Please read chapter 6. After reading the chapter, please respond to the following questions:
What were three (3) things from the chapter that you found interesting? Why were they interesting to you? What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting? Why?
What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding the history of psychology?
How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
What topic would you like to learn more about? Why ?
What ideas did you have while reading the chapter?
Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
The first thing that I found interesting was the part on William James and his ideas about consciousness. I am learning all about consciousness in my psych of personality class so this part I was able to connect with. I thought it was interesting that he believed studying consciousness was a waste of time and he didn’t see why so many people were caring about it. I also like that he came up with additional attributes of conscious which kind of showed that he was a hypocrite because he was studying what he said had to point of being studied. Those attributes were that the conscious is personal, constantly changing, sensibly continuous, selective, and active. His ideas about consciousness had been affected by Darwin because he was interested in how it helped us evolve in our environment.
The second thing that I found interesting was learning about how mazes came into being. I think that it is interesting to think that multiple people in different areas were using mazes at the same time. This makes me think back to our Darwin wasn’t the only one in his time who discovered the idea of evolution. The first two people to use them were Sir John Lubbock (a Darwinian) and E.L. Thorndike. Even if they were the first to start using them the credit for systematic rats-in-mazes studies goes to Willard Small. One interesting discovery made by small was that blind rates and non-blind rats could make it through a maze just as easy as the other. These mazes helped to investigate the sensory and mental processes that are used when trying to solve a maze and this process also showed how organisms are able to adapt to their current environment.
The third thing that I found interesting to read about was the story of Mary Whiton Calkins. She started out rough with having little support from universities and more powerful males in the psychology research area. Fortunately for her she was able to find a few people to help her on her way to becoming a successful female psychologist. One thing that she came up with that interested me was her ideas on self-psychology. This idea of hers mainly came from her time with her mentor William James. Self-psychology was for the purpose of settling the dispute between functionalism and structuralism.
If I had to pick something that I didn’t really find interesting it would be the part towards the beginning of the chapter where it talked about the first American Psychology textbook and the part on the modern universities. This just wasn’t very interesting to be because I am not very interested in how the universities developed and changed and I have never been too interested in the textbooks that people right because by now most of that information has changed. I mean I think it is interesting to learn how many books someone wrote in their lifetime, but not so much what they books or journals were for.
I think reading about how some were influenced by Darwin is a really big thing to remember. I think it is important to remember that Darwin set off a chain of reaction in people’s minds and that this chapter shows how he affected some of the people like William James theories about consciousness. People were now going from what we can do with our brains to how our brains may help us adapt or evolve. This chapter builds off the last by going into the next step chronologically.
Also in this chapter it throws in how these people relate to Darwin or how he affected them in some way. This is just going into the next step of the time line showing how people are proving and disproving others.
One thing that I would like to learn more about is the maze studies done with other animals besides rats. I would also like to know how much maze studies are used today or if they kind of died out after everyone was doing them around Small’s time. I never really thought about using mazes on other types of larger animals so that is what I am interested in learning more about.
When reading this chapter an idea that kept coming up in my mind was that I found myself being placed in these women’s shoes. I mean it had to of been so hard to be judged just for your gender for all of those year. Yes they did have some people on their side which definitely helped I think. I think that if I was in their situation and didn’t have anyone on my side then I would give up rather easily, but if you just had one or two males helping and supporting you then it can make all the difference in how you are viewed and it can give you hope. I think that I would have tried very hard to become an educated woman back them because I don’t think I would have been content with being a stay at home mother.
William James, Consciousness, conscious, personal, constantly changing, sensibly continuous, selective, active, Darwin, evolve, mazes, evolution, Sir John Lubbock, Darwinian, Willard Small, E.L. Thorndike, rats-in-mazes, adapt, organism, sensory and mental process, Mary Whiton Calkins, psychologist, self-psychology, functionalism, structuralism, American psychology, modern universities
Chapter6
The first section that I found interesting in Chapter 6 was the section about education for women and minorities. Education was not something that was equal for all sectors of social classes. It was most available for middle and upper class white males. Women and minority groups faced large barriers when it came to getting an education. Women faced what was called the “women sphere” which was an integrated set of concepts that centered on the idea of women as wife and mother. In the 19th century women were only seen for purposes of creating and caring for the family. Women who wanted to pursue a high education or career were discouraged to do so, the book even points out that it was believed at one time that if you pursued an education beyond high school, you are putting yourself at risk for adverse medical conditions. Another widespread belief was that women were intellectually inferior to men. The periodic function was a belief that women were intellectually incapacitated during their menstrual cycle, another widespread belief. In the second half of the 19th century, women were finally able to enroll in universities, although they tended to be enrolled into programs that suited women. But they were being trained to meet the need for teachers. In 1865, the first ever exclusively women college was created, making a college education very available and possible for women. Although women were facing very difficult barriers to gaining an education, minorities were having an even more difficult time, especially after the Civil War. The slavery era created a widespread belief that the African American race were overall an inferior race. Discrimination against all races, including African Americans, were discouraged to get an education, in fear that the idea of freedom would be put into their heads. Furthermore, segregation in schools and society made the idea of an education among African Americans almost impossible. For those African Americans that were privlidged and gained a higher education, the job market and jobs were very bleak. Francis Sumner was one of those lucky African Americans who gained a higher education and made a very good living for himself. He gained his bachelors degree in 1915 in psychology and went back and taught in Lincoln. Sumner’s opportunities were limited to teaching at black colleges he began and remained the psychology department chair at Howard College, until his untimely death. The explosive growth of higher education at the end of the 19th century, accompanied by willingness to experiment new ideas and methods, made universities an amazing place for creation of novel approaches to old problems.
