alpha and Beta tests.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDujDOLre-8
This is a video recreating the cat and puzzle box studies done by Thorndike.
I wanted to read more about John Dewey and the functionalists, because it seemed like he took a more phenomenological approach to the reflex theory (seeing it as a single, complex action which can only be evaluated in context, as a functional relationship between the individual and the environment [Green]), and that makes more sense to me that the view of discrete ‘stages’ that Titchener and the structuralists held. Dewey’s position here is consistent with his philosophy of pragmatism, which says that we come to know things by their effects.
Following from Darwin’s theory of evolution, Dewey and the functionalists argued that the activities of the mind were the product of an adaptive process - i.e., we have them because they serve a purpose, or function. (In the words of William James, “Our various ways of feeling and thinking have grown to be what they are because of their utility in shaping our reactions to the outer world” [Foundations, 10]). The functionalists were not interested in dissecting the various mental processes into component parts; instead, they wanted to know how the various mental activities helped us to adapt and thrive in our environment. And just as Darwin’s theory focused on how peculiar characteristics of the individual can be selected that will allow for the survival of the species, Dewey contended that studying the differences in the thoughts and behaviors of individuals could be informative regarding the adaptive purpose of our mental activities.
This was a position in direct contrast to Titchener, who believed that we are all - except the insane, and who cares about them? - the same when it comes to our mental states. The problem with Titchener’s view however, was that experimental research following Titchener’s own protocols revealed differences in individual responses - differences that Titchener could only explain away as ‘errors’ on the part of the researchers or their observers (subjects) (Goodwin, 222). Functionalism, on the other hand, explored the idea that it is the unique interaction between each individual and the environment that results in different (though not entirely disparate) states of mind.* Thus Functionalism’s response to Titchener was that these differences were not errors, but rather to be expected - as they demonstrated individual adaptation (Green).
Still, Functionalism was not without its own problems: adaptation and response to stimuli are insufficient to account for the breadth of all human mental activities. But Dewey and the functionalists did open the door for behavioral and cognitive psychology, which attempted to further resolve these issues (Muhammad).
*Dewey applied this belief to his philosophy of education, arguing that individual children should be grouped and taught on a level appropriate to their mental development.
Wikipedia: John Dewey: Functional Psychology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey#Functional_psychology
Information on Dewey’s contributions to Functional Psychology
Wikipedia: Pragmatism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatism
Information on Pramatism
Wikipedia: Functional psychology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_psychology
Explanation of Functionalism
"Theory of Functionalism in Education Psychology", Sultan Muhammad, 01/27/2009
http://research-education-edu.blogspot.com/2009/01/theory-of-functionalism-in-education.html
Difficult to read, but this was actually not a bad article, describing Functionalism and discussing the strengths and weaknesses of the theory.
"What Was American Functionalist Psychology?”, Prof. Christopher Green
http://www.psychlectures.com/?p=531
Good history of the development of Functionalism
"Foundations of cognitive psychology", Nick Braisby and Angus Gellatly
http://www.oup.com/uk/orc/bin/9780199273768/ch01.pdf
Good info on the development of behavioral and cognitive psychology
The person I chose to do a bit more research on was James R Angell. I enjoyed reading about Dewey, and since Angell studied under Dewey and was introduced to Psychology by Dewey I thought I would do a bit reading about him. He read The Principles of Psychology, which he said influenced his thinking more than any other book he has read. He also interested me because he worked with William James for a year at Harvard and that is who I did some extra research last blog post.
I found it interesting that he wrote his dissertation and it was accepted but he never did receive his PhD. I thought it was pretty amazing that two of Angell's famous students include Harvey Carr and John B. Watson. That seems like a pretty big accomplishment in itself. Shortly after he became president of Yale University and helped to develop the Institute of Human Relations. He has a pretty impressive resume, especially for never receiving his PhD.
A few other impressive facts about Angell include: In 1906, he was elected 15th president of APA. In 1904, he wrote a highly successful book called Psychology: An Introductory Study of Structure and Functions of Human Consciousness. He even served on the board of the National Broadcasting Company (NBC).
