Topical Blog Week #12 (Due Thursday)

For this week’s topical blog I decided to research Clark Hull. He is one of the three main figures discussed in chapter 11 and is known for using the hypothetico-deductive system. However, I’m more interested in Hull’s personal life. After reading about his life in the textbook I became interested in him and wanted to learn more about him.

Clark Hull was born on May 24th, 1884 in Akron, New York. Although he was born in New York, he was raised on a farm in rural Michigan. His family was poor and he was educated in a one room schoolhouse, where he would also teach for a year after graduating. After teaching for a year he continued his education at Alma Academy. After graduating from the academy his education was put on hold due to a nearly fatal case of typhoid fever. At the age of 24 he contracted polio and became permanently paralyzed in his left leg, which left him reliant on an iron brace and a cane to walk. During this time Hull wanted to become a mining engineer, but his poor psychical condition made it virtually impossible to meet the physical demands of the career – which lead to a new found interest in psychology. Although his poor health and financial struggles lead to numerous delays in his education he eventually earned his bachelor’s and master’s degree from the University of Michigan. Hull then applied to graduate school and was rejected by Cornell and Yale, but admitted by the University of Wisconsin. In 1918, Hull was awarded his Ph.D. under Joseph Jastrow.

After completing his Ph.D. he remained at the University of Wisconsin to teach. During this time he also published his book Aptitude Testing in 1928. In 1929, Hull accepted a position at Yale University, which is where he would work the remainder of his career. This is where he developed his major contribution, which was an elaborate theory of behavior based on Pavlov's laws of conditioning. Pavlov provoked Hull to become greatly interested in the problem of conditioned reflexes and learning. In 1943 Hull published, Principles of Behavior, which presented a number of constructs in a detailed Theory of Behavior. Following this publication he soon he became the most cited psychologist.

All in all, Hull is an interesting figure who came from virtually nothing and created a name for himself through hard work and remaining dedicated to the field of psychology despite his given situation. Although Hull dealt with numerous hardships (e.g. poverty and illness) he still became one of the great contributors to psychology – which basically sums up why I wanted to read more about him. He’s a truly inspiring figure.

http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/hull.htm
- Overview of Hull’s life and contributions
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesal/p/clark-hull.htm
- Biography of Hull
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_L._Hull
- Brief overview of Hull’s life and career

For my topical blog for Chapter 11 I decided to explore the Neobehaviorism movement a little closer. The movement of neobehaviorlsm emerged in the 1930s at the hands of famous psychologists like Tolman, Hull, and Skinner. This movement became central to experimental psychology lasting from 1930 to about 1960. Although there was not a unified sense among the psychologists, each having their own viewpoints on the large differences, there seemed to be a certain consensus among the neobehaviorists. Like Thorndike, Watson, and Pavlov, the neobehaviorists believed that the study of learning and a focus on rigorously objective observational methods were the keys to a scientific psychology. These neobehaviorists were trying to be more self-conscious about trying to formalize the laws of behavior. This group was also influenced by another group called the Vienna Circle of Logical Positivists, this consisted of philosophers lead by Carnap, Neurath, and Feigl, whose argument was that meaningful statements about the world had to be cast as statements about physical observations. Anything else was considered nonsense and rejected, they believed that knowledge would be built on a basis of observations, being verified by only the extent that it could be observed.

Tolman focused his experimental work largely on white rats learning their way through mazes. He took a different approach than his behaviorists that came before him by taking a more holistic approach. He emphasized integrating the rats into their environment by referring to them as what he called “stimulating agencies” and “behavior acts”. In a book he wrote in 1932, he argued that “the purpose and cognition were essential behavior and should be interpreted not as mentalistic entities but as outwardly observable features of behavior describable in objective language”.