The second section I found interesting was the one about creating American Psychology’s most famous textbook. William James signed a contract with Henry Holt for what he called a “manual” of psychology to be written in a year. After some bartering, James got Holt to agree to two years. The book seemed to come to life but required a total of twelve years to be completed, making its appearance on shelves in 1890. The book contained 1400 pages and broken down into two volumes. Soon after publication, James agreed to write a more condensed version. James coined a term called “introspective observation” meaning careful self-observation, a n internal investigation and reflection on the states of consciousness that characterize one’s mental health. He soon recognized the problem with this method, seeing that it would be biased. Nonetheless he believed that careful self-reflection was essential to gain insight into the workings of the human mind. In addition to introspective and experimental bias, James listed “comparative method as the third approach. This involved learning about mental life by comparing normal human consciousness with that of other living things and animals. These chapters included consciousness, habit, and emotion.
The third section I found interesting was the section on Hall and Psychoanalysis. Hall wrote a book called “Adolescence”, which had a 50 page chapter entitled “adolescent love”, and Hall offered a course at Clark entitled “the psychology of sex”, and consistent with his ideas on education, he believed in the natural expression of sexual behavior. This attitude raised eyebrows among Hall’s colleagues. Hall’s preoccupation with sex, combined with the interested in abnormal behavior, drew Hall immediately to Freud’s theories.
There really wasn’t a section in this chapter that I didn’t find interesting. I thought that the introduction of all these people that I had never heard of was really interesting. It was cool reading about all of them and how the contributed to early 19th century psychology. The thing that I think will be useful to the history of psychology was the section on how women and minorities were not given the ability to get a good education until the late 19th century. It was interesting and prominent because women and minorities gave us a much better insight into psychology. This chapter relates to the other chapters in the way that we have already considered the philosophical and scientific contexts out of which modern psychology has been developed, its early origins in Germany, and the far-reaching ideals of Darwin, it was now time to gain an understanding of the development of psychology in the U.S. in the 19th century. Especially around the time of the Civil War, and an insight into America’s first major psychologist William James. I thought that the excuses that people made for women to not get a high education after high school were interesting and a bit strange. But then I remembered that we still make an excuse like that today saying that a Liberal Arts degree is a “MRS” degree. So I think in some way, a few of those ideals are still in action today, obviously not to that extreme but somewhat to that degree.
While reading this chapter the ideas that kept coming to mind were mainly about my ancestors. As a women and a minority women at that I know the thought of how hard it would have been to be portrayed in that manner. I know that my great grandmother had to deal with this issue which is why she had very little education.
Terminology: William James, Darwin, psychologist, modern psychology, Freud’s theories, Hall, Psychoanalysis, Henry Holt, introspective and experimental bias, comparative method, self-reflection, introspective observation, American Psychology, women sphere, Francis Sumner
While reading this chapter I found William James view on consciousness to be interesting. He didn't like that other would analyze consciousness into its elements. He argued that consciousness was always changing, selective, continuous, and active. He also argued that it allows people to adapt to new environments quickly. In order for consciousness to solve problems we form habits, that way we also don't have to think about the other every day stuff. We just do it. I found this true and interesting because our consciousness is always changing it is more difficult to analyze and at that time how would they know if they were analyzing consciousness correctly. We do things without even thinking about it. Some things are just habit. It makes things less stressful and easier because humans already have so much to worry about.
Mary Whiton Calkins was the first woman to become president of the American Psychological Association. I found her interesting because she was a woman in the field of psychology, which at the time was a rarity. I also found her interesting because although she was a woman she still managed to contribute to psychology. Although she couldn't be a student at Harvard she still came up with paired associate learning. She also found that frequency was the most important in strengthening associations. Her biggest contribution was self psychology, the idea that consciousness was personal.
Another part of this chapter I found interesting was Halls child study movement and the theory of recapitulation. I found this interesting because when I think of child development, abnormality, and sexuality I usually think of Freud. Learning about other theories and thoughts on development is always a bit refreshing. The theory of recapitulation is the belief that the development of the individual organism is a mirror of the evolution of the species.
This chapter relates to the others in that psychology is just not starting to develop, it still discusses the philosophical aspects of psychology as well. This information contributed to the history of psychology because more programs were developed at different universities, consciousness was being looked at more in depth and women were finally starting to come into the picture. I am interested in leaning more about other women psychologist from this era, Christine Ladd-Franklin and Margaret Washburn.
Terms: William James, Consciousness, Habit, Mary Whiton Calkins, American Psychological Association, Psychology, Paired Associate Learning, Frequency, Association, Self Psychology, Hall, Child Study Movement, Theory of Recapitulation, Child Development, Abnormality, Sexuality, Christine Ladd-Franklin, Margaret Washburn
Chapter 6
The first section I found interesting in chapter six was Education for Women and minorities. Being a female I have always been interested in learning about how we evolved as a gender and it is interesting to hear about all of the oppression we faced. It is very interesting to me that with all of the racism during the civil war American's still treated white females the same as black people. Also it is crazy to hear all of the conspiracy theories regarding women being educated harming their reproductive organs. A few things I learned in this section that I didn't know before were about the periodic function: the belief that women were intellectually incapacitated every month during menstruation. Also there was a connection from chapter 5 in this section having to do with Darwin's variability hypothesis which showed that individuals each differ from each other and this provides material for natural selection. People believed that with this men had a greater degree of variability than women on many different traits including intelligence. While reading this chapter I just kept laughing to myself with all of the ridiculous ideas people had about women, it is so frustrating just reading about it I can’t imagine how they felt living back then.