About functional psychology, he said it was not at all new but had been a significant part of psychology from the earliest of times. It was structural psychology that had set itself apart from the older and more truly pervasive functional form of psychology. Angell describes the three major themes of the functionalist movement. (Schultz & Schultz, 2004). He said functional psychology should (1) study mental operations, rather than mental structure, (2) view consciousness in a utilitarian manner (i.e., as a useful tool for directing the organism), and (3) view mind and body as being functionally integrated, with no clear distinction between them. After writing his book, functionalism became a serious alternative to Titchener’s structuralism, and eventually this paved the way for functionalism became a serious alternative to Titchener’s structuralism.
I also find it sort of cool that it was when Angell went to the University of Chicago that it was afterwards the major source from which functional psychologists came. We always read about things in Psychology that were developed primarily in Germany, so this feels so close to home and gives me almost a sense of pride.
http://www.mikeraulin.org/graziano7e/supplements/History/5-07.htm
http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/datelines_jamesangell.html
http://core.ecu.edu/psyc/evansr/EVANS20.htm
I enjoyed the section in our chapter discussing James Angell explicitely the "What is consciousness?" vs. "What is consciousness for?" debate.
In reading about James Angell further, I found his points on functionalism are exclusive in regards to structuralism in that Angell advocate for functionalism being taught in schools as a part of psychology and structure would be biology and not psychology.
I agree in that to some extent but I still feel as though some portion of classes should be dedicated to the structures that influence the functions.
I think of our basics and cornerstones of knowledge as structuralism and expanding on that knowledge to be functionalism. In chorus class in 5th grade I was introduced to orchestra music by manner of watching "Peter and the Wolf." In this scenario, the function of music to insite emotion was introduced which sparked later interest in the real structure of orchestra and composition. I feel that related to my learning style in specific and possible my age, where others may learn or gain interest largely by knowing structure and later seeking function in other ways. Certainly I feel that psychology instruction would be lacking without available reference to the structure of behavioural body parts etc.
Different from James Angell, possibly, I find structure and function studies to complement one another and not exclude one another. Learners go from phase to phase, at times structure may deepen learning, and at times functional studies may do so.
Possibly Angell was biased because he specialized in one of the areas and sold books about it. Schools buy books, in large numbers.
Thanks!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_and_the_Wolf
wikipedia on Peter and the Wolf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siWFe7FXo7Y
Youtube Peter and the wolf cartoon
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Rowland_Angell
wikipedia on James Rowlan Angell
a) Wilhelm Wundt
b) Wilhelm Wundt was the father of structuralism
c) Structuralism interests me, therefore the founder of it does as well
Wilhelm Wundt played a major role into psychology. Some even refer to him as the father of psychology. Wundt is referred to as the father of structuralism, created the first psychology lab, and his influence with introspection. Structuralism derived from elementism, which is the theory of breaking a part a complex phenomenon into smaller pieces, or elements. At the same time, the first school of psychology was formed in Germany. Here Wilhelm Wundt started the first psychological laboratory. This laboratory was very important to psychology, because here psychology was finally separated from philosophy. Structuralism was born. Structuralism is related to elmentism because it’s the theory of taking consciousness and breaking it apart into multiple areas. These multiple areas were found and classified in Wundt’s lab. This is why we call Wilhelm Wundt the father of structuralism. In order to do this, he phenomenon called introspection. Introspection is a detailed process of looking into yourself and your own personal experiences to study consciousness.
http://www.simplypsychology.org/wundt.html
This website was a great overview of Wilhelm Wundt and his major contributions to psychology.
http://web.mst.edu/~psyworld/structuralism.htm?pagewanted=all
This URL discussed the laboratory and structuralism.
http://www.psych.utah.edu/gordon/Classes/Psy4905Docs/PsychHistory/Cards/Wundt.html
This website was perfect on details of Wundt and his contributions to structuralism.
I really found the work of Edward Thorndike to be interesting .Hence I decided to search and write about him. Edward L Thorndike. Thorndike was a psychologist who did considerable research in the field of functionalism which makes this topic relevant to this chapter. Thorndike contributed a considerable amount to the field of psychology. He used animals as his subjects most of the times.