Clark Hull seemed to be the most ambitious out of the three psychologists in the neobehaviorists group. As noted in the chapter, we know that he constructed a formal theory of behavior, believing that he had found the fundamental law of learning or habit-formation. Habit-formation was the law of stimulus generalization. Furthermore, he believed that all behavior, whether it be in humans or animals, could all be unified by this basic principle in all social sciences. This law stated that a response “could be called forth by an unconvential stimulus as long as that stimulus was associated, either temporarily or in character, with the stimulus that usually called forth the response”. As long as the initial response was either identical or extremely similar to the original stimulus, a response would occur. Something really interesting was that Hull’s work was carried on after his death by a friend by the name of Kenneth Spence who was a psychologist at the University of Iowa.

Skinner, the third of the neobehaviorists, rejected Hull’s notions and ideas and returned to the “Watsonian” project of founding a science entirely on the observation of behavior. Skinner developed the “Skinner Box”, and developed what is now called operant conditioning. Stating that both animals and humans behave the way they do because of the positive consequences produced by past behavior. For Skinner, all learning was was a matter of reinforcement, and his method was used to record the sequence of movements and then noticing these patterns, and determining when behavior should be reinforced.
Neobehaviorism came in from strong criticism in the lat 50’s and 60’s. Philosophers doubted that science could only be theory-neurtral, meaning that it was based soley on observation; observations themselves were seemed to be theory laden. Behaviorism is currently regarded by psychologists as one form or approach among many.

http://science.jrank.org/pages/8448/Behaviorism-Neobehaviorism-1930-1955.html
-Summary of Neobehaviorism
http://graulab.tamu.edu/J-Grau/Psyc606/Papers/Neobehaviorism.pdf
-Textbook excerpt on Neobehaviorism
http://www.class.uidaho.edu/psyc390/pdf/3-3-Neobehaviorism-web.pdf
-PowerPoint on Neobehaviorism

The topic that I would like to discuss is Clark Hull and his drive reduction theory. Before this class I had never even heard of Clark Hull or his theory and components of his theory, therefore sparking my interest into this new information.
Clark Hull was one of the only psychologists we’ve talked about thus far that has been born in the United States. He grew up in a lower SES family, and he originally wanted to go into studying engineering. Because he had gotten polio and become partially paralyzed, it restricted him from going into this field. He instead chose to go into psychology at the University of Michigan for his undergrad education and the University of Wisconsin for his graduate education.
Hull’s drive reduction theory is a more general theory of learning. He believed that drive reduction, or needs satisfaction, is the main factor that determines the learning outcome. These drives that could include hunger or thirst, are what triggers the behavior response. When the drive is satisfied, like getting food to satisfy the hunger drive or water to satisfy the thirst drive, the drive is reduced for the time being. This temporary satisfaction of the drive is what acts as the learning reinforcer. These innate drives that we have that are needed to be satisfied Hull thought were influential to Darwin’s evolutionary theory because “he assumed that learning could only occur with reinforcement of the responses that lead to meeting of survival needs, and that the mechanism of this reinforcement was the reduction of a biological drive.”
Along with these innate drives, however are secondary drives. Secondary drives are not influenced by survival needs, including psychological or biological needs, but are influenced by conditioning, money for example.
Hull’s theory is the first theory for motivation. The premise of this theory is that people have certain psychological needs, and when these needs aren’t met is the point where tension is created. But when these needs are met the person is relaxed, or at a state of homeostasis.

http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/behaviorism/clarkhull.html
explanation of the theory and relation to evolutionary theory, biography

http://www.instructionaldesign.org/theories/drive-reduction.html

explanation of drive reduction theory

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive_theory
reinforcers, primary and secondary drives