One other thing in this same section of the chapter that I found interesting was all of the comparative experiments that were done. In 1895 a man named Bache compared reaction times of whites, blacks, and Native Americans and found that whites had the slowest times. Instead of following the Galtonian idea that reaction time was related to mental quickness/intelligence he created a completely new idea saying that whites were a higher human form because they were reflective while blacks/Native American's showed immaturity and intellectual backward impulsiveness. The next experiment done by Stetson compared white and black children's ability to memorize poetry, and what he found was that they showed no difference in this ability. Rather than publishing that straightforward outcome he came up with the notion that memorization was a useless test of intelligence.
The last subject I found interesting was on Christine Ladd-Franklin. I was moved by her because of her strong will to become educated and have equal opportunities. When I read that she accepted her doctorate degree at the age of seventy nine years old I was shocked. Christine loved math but she also did a study in psychology on visual perception, binocular vision, and she developed a theory of color vision that was grounded in evolutionary theory. She studied with Muller and Helmholtz in Europe and she wrote to Titchener and eventually he gave in and allowed her to present her work at an Experimentalist meeting. I liked reading about Christine because she was a go getter and never gave up on her dreams.
One section that I found kind of uninteresting in this chapter was the introduction to the chapter about America's first textbook and the modern university. I prefer to read about people's lives and their research not about the organization of textbooks and how higher education came into being. I know that this information is important and needs to be touched on, it just wasn't that interesting and it was a lot of dates, names, and places so I just kind of skimmed over it.
I think that this chapter relates to other chapters because it is slowly working its way deeper and chronologically more forward in time with the history of psychology. It expands on Darwin’s ideas in the section about women, we see how William James' theory on consciousness was affected by it, people are starting to look more at the adaptation of our brains, we are still looking at the philosophical backings behind certain aspects of psychology, and lastly we are learning about its beginning in America in other chapters we learned about universities in Germany and how it was first founded but now we see its expansion into America.
One topic that I would like to learn more about is maze studies. The book gave a brief description about a few examples mostly about rats and these were very interesting. They drew the conclusion that the kinesthetic sense was most critical for rats finding their way through mazes, and with this they found that blind rats figured out mazes just as well as sight-seeing rats. I find this whole concept interesting and I would like to see the mental processes behind it and learn about maze studies done with other animals and possibly even humans. Also I while reading through this study I kept trying to think about all of the different reasons to one would want to do a maze study and a few ideas I came up with were first what the book mentioned, home recognition, but a few more would be which senses affect direction the most, which mental processes are all involved, memorization, problem solving and the brain, there could be endless reasons for this.
I think the most important aspect of this chapter is to see how psychology has evolved over time. From Europe to America, from men to women, and also in general it is important to learn about the individual work done by each of the important psychologists because their findings will probably be enhanced by other psychologists as we read more into the book.
Terms: periodic function, Darwin, variability hypothesis, Bache, Galtonian, Stetson, Christine Ladd-Franklin, visual perception, Muller, Helmholtz, Titchener, William James, mazes.
Chapter 6
The first thing that I found to be interesting in chapter 6 was the discussion about the educational opportunities for both women and minorities during the nineteenth century and even into the twentieth. It is no surprise that woman and minorities were not welcomed into universities and that they were viewed as inferior to white men. However, what I found interesting was the way that educated white men used their intelligence and social ranking to almost deceive the public into believing in their superiority. For instance, in the book, our author said that a medical professor at Harvard recommended women to stop pursuing their education after puberty for too mental activity at that stage could “retard the development of their reproductive organs.” Clearly, there was not substantial evidence for that, for it is not true. Nonetheless, the public readily believed his claims because of his social eminence. As for minorities, many researchers of that time were bias in their readings of results, especially if the results showed minorities in a more favorable way than whites. This made me think of today’s times and I wondered if there is anything that we are being told by professionals that is not all that true, but rather a result of their biased opinions.
Secondly, I found the story of William James to be interesting. It was very intriguing that, no matter the amplitude of his influence on modern psychology, he did not want to be called a psychologist. This made me realize how far psychology has come since the nineteenth century, for it must not have been seen very satisfactory if such a paramount leader in academia refused to be labeled as a leader in psychology. James’ accomplishments impressed me (how could they not) but I even more so appreciated the part of the book that discussed James’ longstanding battle with depression and his battle with the belief in free will. Here, I wondered if there was any correlation between intellectual ability and suicidal ideation. The book went on to say that James’ did eventually reach salvation, although he did experience a few droughts of sadness for the remaining of his life. His salvation was reached after he discovered Charles Renouvier, a French evolutionary philosopher. Renouvier addressed free will saying that it is not an illusion and that the first act of free will should be to believe in free will. As these words helped William James, they also helped me. Also, I found the nicknames of The James and The Jimmy to refer to James’ textbooks to be very impressive. I cannot think of any current textbook that is that well known.