Thorndike was responsible for discovering the famous Law of Effect and law of exercise .The law of effect stating that if satisfaction is perceived in one variable is likely to be repeated. The law of Exercise states that the repetition of stimulus and response strengthens the relationship between the two. These laws are extremely valid in the real world and are still studied and made use in experimentation
Trial and Error learning was another major contribution made by Thorndike. Trial and Error learning basically a process explaining the progressive process followed by while learning. Thorndike explained that while learning phenomena a person goes through series of errors or choosing the incorrect ways to solve problems before reaching the correct conclusion or learning the phenomena.
Thorndike made a name for himself in the history of psychology because of his experimental work. He also became the president of APA, developed intelligence tests. In conclusion, Thorndike is known as one of the most famous and major figures in psychology. The concepts discovered by him are the ones which are readily used and are integral part the history of psychology.
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
http://www.simplypsychology.org/edward-thorndike.html
I chose to research Robert S. Woodworth, a functionalist who worked closely with Thorndike. The textbook did not have too much information on him, and he had some interesting theories, such as the SOR model. I was interested in finding out more about him. He fits into this chapter in that his work was closely related to that of Thorndike's; both of them were functionalists who went to Columbia. Functionalism was widespread enough to eventually be known as "America's psychology;" thus, I think it is important that we know all the researchers involved in its birth.
Robert Sessions Woodworth is today considered to be one of the most influential American academic psychologists. He graduated from Harvard and Columbia, along with Thorndike. He wrote many well-known articles on his functionalist approach to psychology, as well as two textbooks on the subject. Many psychology students owned copies of his textbooks: Experimental Psychology and A Study of Modern Life.
Within the latter textbook, Woodworth introduced his idea of the S-O-R approach. This was known as the stimulus-organism-response approach, and the "O" (organism) was introduced in order to differentiate the theory from the original S-R theory of the behaviorists. He insisted that psychologists must not only understand a stimulus and a response, but the organism which responds in the first place as well.
Something I found to be particularly interesting was that Woodworth created what we now know to be perhaps one of the first personality tests ever recorded. During World War I, Woodworth wrote up what he called the Woodworth Personal Data Sheet. It was originally created in order to weed out soldiers who were determined most likely to get "shell-shocked" whilst in the line of duty. It turns out that the timing of this early personality test wasn't exactly soon enough to put it to good use; however, we learned a lot from it, and it is perhaps what influenced us to invent further personality tests.
Another theory I found interesting was actually studied and brought forth by Woodworth AND Thorndike. This was called transfer of practice, later known as transfer of learning. Woodworth and Thorndike researched how learning in one context would transfer over to another context that was similar to the first. Perhaps a better way to say it would be that improvement in one mental function could lead to improvement in another. From this research, the pair wrote their article titled: The Influence of Improvement in One Mental Function Upon the Efficiency of Other Functions. This led to the introduction of the identical element theory, which stated that identical elements are concerned in the influencing and influenced function. This entire concept attracted a lot of attention in the psychology community, and Woodworth's work has led to many further experiments and theories we have today in modern psychology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_S._Woodworth
This was just a short summary of Robert Woodworth's life and work. This helped me get a general outline of what I should research further.
http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Woodworth/murchison.htm
This was Robert Woodworth's autobiography, written by the man himself. It was quite interesting to read and get a sense of his voice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfer_of_learning
This page was very helpful when studying Thorndike and Woodworth's cooperation of work, the transfer theory in particular.
http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Thorndike/Transfer/transfer1.htm
This was a very well-known article written by Thorndike and Woodworth on the transfer theory.
Edward Thorndike did a lot of research on learning for the field of psychology. He created the ASVAB which is used for the entrance into the United States armed forces. He created word books for teachers, came up with many theories about learning, connectionism as well as a lot of lab experiments. Thorndike was born in the lat 1800s and his work is still used today in modern psychology. I think Thorndike is very interesting because of his wide range of work in learning and the contributions that he made in psychology. Thorndike fits into this chapter because of his work done for functionalists psychology.