The topic I choose to research this week was hypnosis. I chose this topic because I have seen it done before and I would like to learn more about how exactly it works. The APA describes hypnosis as a cooperative interaction in which the participant responds to the suggestions of the hypnotist. While hypnosis has become well-known thanks to popular acts where people are prompted to perform unusual or ridiculous actions (where I have seen it used), the technique has also been clinically proven to provide medical and therapeutic benefits. A person is in a deeply focused state unusually responsive to an idea or image, but this does not mean that a hypnotist can control the person's mind and free will. On the contrary, hypnosis can actually teach people how to master their own states of awareness. By doing so they can affect their own bodily functions and psychological responses. I have never personally been hypnotized but a few of my friends have (for fun at our prom). I also did some research on hypnotherapy and how it works. When something happens to us, we remember it and learn a particular behavior in response to what happened. Each time something similar happens, our physical and emotional reactions attached to the memory are repeated. In some cases these reactions are unhealthy. In some forms of hypnotherapy, a trained therapist guides you to remember the event that led to the first reaction, separate the memory from the learned behavior, and replace unhealthy behaviors with new, healthier ones. During hypnosis, your body relaxes and your thoughts become more focused. Like other relaxation techniques, hypnosis lowers blood pressure and heart rate, and changes certain types of brain wave activity. In this relaxed state, you will feel at ease physically yet fully awake mentally and may be highly responsive to suggestion. Your conscious mind becomes less alert and your subconscious mind becomes more focused. Some people respond better to hypnotic suggestion than others. There are a few myths about hypnosis that I was unaware of. The first one is when you wake up from hypnosis, you won’t remember anything that happened when you were hypnotized. The second one is hypnosis can help people remember the exact details of a crime they witnessed. I thought this may be somewhat true because I saw them do it on a television show, but then again, it was a television show. However, it can enhance memory but it does not lead to significant memory enhancement or accuracy. The third myth is you can be hypnotized against your will. Fourth myth, the hypnotist has complete control of your actions while you’re under hypnosis. I thought this was basically because what I have experienced of hypnosis is, the hypnotist told them to do something and they would do it. They did do it in their own way however. The last myth is hypnosis can make you super strong, fast, or athletically talented. Hypnosis can be used to enhance performance, but it cannot make people stronger or more athletic than their existing physical capabilities.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnosis
Everything about hypnosis

http://www.umm.edu/altmed/articles/hypnotherapy-000353.htm
information on hypnotherapy

http://psychology.about.com/od/statesofconsciousness/a/hypnosis.htm
information on current hypnosis

The topic I wanted to learn more about this week was B.F. Skinner and his Skinner box experiment. B.F. Skinner was born on March 20, 1904. When he was young, he really enjoyed building and inventing things. He graduated from Hamilton College in 1926 with a B.A. in English Literature. He spent some time as a struggling writer, but then he discovered the work of Watson and Pavlov. He became very inspired by their works and decided to enter the psychology graduate program at Harvard University. He then married Yvonne Blue in 1936. They had two daughters together. In 1945, Skinner moved to Bloomington, Indiana to be a Psychology Department Chair at the University of Indiana. However, he joined the psychology department at Harvard University a short three years after arriving at the University of Indiana. He would remain at Harvard University for the remainder of his life. He was very interested in behaviorism, and this led to him inventing the Skinner box.
The Skinner box is a chamber that contains a bar that an animal can press to be reinforced with a treat. It had a device that recorded each response by the animal. It also recorded the unique schedule of reinforcement the animal was assigned. The design of the boxes varies depending on what type of animal they’re testing. Some of the boxes also included lights, sounds, and images. In some cases, some of the floors of the chamber may be electrified. The purpose of the Skinner box was to allow researchers to carefully study behavior in a very controlled environment. The researchers could also determine which schedule of reinforcement led to the highest rate of response. In one particular study, researchers used two rats and placed them in separate boxes. One of the rats was labeled very hungry, and the other rat was labeled not hungry. The rat that wasn’t hungry soon became adapted to its new environment and became inactive. On the other hand, the hungry rat was very active. Once it eventually figured out where the lever was, it continued to press it until it was no longer hungry.
The Skinner box wasn’t Skinner’s only contribution to psychology. He had another invention called the baby tender. This was an enclosed heated crib with a plexiglass window. He invented this per his wife’s request for a safer crib. The crib received a lot of criticism as Ladies Home Journal printed an article calling the crib “Baby in a Box”. Skinner also published many works as he published almost 200 articles and more than 20 books. In a 2002 survey of psychologists, he was identified as the most influential psychologist of the 20th century. He also won some awards during his career. He won the Edward Lee Thorndike Award in 1966, the National Medal of Science from President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968, the Gold Medal of the American Psychological Foundation in 1971, the Human of the Year Award in 1972, and a Citation for Outstanding Lifetime Contribution to Psychology in 1990. It’s obvious that Skinner played a vital role in the history of psychology. Many of his works, especially his work on operant conditioning, are still being used today. He is definitely a very intriguing person as a lot of his research and experiments are very interesting to learn about.
http://psychology.about.com/od/sindex/g/def_skinnerbox.htm
-Info on the Skinner box experiments
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_skinner.htm
-Info on B.F. Skinner
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6zS7v9nSpo&feature=fvwrel
-Video showing a Skinner box experiment