Lastly, I found the section about James’ influence and fascination with spiritualism to be interesting. I consider myself a very spiritual person and I too believe that my education in the field of psychology can help me answer some of life’s spiritual questions. James believed that psychologists, given their expertise of the human mind, could be very useful in the research of spiritual phenomenon. The book described spiritualists has people who “believed that consciousness survived death and that those who died could be contacted by mediums. “ While I believe that spirituality and psychology can go hand in hand, I do not believe in things such as psychics, like James did. However, I did think it was interesting that James did not necessarily believe or not believe in psychics, he simply did not want to rule them out for he believed that if they could be proven valid, they could be very useful. This was an example of James’ pragmatism- that the values of ideas are judged by their usefulness.
I found the section about Stanley Hall to be least interesting. I understand his importance to the new psychology by founding laboratories and journals and creating the American Psychological Association, I just found this section to be rather boring while reading. I did think however, that his tie to the catholic community caused him to contribute very little research to his many areas of interest such as adolescence, aging, and psychoanalysis. And it was rejuvenating to learn that he did not have his first real job until the age of 40—there is still hope for me!
This chapter will be helpful in my understanding of the history of psychology for many reasons. First, I enjoyed the discussion of psychology’s many American pioneers and how they came to be. Knowing their roots and their differing belief systems made it easier for me to picture them in their work and to conceptualize why they were interested in such things. Also, the last few pages of the chapter that discussed Calkins, Ladd-Franklin, and Washburn (women pioneers) was helpful to me because it gave me a story to follow and “watch”, outlining how psychology became de-gendered, building itself up to today’s times where men and women professional work together. Lastly, this chapter discussed that some psychologists were “lab rats” who loved doing experimental research in the laboratories while other psychologists relied heavily on reflective introspection and non-lab work. This made it easier for me to recognize the tendency to favor quantitative research over qualitative.
It would be nearly impossible to read and understand chapter 6 without reading the previous chapters for chapter 6 incorporates many earlier terms that we have encountered. The American pioneers of psychology knew what they did about psychology mostly from the influence of Germany and Great Britain. Until the nineteenth century, psychology was a faculty psychology reflecting the idea that the mind had many different attributes such as intelligence, humor, judgment, etc. Because of the influence of faculty psychology, many of the first textbooks written had sub categories, addressing the main faculties of the mind, as agreed upon in the nineteenth century (intellect, senses, and free will). This influence is still seen today in our many different specialized areas of psychology such as cognitive, abnormal, developmental, social, etc...
After reading chapter 6, I would like to learn more about depression and how/if it is correlated to high intellect. I would also like to look up more information about different women psychologists of that time and when the universities stopped being identified as either “all boys” or “all girls.”
Terms used: women and minorities, William James, new psychology, free will, pragmatism, G. Stanley Hall, psychic, psychoanalysis, facultative psychology, Calkins, Ladd-Franklin, Washburn, reflective introspection, quantitative research
After reading chapter six, there were a few things that I thought were fairly interesting. The first topic I found interesting was the section on William James. James had many contributions to psychology, and he also accomplished many things in his life time. He was a very well educated individual, he was homeschooled for the first few years of his schooling, and he also attended Harvard. He was the first person ever to write a psychology text book. He did so by having his notes all organized and then published. He also pegged alot of psychology terms and ideologies. One being introspection. Introspection is the idea of careful self observation, it was an examination and reflection on states of consciousness that characterize ones mental life. He is also known for his studies on conscousness and emotion. The next topic I found interesting was section on Mary Whiton Calkins. I found this intersting because she was the first female ever to get a degree in psychology. She had to fight hard to earn this degree, especially since it was so frowned upon for girls in that day in age to get a degree. They were expected to be house wives and home makers. When she attended seminars at Harvard she couldn't be labeled a student, she was labeled an "unofficial guest." She was also named the first woman president of the American Psychological Association, and also the first women to be elected president of the American Philosophical Association. I admire her determination and will to get her education. She was a very determined and strong lady. The third topic I found interesting was after the Civil War everyone wanted to further their education. Secondary education became increasingly popular after the warn ended and the number of individuals enrolled in college increased dramatically.
The things from this chapter that I believe will be most useful in understanding psychology would probably be knowing about G. Stanley Hall, Francis Sumner, and William James. They contributed ALOT to psychology and their work should be known about. I think this chapter relates to the last chapter because we're getting more indepth into the history of psychology, and how it became an area of study in the United States. We're learning more about contributors from the U.S. and not all over the world, mainly Europe. I would like to learn more about Francis Sumner, I think that him being the first African American to graduate with a Ph.D in psychology is a huge honor, and also a big milestone for our country, and psychology.
Terms: William James, G.Stanley Hall, Francis Sumner, Mary WHiton Calkins, Introspection, Emotion, Harvard
The first interesting topic in chapter 6 was Education for Women and Minorities; an equal opportunity for education was not available for everyone. Middle and upper class white males dominated the educational fields. Women and other minorities were often left out. Many men believed the theory of women’s sphere, which is the idea that a woman’s role is to be a wife and mother. Women were discouraged from receiving an education. Even one Harvard medical professor tried to say receiving an education was bad for women’s health! From the beginning of time, men have made women believe they were “intellectually inferior.” Periodic function was a term used to explain a woman’s menstrual cycle, in which men viewed as a handicap. This was the so called intellectual difference between a man and a woman. According to the evolutionary theory of variability hypothesis, females are, “Individual members of a species differed from each other,” a variation that was thought to be a part of natural selection. This hypothesis suggested that “men had a greater degree of variability than women,” meaning they thought males were more intelligent than females. It wasn’t until later in the 19th century that a woman could attend certain universities. Matthew Vassar would help women by establishing Vassar College, where women could attend and further expand their potential and dreams. He understood how we all come “from the same intellectual constitution as man, has the same right as man to intellectual culture and development.” From establishing these colleges, women could now flourish and be inspired to one day become important psychologists.