One thing I found interesting and admirable about Thirndike was that he tried to diminish the ties between psychology and philosophy. The text book has gone through the evolution of philosophy into psychology. This process involved a lot of critcism of psychology, but as time progresses psychology began getting it’s own identity. It is interesting to see how these ties where still around, and how Thorndike helped to try and distinguish it as its own field of study. Today, there is still the knowledge that psychology came from philosophy, but they are viewed as being different fields of study.
Being a student, I have taken many standardized tests, and Thorndike helped contribute to this. He wanted education to become quantitative instead of qualitative. This makes sense for some things in education. This helps for a teacher to grade objectively, and not based on their liking of the particular student. This also helps comparison to other students at that level. Thorndike was not only interested in eduacation, but in other types of aptitude, and through this he became the “father” of personnel-selection psychology in business.
Thorndike made some great contributions to the education system. At UNI the education majors have to take a lot of educational psychology courses, and Thorndike’s work contributed to this. Thorndike’s lab research on animals, and humans, helped him to see how individuals learn, and he theorized that learning is a natural behavior, and that intelligence is hereditary. I think it is important that psychology is applied in the classroom, and a teacher will be more successful with this background knowledge. This is just another testament to Thondike’s work still being important to psychology today.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Thorndike
http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2509/Thorndike-Edward-L-1874-1949.html
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm
I picked to learn more about Edward L. Thorndike. He fits into the chapter because he made was a big name in educational psychology and psychological testing. I chose him because I do not know a whole lot about him and would like to know more. He is most famous for his "cat escape out of puzzle boxes" testing. He was a leader of the functionalist movement, which I am also a fan of and want to learn more about.
As I got to know Thorndike, I liked him more and more. He focused a lot on animal intelligence studies which interested me in a big way because I am huge animal lover, and often find myself talking to them anyway, and wondering what their intelligence level even consists of. Although Thorndike did not learn how to read the minds of animals, he got in the ball park range in understanding how the animal mind differs from our own.
What set Thorndike aside from other animal researchers of his time were his actual studies. The numbers. The data. He came out with a book, "Animal Intelligence", subtitled, "An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals". It was considered the most influential book of the first half century of psychological science.
Thorndike also started the process of what we now know as the IQ test. He came up with what was called the CAVD intelligence test. It measured completion, arithmetic, vocabulary, and directions. The logic behind this test became the foundation for modern intelligence tests.
http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/ethorndike.shtml
--This gives a good overview of Thorndike
http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Thorndike/Animal/wozniak.htm
--This gave me good information on his animal intelligence studies, very interesting.
http://www.kdp.org/meetourlaureates/laureates/edwardthorndike.php
--another good overview, in which I learned more about his CAVD intelligence test.
I chose to search for little known or interesting facts on Titchener (so all of the following links were chosen because they contained something I haven’t heard elsewhere). I was interested in him once I heard that he had such a love/hate relationship with the APA. Titchener had a huge impact in his hayday and developed the largest doctoral program (at Cornell) of his time. He was definitely worth reading about.
When Titchener was in prep school, he was gifted and driven. American poet James Russell Lowell was a guest speaker at an award ceremony there, and he remarked ‘Mr. Titchener, I am tired of seeing your face,’ because he was receiving so many awards and approached the stage so often. He was so well revered that he received an honorary degree each from Harvard, University of Wisconsin, and Clark U.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Edward_Bradford_Titchener.aspx
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_B._Titchener (Both URLs chosen because they were excellent sources for history of his life, and had all of the interesting little tidbits that went along with it.)
I found a fun video illustrating the Titchener illusion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGKknO7W2f0&feature=player_embedded (I liked this URL because it explains with visuals what is difficult to explain with words.)
Other than that, I found that Titchener’s methods were interesting. During introspection tests, the subject would be handed an item like a pencil and then asked for the “raw data” on the object. The subject would NOT say “pencil,” but would say “yellow, long, wooden,” etc… His methods and ideas ‘thrived’ while he was alive, perhaps because he was such a charismatic person and could promote his theories with well-given speeches. After he died, though, there was no one left to champion his ideas with such passion, so interest waned.