I began my research on the topic of "Walden Two", which is the book that B.F. Skinner wrote describing a utopian society that was developed through the use of operant conditioning. Little did I know that I would stumble across something that would be far more interesting than the book itself. In a Google search I tried to find information on the book "Walden Two"; whether that be analysis', reviews, summaries, etc., when I found a link that took me to the website of Twin Oaks Intentional Community. I had no idea what I had clicked on, but was soon in ah at what I had found. Twin Oaks was a community that was founded based on the writings of the Utopian society that B.F. Skinner wrote about! Not only that, but the community still exists today.

Before I talk about Twin Oaks, I would like to give a basic overview of the book it was founded upon, "Walden Two". It was towards the end of WWII and Skinner was asking himself the question, "Now What?" What were the soilders that were coming back from fighting the war going to do now? He said that they can experiment and find knew and better ways of living, instead of coming back and falling into the typical life. WIth this in mind he wrote "Walden Two", which is a play-off of "Walden" written by Henry Thoreau.

In the story professor Burris writes to Frazier, who is the builder of the utopian community called Walden Two. Frazier then writes back to professor Burris and tell him to come to Walden Two and see the community, so he does and with him he brings two students and there girlfriends, and a friend Castle. While at Walden Two they discover what the community is about and there are mixed feelings from the visitors. At Walden Two there are community living spaces, children are raided by all, and they work only 4 hours a week and for now pay, but instead are taken care of by the community.There are Planner that are the governing board of Walden Two and Manager who help to lead the community in the right direction. By the end of the story Dr. Burris decides that he is going to stay at Walden Two. The basic principle behind Walden Two is that operant conditioning can be used to train people to do the right thing and make for better communities.

This leads me to Twin Oaks Community. Twin Oaks was founded in 1967 and used "Walden Two" as a basis for its foundation. Twin Oaks is and intentional communtiy in rural Virgina. At Twin Oaks there values of cooperation, sharing, non-violence, equality and ecology are implmented through its 100 member community. In the community each member has their own room, but living quarters are all community based. All people work 42 hours a week. These hours can be done in many different ways, either through childcare, cleaning, cooking, or through manufacturing or good that are sold to make money for the community. The make tofu, and hammoks that are sold to provide the money to keep the community thriving. With these funds indivuals are provided there food, housing, healthcare, transportation, and even a stipend that they can use to buy whatever they want.

Anyone can apply to be a member and go through the membership process, which involves staying at the community for 3 weeks and then moving away for a month to allow time for the community to think of you will fit in as well as for you to decide of it is for you. Once the decision is made you have 9 months to move in and after that the admittance is void. You can also visit the community for a 5 dollar fee for one day or live there for 3 weeks for 50 dollars to see if it is for you.

The "government" is replicated from the book other than the fact that there are 3 planners instead of six. In additon to that there are managers. The candidates for planner can be vetoed with 20% of the member against them and decisions that planners make can be overturned by simply a majority member rule. Members voices are heard a community meetings that are heald once per week.