The second interesting topic was about G. Stanly Hall, according to our text he “professionalized psychology,” and he was responsible for the founding of laboratories and journals. He was also the founder of the American Psychological Association which helped his professional status. Hall was a huge influence on psychology, especially with interests in studying aging from childhood, through adolescence, and into the older adult years. He understood the importance of applying psychology to education. I found it interesting that Hall was credited for introducing Americans to Freud and psychoanalysis. Hall even taught a course entitled “The Psychology of Sex,” he was interested in sexual and abnormal behavior. Another interest for Hall was evolution; this led him to genetic psychology where he studied the development and evolution of the human mind through comparative, abnormal, and developmental psychology. His interests with comparative psychology inspired him to research rats-in-maze which was used for laboratory experiments. Recapitulation was also an interesting concept about the theory of how the beginning stage of life resembles a fish, “evolutionary history where the human species had aquatic ancestors.” Hall argued how psychological development reflects evolution, and with his psychological methods of research, “Hall developed as international reputation,” he was respected by many around the world.
The third interesting topic was about Mary Whiton Calkins, challenging the male monopoly. I found it interesting that even with all of the gender discrimination women faced during that time; Calkins was able to put a crack in the glass ceiling. She had an interest in philosophy and psychology. Some universities like Harvard and Clark only invited her as a guest; they wouldn’t offer her a fellowship. However, Edmund Stanford invited her into his laboratory at Wellesley. There Calkins did experimental studies about the strength of association and how it is influenced by certain factors such as, frequency, recency, vividness, and primacy. She wanted to get past “ordinary self-observation” and go further in-depth with research. Calkins came up with paired- associate learning, a method of studying the stimulus-response by relating color patches with a number. It was also important to her in learning how the consciousness helps individuals adapt to their environment. In 1995, she was the first female to be elected as president of the American Psychological Association. Mary Calkins found a way to break through the gender gap and inspired many other women of her generation.
Chapter 6 relates to previous chapters by talking about how the study of psychology evolved from Europe, and continued to influence a new generation of Americans in the United States. To me the most useful thing to understand about this chapter was the women who pioneered their way through a male dominated profession. Through the years women have been able to establish themselves as being just as intellectually equal as men.
It would be interesting to learn more about Francis Sumner, he had to overcome racism and defy the odds in order to receive a higher education. He attended the first black college and studied “race psychology” at Clark University. In 1920, Sumner was the first African-American to complete a Ph. D in psychology.
Terms: G. Stanly Hall, Mary Calkins, Francis Sumner, periodic function, variability hypothesis, women’s sphere, genetic psychology, paired-associate learning
Chapter 6
The first thing I found to be very interesting was the section on Hall and Freud's theory of psychoanalysis. I understand that when these theories were first brought forth, they probably did not receive to must praise. I think it would of been hard for people to accept the things that psychoanalysis included. Among these thing was unconscious thought. I bet that people were not to fond when they were told that they were not completely and consciously in control of all their thoughts and behaviors. Hall's attitudes on the topic were not met with great admiration. He even stated that, "the natural expression of sexual behavior should not be inhibited." Not a great way to get everyone on your side. However, he eventually got Freud to come to the U.S. and lecture on these theories. These talks that Freud gave were very important to this field. The Clark Conference was instrumental in raising awareness and acceptance of these theories.
I found the idea's of self psychology to be very interesting as well. Calkins believed that all consciousness contains an element of the self. At the time their was a debate on which way to head in new psychology. Either the functionalist way or the structuralism. Self psychology aimed to try and bring the two schools of thought closer and highlight their similarities. This would help in getting psychologists to work together for the greater good. She wanted psychology to be the study of mental life. This broad definition would allow for different schools of thought to be compared and contrasted and eventually help us in understanding psychology of human behavior.
I also found the field of genetic psychology to be equally as interesting. This area focused more on the areas of evolution and development. This could be important because it tells us where and how we evolved. It could also aid in trying to figure out where we are going in the future and how we might evolve. These psychologists had to be very excited about the theory of evolution and ways that they could study the brain and how it has evolved. The theory of evolution pretty much created the field of genetic psychology which can be very important in our future.
This chapter is very helpful because, like others, it explains to us where all of these ideas of fields of psychology came from. They did not sprout up out of thin air. They were thought out and many of them developed off of other theories. It is important to know how different field of psychology can intertwine and give us a better understanding on certain questions. In that way, it built on the last chapters. You can almost see how one theory lead to another, and how that theory led to another field or area of study in psychology.
I would really like to know more about the field of self psychology. I think it played an important role in getting everyone on the same page even though their research may of been a little different. It is important to remember how each area of study can be associated with the next. All psychologists should somewhat be on the same page in order to adequately move forward and obtain more knowledge. This is what I kept finding myself thinking about. We should not get in a competition or try to discredit each other in our findings. Instead, we should work together because all experiments can tell us something more about psychology.
terms: self psychology, Calkins, Hall, genetic psychology, evolution, Freud, psychoanalysis, Clark convention, development, evolve
The first thing in chapter 6 that I found interesting and actually laughable was the section on women and minorities. Specifically the section about women and education was particularly interesting. Being a woman, I always knew that we had to really fight for our rights and are still fighting to be seen as equals to men. However, I had no idea where women came into the picture of psychology. I also found it extremely interesting and laughable that society used to believe that women were handicapped one week per month due to the "periodic function." I understand how people who had heard the Creation Story and the story of Adam and Eve could believe that women were made from man and thus would literally believe that they created us and were therefore superior, but how did this idea of a "periodic function" of a handicap come about? It's ridiculous. Another thing that was interesting from this section was that of the women's sphere which came from the Creation Story. This was something I had never heard of before and was interested to learn more about how it delayed the process of women in academia.