I am dying of laughter right now… I just found – at the end of my search – a “rap” by a University of Iowa student for a History of Psych course. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9tQ7pNV_Mo&feature=player_embedded Good stuff. Do we get extra points for submitting music videos?
I picked John Dewey to do some research on. This is because I felt like he was able have a solid idea about education and how it should be taught. He was very detailed about the proper idea of education and what should be done for students to grow and gain the proper experience. I really enjoyed reading that I had the chance to read. Also watching the video was a huge eye opener.
In my mind occupation is a social activity that ties together the traditional areas of learning. Because of now a days only focuses on one area they become dependent on others for areas that they acquired no information about. All students are not aware about today items. Education needs to be more comprehensive. The internet is a great tool but it does not allow students to gain the proper knowledge through activities and experiences. Sitting behind a computer does know allow one to experience real life issues. Relying on technology is like relying on books rather than experience. These are just few things that John Dewey said and talked about in the you-tube video. This is a must watch, I learned many different things.
John Dewey had such a great outlook on everything that he looked into and studied. John Dewey was born on October 20, 1859 and passed away on June 1, 1952). He was an American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer . His ideas came from educational concerns and social reform. He taught at many universities and his students appreciated his way of teaching. They felt that he was able to teach them and they understood what was going on.
His focus was on education and Dewey continually argues that education and learning ARE social and interactive processes. There fore school itself is a social institution where social reform should take place. You do not see this happen very often. “In addition, he believed that students thrive in an environment where they are allowed to experience and interact with the curriculum, and all students should have the opportunity to take part in their own learning.” I feel for me this would be amazing. I am more of a hands on learner, so but interacting with the world and learning through interaction would benefit my learning ad my grades. When we interact with the people and world around us, we are able to draw conclusions and questions. We tend to explore more when we are interacting. Education to him was primarily transmitted through communication. Communication is a sharing process until it becomes a common possession. This here is a direct quote from one of his chapters in a book. “As formal teaching and training grow in extent, there is the danger of creating an undesirable split between the experience gained in more direct associations and what is acquired in school. This danger was never greater than at the present time, on account of the rapid growth in the last few centuries of knowledge and technical modes of skill.” John Dewey: Democracy and Education. That was the title of one of his books that was written.
Dewey was active in everything that dealt with education and social policies. He aided in the Hull Houses in Chicago. He taught thoughts of children and was able to show many people that life is full of knowledge if you all yourself to interact with it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey
Information on Dewey himself
http://wilderdom.com/experiential/JohnDeweyPhilosophyEducation.html
Inforamation of his view of education!
http://www.johndewey.org/welcome-john-deweyorg/
His own website which was very interesting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQAtzmaGBeE
MUST WATCH. Really interesting.
I picked John Dewey to do some research on. This is because I felt like he was able have a solid idea about education and how it should be taught. He was very detailed about the proper idea of education and what should be done for students to grow and gain the proper experience. I really enjoyed reading that I had the chance to read. Also watching the video was a huge eye opener.
In my mind occupation is a social activity that ties together the traditional areas of learning. Because of now a days only focuses on one area they become dependent on others for areas that they acquired no information about. All students are not aware about today items. Education needs to be more comprehensive. The internet is a great tool but it does not allow students to gain the proper knowledge through activities and experiences. Sitting behind a computer does know allow one to experience real life issues. Relying on technology is like relying on books rather than experience. These are just few things that John Dewey said and talked about in the you-tube video. This is a must watch, I learned many different things.
John Dewey had such a great outlook on everything that he looked into and studied. John Dewey was born on October 20, 1859 and passed away on June 1, 1952). He was an American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer . His ideas came from educational concerns and social reform. He taught at many universities and his students appreciated his way of teaching. They felt that he was able to teach them and they understood what was going on.