Some other interesting things about Twin Oaks are that there are most of the ammenities that people have at Twin Oaks with the exception of TV. They have community cars that members can use. They can have things stored in their rooms. All forms of people are welcome with no discrimination. Skinner also visited Twin Oaks twice and there was a documentary written on the encounter by PBS. However, I have a feeling that Skinner was disapointed by Twin Oaks, because it is more egalitarian than behavioristic. Regardless it would be very interesting to visit the community and see what Skinner inspired.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2778813/
-Why Skinner wrote Walden Two and analysis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walden_Two
-Basin overview of Walden Two

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/walden2/summary.html
-Summary of Walden Two

http://www.twinoakscommunity.org/frequently-asked-questions-faqs.html
-Information on Twin Oaks

A topic that really interested me was B.F. Skinner and his work with operant conditioning. It also interested me to dig deeper into Skinners life and find out why he chose to study behaviorism after first being a writing major in college. Skinner started his career in Hamilton College in New York where he was out of place even after joining a fraternity and becoming involved with writing the school newspaper with atheist views at a religious college. He focused on writing and received a BA in English literature at Hamilton and took a year off to find himself and write. In this year Skinner decided that writing was not for him and read Watson’s book on behaviorism which interested him a lot. This revelation caused him to apply to Harvard Graduate School where he was accepted and worked until his retirement in 1974. This is where Skinner found his place in psychology where he was able to challenge Watson and Pavlov’s work to create his own operant conditioning model or Type R conditioning. He believed that behaviors are casual factors affected by the consequences which were much different than a stimulus response type approach. I watched a video as well that explained how an environment and a schedule of reinforcement affected how a pigeon reacted to food. It was very interesting to compare a schedule of reinforcement to gambling and how it is a chance of how you receive something such as food for a pigeon or money for a human that keeps a subject going. He believed that free will is decided by causes and behavior which elicits a response from a person. The third video I watched was from the show Big Bang Theory and it involved the character using operant conditioning to train a friends girlfriend how to behave correctly in his own view with chocolate. This was not only a very humorous video, but it showed how Skinner’s basic principles can be used in a variety of different ways.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._F._Skinner - Biography
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_ctJqjlrHA – Video explaining schedule of reinforcement behaviors.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=euINCrDbbD4&NR=1 – Big Bang Theory episode that involves operant conditioning.

I decided I would like to find more out about Clark Hull and hypnosis specifically. He did research to demonstrate that his theories can predict behavior in others. He is credited with starting the modern study of hypnosis. In 1933, he even wrote a book called Hypnosis and Suggestibility where he talked about hypnosis using statistics and experimental analysis. This was the first major compilation of laboratory studies done on hypnosis. He highly emphasized that hypnosis is not related to sleep. Hypnosis is a state where you focus your attention, heighten your suggestibility, and make your fantasies more vivid. It is a form of unconsciousness resembling sleep. The threshold that is met in hypnosis with sensory stimulation can be induced psychologically. Sleep and hypnosis have nothing in common. He believed it should be studied scientifically in laboratory conditions. So, nothing interferes with it. It has advanced over the years due to brain imaging technology, therapists, and psychologists. Hypnosis is a perfectly natural and ordinary state of mind. In the 20th century hypnotherapy grew into becoming a profession. This is to be used by licensed psychologists and physicians mostly. This technique can even be used to treat people trying to learn weight management and stop smoking.
Hypnosis affects everyone differently. Some people felt their actions were outside of their conscious and others may have felt fully aware and able to carry on conversation. It is known to help reduce pain in people, especially in childbirth and performance. Psychiatric nurses in most facilities are allowed to use hypnosis on their patients to help relieve things like anxiety, unwanted behavior, arousal, and to improve self-esteem and confidence. Children tend to be more responsive to hypnosis. About 10 percent of adults have a hard time being hypnotized and about 15 percent of adults are easily hypnotized. The person hypnotizing you does not have control over you and generally most people remember almost everything they did while under hypnosis. Hypnosis is a state of relaxation that occurs because of mental concentration or abstraction. We feel tranquility from our heightened focus and suggestibility.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_L._Hull - This website told me a general overview of what
http://www.historyofhypnosis.org/20th-century-and-beyond/ - This gave more insight into Hull’s personal views on hypnosis.
http://psychology.about.com/od/statesofconsciousness/a/hypnosis.htm - This website explained how hypnosis affects people differently.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnosis - This website explained how hypnosis can be beneficial in the medical field.