Something else that I found interesting was the story of William James. I actually found his whole life to be very fascinating. He grew up with a father who had a very liberal idea of how to raise his children and really let them learns what they wanted when they wanted to learn it. I really thought this was interesting since we don't hear much about families of that time raising their kids in that way. Also, myself being an art major as well as a psychology major, took a liking to his delight in art right after reading the section. Although he lost his artistic interests, he still maintained a great career after attending Harvard University. I real found it interesting that he completed medical school without begin pushed by his father, which seems to be quite the trend with famous scientists of this time. William James will certainly stick in my mind as the writer of the most famous psychology textbook after teaching the first psychology coarse he'd ever taken. That whole experience must have been nauseating and intense.
Another thing that I found interesting was the life of Mary Calkins. The most interesting thing about her to me is how she developed a career in a field dominated by men. I understand that nearly all fields of the time were dominated by men, however, this one I'm sure was equally or more difficult to break into seeing as it was not even yet a fully recognized field. The fact alone that she was allowed to develop a course in psychology was so interesting and really makes me think about how she planned on planning it, seeing as it was so new. However, it's rather upsetting to hear that both Harvard University and Clark University would only recognize her as an "unofficial guest." Although the certain respecting professors of the universities were very helpful and inviting. I really find her interesting because of her pioneering in the field and her ability to receive a doctoral degree even after the obstacles of the universities, I'm sure, gave her doubts.
Something that I found rather uninteresting was the section on spiritualization. Although I liked reading about William James a lot, i was kind of disappointed when I found out that he was interested in Spiritualization. After reading the section the idea of it sounded ridiculous. It might be because I'm a pretty devout Catholic, but believing that consciousness survived death and could be contacted by mediums seems stupid, and then to attempt to perform research on something that is that crazy just blows my mind. I'd like to read his research about this however, mostly just to more fully understand how crazy this theory is and how they could possibly attempt research on the subject.
The most important thing in this chapter I think is the overall importance of realizing the sexist and racist breakthroughs of the time. People that weren't white and middle to upper class really weren't allowed to do the things they should have been able to do. Yet, they accomplished so much throughout the years and will continue to do so. I think keeping these people in mind and honoring and remembering their struggle and sacrifice for their fields of study is a very important thing to keep in mind and will probably be the thing that most students take away after reading this chapter of the book.
This chapter is a continuation of chapter five. Chapter five is a discussion about early contributions to psychology, although it didn't go very far into the first known psychologists. This chapter is really another chapter built on telling about the lives and contributions of people involved in the field of psychology. The only difference between the chapter is the people that it is describing and the field that they elected to be in initially.
I would really like to learn more about Mary Calkins. I think the book did a very good job of summarizing her contributions to psychology and how she was able to attain these opportunities of contribution. However, I would like to know more about her life growing up and how she got to be in the position she attained. Also I would like to read more about her studies and how they have influenced modern psychology.
I had a lot of thought while reading this chapter, most that revolved around the ideas of being a woman during this time period. I wonder how my interest in psychology would be influenced or if I would even have an inert seeing as how new of a field it was.
Words: Periodic function, women's sphere, Mary Calkins, William James, Spiritualization, cognitive psychology
The first thing I found interesting and always due when I read, is the education of and for women. When it came to women looking to get educated they faced what was known as the “women’s sphere”, a set of concepts that centered their lives around the role of being a wife and mother; getting married and raising children, a typical outlook for the 19th century. One of the first things that came about was that further education beyond high school was bad for the female health and that it retarded the reproductive organs. Which was then stung along to effecting the population and its chances of reproducing for the human species. So women were left with two options; either marry and forget about education or not marry and pursue an education, but not both. Even with those two to choice from they were burdened with yet another responsibility, taking care of their elderly parents. To hinder them even further, and I think this is kind of creative, society took into account their menstruation period. Saying they were intellectually incapacitated for so long a period a month, and in my opinion the females thought pattern does changes slightly when this period occurs, so they called this the periodic function. A religious aspect was thought up as well, saying that no matter what women did they would always be inferior intellectually due to the fact that they were made from a man’s rib. Building upon the last chapter they “men” put Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory to work in order to further their reasoning of superiority. Calling it the variability hypothesis the fact that men have a greater degree of variability for natural selection, giving them more traits and the one of focus was intelligence.
The next thing I found interesting was the education of minorities. The conditions for them were even worse off than women, with more limitation and the approach of the Civil War called for even more pressure. Due to African-Americans position during this time (slavery) the white held the position as being superior to blacks. This foreshadowed a biased on research results when it came time to see who was more intelligent. When I read about the study done by Bache and reaction time I couldn’t believe how they managed to twist the results to still fit their beliefs. Saying that the faster reaction time from the blacks and Natives was the result of a more primitive reaction and the slower reaction from the whites was that of a reflective mental process. Even though reaction time was related (at that time) to mental quickness, so changing the meaning of the results allowed whites to maintain that higher form of being. It was done yet again in 1897 with five hundred white and black kids in the study of memory, showing a clear and strongly held prejudices view in the scientific field. The results of these biases reflected in African-American education, with fewer opportunities and an inferior education. During the war this was even more so, especially in the south with the passing of the black codes which kept black away from any formal education and the thought of freedom in their heads.