His focus was on education and Dewey continually argues that education and learning ARE social and interactive processes. There fore school itself is a social institution where social reform should take place. You do not see this happen very often. “In addition, he believed that students thrive in an environment where they are allowed to experience and interact with the curriculum, and all students should have the opportunity to take part in their own learning.” I feel for me this would be amazing. I am more of a hands on learner, so but interacting with the world and learning through interaction would benefit my learning ad my grades. When we interact with the people and world around us, we are able to draw conclusions and questions. We tend to explore more when we are interacting. Education to him was primarily transmitted through communication. Communication is a sharing process until it becomes a common possession. This here is a direct quote from one of his chapters in a book. “As formal teaching and training grow in extent, there is the danger of creating an undesirable split between the experience gained in more direct associations and what is acquired in school. This danger was never greater than at the present time, on account of the rapid growth in the last few centuries of knowledge and technical modes of skill.” John Dewey: Democracy and Education. That was the title of one of his books that was written.
Dewey was active in everything that dealt with education and social policies. He aided in the Hull Houses in Chicago. He taught thoughts of children and was able to show many people that life is full of knowledge if you all yourself to interact with it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey
Information on Dewey himself
http://wilderdom.com/experiential/JohnDeweyPhilosophyEducation.html
Inforamation of his view of education!
http://www.johndewey.org/welcome-john-deweyorg/
His own website which was very interesting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQAtzmaGBeE
MUST WATCH. Really interesting.
I chose to learn more about Robert S. Woodworth. He was a functionalist who introduced the S-O-R model to psychology. By adding the “organism” component to the stimulus-response approach, he became a somewhat famous behaviorist of the early twentieth century. In his books, Dynamic Psychology and Dynamics of Behavior, Woodworth stressed the importance of the organism in the original stimulus-response model. Our textbook quotes Woodworth saying “motivation has always seemed to me a field of study worthy to be placed alongside of performance. That is, we to know not only what the individual can do and how he does it, but also what induces him to do one thing rather than another.” This is something that caught my attention right away. Motivation is something that I think of often, and I think it is important to remind myself what my true motivations in life really are. Everyone has something that drives them. For some, its money. For others, it sex, love, greed, or power. Woodworth pointed out that that a mechanism can take on the function of a drive. I feel that this pertains to my life in so many ways. Even it writing this blog, there is definitely a motive force in the way that it is done. I am choosing a person to learn more about because that is part of the assignment that will be graded. My grades affect my GPA, my GPA is a deciding factor in when and if I will graduate from UNI. A degree is a huge factor in my future. I am hoping that my perspective career will help others, while hopefully providing me with a comfortable lifestyle. So I guess that part of my motivation for reading about Woodworth would by money and the hope of making a difference in the lives’ of others someday. I think that Woodworth realized how important that was and made that a priority.
During World War One, Woodworth also developed the Woodworth Personal Data Sheet (WPDS). This test was designed to identify military recruits that were likely to suffer from “shell shock.” Although this test was designed too late for its original purpose, it was an important influence in other military testing of the same nature.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647724/Robert-S-Woodworth
(this site talked about Woodworth’s books and various topics within them)
http://www.igs.net/~pballan/Woodworth.htm
(this site discussed Woodworth’s “transfer of training” and other ideas originated by the functionalist)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_S._Woodworth
(as mentioned in my previous blogs, I don’t love using Wikipedia as a resource, but it is a good starting out point for research)
We were introduced to a lot of new people throughout chapter seven, but the one I found that stuck out the most was Edward L. Thorndike. Throughout the section dedicated to Thorndike’s work in this chapter, I found his laws of learning to be very interesting. Thorndike developed several laws of learning, also known as principles of learning. His first laws included readiness, exercise, and effect. Later on four more laws were added, primacy, recency, intensity, freedom and recruitment. I wanted to take a closer look at the first three laws that Thorndike developed in the early part of the twentieth century.
The law of readiness means when a person is physically and mentally ready to learn. This law talks about the importance of learning something meaningful. If an individual does not find a certain subject to be of any importance, they will not learn the information. This process also includes the instructor making it clear on what is going to be talked about, what should be taken from the experience, and ultimately what they hope each trainee will do with the acquired information. Something else that can also affect the trainees’ ability to learn is anything outside of the learning environment that they cannot control in their personal life. This makes it hard to concentrate and pick up any new information. Motivation is a huge factor in law of readiness.