Clark Hull is one of the three men covered in Chapter 11. He is many times credited with the modern creation of understanding hypnosis. “Hull was probably the first psychologist to approach hypnosis with the quantitative methodology customarily used in experimental psychology.” I think this is an interesting subject because I have used techniques similar to hypnosis. I teach yoga and have used several methods to help students and myself relax. I have had students tell me they felt like I was hypnotizing them. I have read a lot about this one specific theory of a relaxation technique called Yoga Nidra which is very similar to hypnosis so I wanted to learn more about what Hull found in his research.

Hypnosis became a respected medical practice in the early 20th century. It was mostly seen in classrooms and in research labs until the 1950s. Before Clark Hull there was Joseph Jastrow at the University of Wisconsin and even though Jastrow was Hull’s mentor Hull gets more credit in history. Hull took over for Jastrow and in 1933 published a famous book titled Hypnosis and Suggestibility which was the “first major book to compile the results of laboratory experiments in hypnosis, and the first to apply the techniques and standards of modern experimental psychology.”

One very important contribution Hull made was to define a modern medical hypnosis. “Hull also kickstarted the “state/non-state” debate, which dominated academic discussion of hypnosis for much of the 20th century, and to some extent, still does. Simply put, proponents of the “state” theory argue that hypnotic trance is a special state of consciousness, distinct from the everyday. “Non-state” theorists believe the opposite – that there is no “special” state of consciousness associated with trance, and that all hypnotic phenomena can be accounted for by “everyday” psychological mechanisms, such as suggestibility.”

Hull was mostly interested in laboratory study of hypnosis and did not want to be seen as a “hypnotherapist.” He was not very concerned with the practical applications of hypnosis. Years later hypnosis still is being used and has become very popular in the self-help movement in the instance of self-hypnosis. Yet it does not seem to have the academic respect it maybe once had and someone cannot make a serious academic career of it. “If you look at the hypnosis researchers who have been successful in academia, it hasn't been because of their interest in hypnosis. Rather, it's been because they've been able to connect their interest in hypnosis to other topics that have somewhat broader appeal.”

William James was also interested in hypnosis and wrote a whole chapter on it in his famous book Principles of Psychology. James wanted to use it to learn about his interest of the will and consciousness.

With current technology such as brain imaging scans hypnosis can be understood in more scientific and visual terms. Some recent research I found very interesting follows “Wolinsky demonstrated that the so-called “Deep Trance Phenomena” can all be detected in everyday waking consciousness – in other words, “normal” consciousness is made up of layers of hypnotic trance that we move into and out of all day long. Hypnosis does produce a distinct state of mind – but it’s a perfectly ordinary and natural one that’s part of everyday consciousness.”

http://www.historyofhypnosis.org/20th-century-and-beyond/
Modern history of hypnosis
http://www.bookrags.com/biography/clark-leonard-hull/
Biographical Info on Hull
http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~kihlstrm/APAHypnosis07.htm
Hypnosis in relation to experimental psychology