The last thing of interest was the lack of education once women and blacks did enter college. For women when or if they were admitted it was to land grant universities. Even then they were only enrolled in programs that suited their role, economics. It wasn’t until the growing demand for teacher arose that they were trained as teachers, teachers to train others at normal schools. It wasn’t till 1865 that women were given a college of their own known as Vassar College donated to them by Matthew Vassar, a man ahead of his time. For blacks once again it was worse. Few colleges offered a psychology curriculum, and of those that did few lab courses were offered. Offering only those in introductory psychology, education, child, social, and adolescent psychology areas that blacks lacked a background in’ in order to pursue a degree. Even for those that did have the potential to further their degree ran into yet more problems, in the south they were denied admission and those in the north that did accept them could not afford to stay away from home. The same happened for them as for the women, once they obtained a degree they were turned toward a teaching job, teaching other blacks.
The thing I found least interesting was that all the reading focused mostly on William James, and I started to doze off while reading about him. It seemed the material just kept dragging on, also the chapter itself was just so long and dry. There was no variation or switch up between famous people. Although I found the reading on James to be uninteresting, I do believe it is important and useful to know the founder of American psychology; a great benefactor to understanding the history. The one thing I saw and stated earlier that built off the last chapter was how psychologist used the methods from those before them to prove a study, but in the process ignored the results of those same methods and changed them to match their outcome. Some ideas that crossed my mind when I read this chapter were of how could, no matter how white they were, psychologist bias research and ignore the results. Stating what they want to be true rather then what was actually true?
Terms: women’s sphere, periodic function, Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory, variability hypothesis, Bache, black codes, land grant universities, normal schools, Vassar College, Matthew Vassar, William James
Overall I really enjoyed chapter six. I found learning about the history of American Psychology to more interesting than any of the previous chapters.
One thing I found most interesting was the Morrill Land Grant Act of 1862. The Morrill Land Act was a act giving government land to each state with one jurisdiction, that the state must build an university within five years of the land being grated to the state. I found this most interesting due to the fact that this act produced the "great state universities" and makes me wonder when and if these schools would have been founded without this act. It also makes me wonder which Iowa school was founded under this act.
The second thing I found most interesting in this chapter was the struggle women faced and endured during these years. I never really connected the women's rights struggles to the history of psychology. I found the "women's sphere" to be quite interesting. The "women's sphere" is an integrated set of concepts that is centered on the idea that women are meant to be a wife and mother. During this time period, women (and men) were socialized to believe that women's roles were marriage, child baring, and to later become a mother. Along side of this, many thought women should choose between being a mother and having a career. However, women were discouraged to have a career because hold a higher degree would have adverse medical consequences on women's reproductive organs. Society also taught that women were superior to men because in biblical times women were formed from the rib of a man. Many also believed the concept of periodic function, that women were intellectually incapacitated every month during menstruation. I found this idea the most amusing, and wonder if this came about due to the emotional effects menstruation has on women's attitudes. This section also connects the previous chapter of Darwin's idea of natural selection through the idea of the variability hypothesis. This hypothesis is formed around the idea that some individuals were selected to differing and have higher significance than others, which takes the idea that men have a higher degree of variability than women on a number of traits, including intelligence. I found this part interesting because it includes the idea of natural selection, although natural selection discusses these significant traits being passed down to their offspring. If that's true, wouldn't that mean these intellectual traits would be passed down to either a male or female offspring?
The third thing I found interesting was the section on Mary Whiton Calkins. I found her struggle to obtain advanced training to be quite interesting, and her will power to overcome these difficulties shows her persistence. I found Calkins's study on paired-assocation learning to be the most interesting part of her section. Her study of associating colors and numbers reminded me a lot of Ebbinghaus's study using nonsense syllables and wasn't surprised when this connection was later discussed.
There wasn't a lot I found to be uninteresting during this chapter. I found learning about the advances in American Psychology to be fully interesting. However, I found the section on William James to be the least interesting thing I read during this section. Although he was the first to write a psychology book, the rest of the section was boring because I didn't find any of his works to be interesting or extraordinary.
This chapter is useful in understanding the history of psychology because you need to understand the growth and progress of psychology. If there was no explanation of the history in Europe, the history in America would not make sense. The chapter helps so the advances psychology is making and the expansion of psychology from Europe across the ocean to America. This goes into to how this chapter builds on previous chapters. If there had not been any chapters previous to chapter six, the reader may have thought psychology began with William James writing this book or Mary Calkins's working in laboratories. Also, the reader may not have understood Calkins's studies if they had not first read about Ebbinghaus's studies including nonsense syllables.
When reading this chapter, the one thing I would really like to learn more about is the Morrill Land Grant Act of 1862. I would find it very interesting to see what schools were founded under this act, especially the most popular state schools in the United States.
When reading this chapter, I really wondered what would have happened in the women's sphere and women's equality barrier had not existed. It makes me wonder if there had been more women psychologists or other important historical figures during this time. The idea came to mind that due to this barrier, women really did have to fight for education and makes me questions if I would have fought for education like these women or if I would have just stepped aside and gone with societies idea of what women should be doing, being a wife and mother.