The law of exercise simply means, things most often repeated are easiest remembered. (This law was brought up in chapter seven when referring to the puzzle box learning.) Repetition consists of many activities we have all learning, including recall, review, restatement, manual drill, and physical application. We have heard the importance of repetition from every teacher when they tell us to study for thirty minutes each day. Also, the more ways we take in information through, reading the chapter, discussing it in lecture, and taking notes, the better chances we have of remembering it. However, most of us still do not do this and that could be because we cannot find the meaning in what it is we are learning. The meaning is there, we just may not see it yet.
The law of effect involves the emotional reaction of the learner. (This law was also mentioned in chapter seven when referring to the puzzle box learning.) Learning is strengthened when followed by a pleasant or satisfying feeling and of course weakened when associated with an unpleasant feeling. Positive reinforcement coming from the instructor and the demand to do better will work to motivate the learner. Thorndike was curious on how new skills were learned. He studied this by putting a cat in the puzzle box and found that the well-practiced cat would find the reward of food again. Thorndike believed that if an action brings a reward, that action becomes stamped in the mind. Behavior changes because of its consequences was part of Thorndike’s thesis after the puzzle box and that is how he described his law of effect.
Thorndike was willing to take on any critics. He was excited about his thesis and was ready to get rid of old ones. His work with animals’ intelligence is one that many find very fascinating. When people get a chance to look at his puzzle boxes some may describe them as crude, but they leave a lasting impression. All of his work lead to his laws of learning. I would like to eventually look at the new laws of learning that were developed, but I thought the first three were important to discuss since they were the first ones found. Thorndike’s laws of learning are still used in a way today and his work will forever be important in the field of psychology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principles_of_learning : I like this website because it talked about the principles of learning and gave some more information on each law.
http://www.drillpad.net/DP_IRL_Laws.htm : This website also discussed the laws of learning and made the terms easier to understand.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vk6H7Ukp6To : This YouTube video was Thorndike’s puzzle box explaining law of effect.
Thorndike is one of my favorite psychologists. He was a student of James Cattell, and an important functionalist. He is known for his connectionism, especially the law of effect, which is a precursor to Skinner's ideas of reinforcement. I am interested in Thorndike primarily because I think he embodies the bold scientific spirit of inquiry. I like him as a character, and I feel like I can relate to him.
Thorndike's major contribution to behaviorism and to educational psychology was connectionism. In essence, connectionism involves a subject making connections between stimuli and responses (this is called the Law of Effect). The classic example is the cat in the puzzle box. The cat learns through trial and error which behaviors are effective and which are not. Effective behaviors are connected to the situation and to the favorable result, so that they will be repeated again in similar situations. In the same way, ineffective behaviors are connected to the situation and to the unfavorable result, and so are less likely to be repeated. From an educational perspective, this means that having kids sit in a room listening to someone talk for hours at a time may not be the only way to teach them.
Connectionism also involves the Law of Exercise, which states that the more often a subject responds to a certain situation in a given way, the stronger that response will be. If you place a cat in a puzzle box, and it has to push a lever to be let out, the cat will initially have no idea what the lever is or what it does. Eventually, through trial and error, the cat will figure out that the lever is the key to getting out of the box. The Law of Exercise states that the more this exercise is performed, the stronger will be the connection between the situation and the behavior.
I think Thorndike's connectionism was brilliant, but the reason he is one of my favorite psychologists after reading this chapter is that he was, in short, a badass. I particularly enjoyed reading about his disdain for the anecdotal conclusions sometimes made in the comparative research of his day, as well as his back-and-forth with Wesley Mills, which displayed a spirit of irreverence that I think is admirable in a scientist.
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/thorndike.htm#Theory
I used this link to get a little more biographical information on Thorndike.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_effect
This is the wikipedia page for the Law of Effect.
http://www.instructionaldesign.org/theories/connectionism.html
I used this page to get a better understanding of connectionism.