The topic I wanted to learn more about was cognitive maps. I found it very interesting how Edward Tolman researched and recorded data of animals to determined if they created mental maps. Tolman first started his rat studies in the 1940’s. He placed food at the end of the maze, and would observe the rats going through the maze several times. He noticed that each time the rat went through the maze, they made fewer mistakes. Tolman called this the “central office”. This is an internal map of the maze in the rat’s brain, which they could internally visualize, thus completely the maze much easier. After several maze runs the races would become much faster and more efficient at the maze. One the rats mastered the maze he would create a different twist to the maze to see how the changes were handled. The book showed several examples of the different types of maze designs there were. I found this to be really interesting because it can also be used to understand the human mind. During that time of psychology tests on animals were their only ways to get results on trying to understand how the mind works. In todays field its usually referred to as mental mapping. Cognitive maps are described as a type of mental processing composed of a series of psychological transformations by which an individual can acquire, code, store, recall, and decode information about the relative locations and attributes of phenomena in their everyday or metaphorical spatial environment. Even though the book didn’t discuss humans and mental mapping we do this also in our everyday lives. For example when we get a new job in a new location. Sometimes there is orientation to get aquainted with the location. After that, you start slowly remembering the finer details and get more comfortable. Once the mind has created a mental map you are able to do it like its second nature. If there was road construction you would be forced to reroute yourself to get to work a different way. It was interesting to learn how we have advanced and used our own cognitive mapping just like the rats did in the experiments. The video I saw that involved the blind dog made me think how certain creatures and even humans have to adapt to their surroundings. Moles for example are blind. They use their other senses to guide them through the Earth which is a maze to them. Blind people also use mental mapping to get around familiar places. The topic really interested me because you can look much deeper and see how we use our own mental mapping.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_map
Gave me the term and definition of mental mapping

http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Tolman/Maps/maps.htm
gave numerous examples of mazes and research. Also had info from the book.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxfJWKHsWE0
interesting youtube video of a blind dog going through the house to get a treat.

This week’s topical blog has me very excited. I decided to research more about Burrhus Frederick Skinner’s Project Pigeon. After reading about it in chapter eleven, I became very interested about it and wished to learn more about it, as I described previously in the reading blog assignment on Tuesday. I find it amazing that animals can be used along-side technology that can help humans achieve certain advancements.

Skinner’s project was funded by the military with a twenty-five thousand dollar grant despite them being very skeptical about its capabilities. Project pigeon came about during WWII and was intended to solve the missile guidance problem. Pigeons were placed in the nose cone of a missile called a PELICAN bomb and pecked at a screen to guide the missile to its target. Three pigeons were used as a fail-safe measure. A lens projected an image on a screen in the cone that the pigeons pecked at. The pigeon’s objective was to keep the target in the center of the screen, so if the image started to move from the center of the screen, the pigeons pecking at it would redirect the missile and keep it on target.

Skinner actually put these pigeon pilots through training programs. They were trained by a familiar terminology called “Operant Conditioning”. When they would peck at a specified target, they were rewarded with food. Skinner started out the image movement in the training program slow. The image would move slowly at first and as the pigeons got better, he sped up the image movement process. The pigeons got surprisingly fast and could deliver four pecks per second by the end of their training. Officials were skeptical about putting so much faith in a bird, but pigeons actually process information much faster than most people commonly think and are very smart birds.

Skinners pigeons actually performed very well and the system was considered successful. However, the military found the idea too impractical to continue and stopped the project and felt that other military endeavors of the time deserved greater priority. Interestingly enough, the project was revived by the Navy four years later and renamed “Project Orcon”. That project was then shut down six years later because of technological advancements of other guidance system protocols.

At the time (WWII), the pigeon’s ability to pilot the PELICAN missiles was provocative because it would provide the ability of not relying on insufficient technology to guide the missile. The pigeons could provide reliability. There were problems though. The missiles could only be used during the day time since pigeons unfortunately do not have the ability of night vision. The project did make a very useful advancement to technology. The screen designed for the pigeons to peck at is what we would now consider a modern day touch screen.

B.F. Skinner’s pigeon project provided valuable evidence for operant conditioning and behaviorism.

http://www.military.com/video/operations-and-strategy/second-world-war/project-orcon-pidgeon-guided-missile/897399315001/ -- Very insightful, fascinating video giving a summary of Skinners/Military’s project.

http://cyberneticzoo.com/?p=5819 -- I got most of my information from this site. It was very informative and provided many visual aids.

http://allpsych.com/biographies/skinner.html -- Short background/biography of Skinner.

I would like to learn more about Tolman and Cognitive maps. This fits in with the chapter as the chapter talks about Tolman specifically and it looks a cognitive maps. I’m interested in it because it all seemed interesting. Tolman was mentioned in the chapter as doing his research with rats and relating them to cognitive mapping, but I am doing a little more research on Tolman and cognitive mapping in other creatures besides rats.

I would really like to expand on the cognitive maps idea. I would like to learn more specifically about the cognitive maps that humans have. We have a large capacity to build and follow our mental maps. How often do we access our recall. How many years do our cognitive maps last and how effective are they? I would like to learn more about Tolman and his work with cognitive makes. I find it interesting that the rats were able to store and remember so much about the maze. I want to know if humans have a similar strength in terms of forming and following cognitive maps.

As I stated above, I want to learn about cognitive maps. Naturally, I wondered about cognitive maps as I read. This summer in Taiwan I did research on rats and I studied their reasoning skills as well as their decision to make a “risky choice” I wonder if their ability to form and store cognitions makes would have anything to do with the connections they make with reasoning and risky behavior or non-risky behavior.

Edward Tolman started his cognitive mapping studies in the 1940s. Cognitive recall was discovered as Tolman noted the fact that rats seemed to recall their previous mistakes in mazes and make fewer mistakes each sequential time. This suggested that they were able to make maps that helped them to remember what worked and what didn’t.

In learning more about Tolman I found out about something called the “central office”. Essentially this refers to the rat’s ability to visualize the maze in their head based on prior information and mapping. I do this same kind of internal mapping or central office storing when I drive to see my fiancé. He lives in Cedar Rapids and I often only get to see him on Sundays. I’m also an RA who’s on-call on Sunday Nights. I of course want to find the fastest way to return to campus so that I can be efficient and spend as much time with my fiancé as possible. The first time I explored my route home I made a few errors as I got off an exit sooner hoping it would save me time. I also set my cruise control fairly close to the speed limit. As I make the trip more frequently, I have become away of areas in which the cops usually are and where I can pick up my speed. I also know when and where to find the best parking spaces, how to time the distance between lights, and which exit to get off. I have discovered all of these things through trial and error and I remember and act upon them based on my own “maze” cognitive mapping, recall, and central office abilities.

Humans are also able to interpret their maps and store them in various ways. We can also potentially create our own cognitive maps that may or may not be real. We could learn or design false places in our heads and form maps for those places. We could also program robots to map thoughts and locations so that they may function and navigate appropriately based on mapping of areas in their environment.

I find it fascinating that so many processes of the brain are so unique and individualized, yet simple and detailed enough that they can be programmed into the daily functioning of a robot. Our brains can be so simple, yet so complex.

After learning everything, I think that the second sight listed below was most helpful and I enjoyed using it for definitions. It’s definition of cognitive mapping was simple, cut and dry, and easy to understand. It states that a cognitive map is essentially a big/overall mental image that is representative of a setting in terms of space and layout. It specifically states that cognitive mapping is, “the mental structuring process that leads to creating the cognitive map”. I really liked how this sit broke down mapping and map to show the differences.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_C._Tolman -Talks about Tolman as a behavioralist yet shows how he’s different from Skinner and his radical behavioralist theories.

http://intraspec.ca/cogmap.php#.UJy-ccU1mSo –gives excellent examples, resources, and definitions of cognitive mapping and related ideas.

http://jeb.biologists.org/content/199/1/219.full.pdf -Talks about the cognitive maps of animals, interesting to read following the previous link that talks about cognitive maps and mapping in humans.