Terms Used: Morrill Land Grant Act of 1862, women's sphere, periodic function, Darwin, natural selection, variability hypothesis, Mary Whiton Calkins, paired-association learning, Ebbinghaus, nonsense syllables, William James,
The first thing I found to be interesting was faculties; which states that the mind has an independent existence in reality and is composed of various innate powers. Which stem two categories, intellectual and active faculties the thing that I found interesting about this section was that overseas Franz Josef Gall actually borrowed the concept to develop the doctrine known as phrenology, so in a sense these two terms; faculty psychology and phrenology, contributed to the development and understanding of one another. Looking at the big picture of faculty psychology I thought it was very interesting that along with Scottish realism, these two categories really boosted Americas education, not to mention that Harvard was founded in 1636; this is something I did not know.
A small section that I found to be interesting was that on Modern University’s, we read about Wissenschaft philosophy and the programs that they offered in chapter four, but I never really understood what that meant for American psychology, around this time in America, I’d say between 1890-1910, the number of high school graduates drastically increased which meant more people would be eligible for a college degree. This led to the need of people or essentially teachers with a higher education than BA. This type of education wasn’t set up yet in America, so those students who wanted a higher education had to travel to Germany to obtain that education and then come back to America to teach it. I just found this interesting on how these events took place and eventually led to higher establishments of education.
A person I found to be particularly interesting was Mary Whiten Calkins, who just so happened to be a female challenging the male monopoly. Considering Mary didn’t fall into the ‘womans sphere’, and she also didn’t fall mentally ill from becoming educated; I thought that she was an interesting woman of her era. She faced difficulties in furthering her education, such as graduate school and if she could find someplace to attend she was an ‘unofficial guest’; which meant that she wasn’t wanted there and everyone around her would make her feel unwanted, for the most part. Calkins came up with one of the most historically used ideas and that’s paired-associate learning. In my mind, I can’t help but wonder what if she had just given up after college and said well I have an education I might as well start my family since I can’t further educate myself.
Something I necessarily didn’t find less interesting, but confusing was William James, I get where his contributions are huge to psychology, I mean he was Americas first psychologist after all, but in the same sense I just didn’t feel like he really enjoyed what he was doing. He was very intelligent and contributed majorly but I felt like he desired to be doing something different with his time, it’s almost as if he just got bored with knowledge.
This chapter is slowly starting to form a circle between Europe and America, to me anyways. Reading about William James, who was blessed with a very wealthy family, which allowed him to travel and study anything of his own desire. James traveled Europe on my occasions and even having encounters with Wundt, Berlin, Reymond, which I feel like helped him in his studies and helped him take into consideration what other scientists of that time had founded.
This chapter builds off of the previous chapters in the sense that this chapter wouldn’t exist without the prior chapters. Obviously that’s a broad statement, but the field of psychology evolved over seas and was brought to America. Without people like Darwin, Mill, Wundt, etc. there wouldn’t be the information that there is today. The book even quotes that American psychology is described as the off spring of the New Psychology that was created in Germany.
I would like to learn more about Francis Sumner, being that he was the first African-American to receive his doctorates in psychology; I remind you that is a doctorates in the year of 1920 is astonishing to me. Not to include that during that time race was a huge issue obviously, and that he was limited on what he could do with that doctorates given that he was a colored man; and on top of that he wasn’t given certain benefits that a white professor or doctoral would receive. Which to me just points out that someone in his position would really have to pursue that career choice because they absolutely loved what they were doing and contributing.
What ideas did you have while reading the chapter?
One idea I had while reading this chapter came during the education for woman and minorities section, one particular part referring to the minorities of African-Americans or Native Americans and a study done by Bache in which he studied the reaction times of whites, African-Americans, and Native Americans and founded that White people actually had the slowest reaction time; and another study done by Stetson in which he found that the ability to memorize poetry between a sample of White or African children- in which there was no difference. This is a perfect example of someone with power and a found intelligence having the right to do well, and simply not. These findings could have influenced the minds of so many people in the aspect that no person just because of their skin color is superior or inferior. Instead the researcher opted not to turn around the data collected to make it still seem as if the findings placed white people in a superior position. I understand that given the time frame and social acceptances of this era who says I wouldn’t have done the same thing; I probably would have. But on the same hand it’s the fact that these researchers are even considering that, once again during this era, African Americans can even be compared intellectually to white Americans; could possibly say something for what they subconsciously believe and eventually helped other people step up and fight for equal rights.
Terms: Faculties, intellectual and active faculties, innate powers, phrenology, Darwin, mill, Wundt, new psychology, modern university, Wissenschaft philosophy, Francis Sumner, William James, Mary Calkins, Male Monopoly, Womans Sphere, paired-associate learning
I thought that chapter 6 was interesting to read about. I feel that it is starting to become easier to read about mainly because the book is venturing into a reasonable time frame. Everything that I am reading about now is stuff that I have learned about in some of my other psychology classes. I think that it is interesting to read about stuff I have already learned about because it is like a review, and at the same time I am learning more detail about the topics. There were three things that I did like about the chapter. One of them was the modern psychology section of the chapter. The differences between men and women. Also the oppurtunities that women had during the early part of the century. Another thing that I enjoyed reading about was the life of William James. He was very influencal to psychology and I liked reading about him in this chapter. The last thing that I found interesting about this chapter was Hall. From what I read I believe him to be very influencal to psychology. One thing that I did not like about the chapter was other pioneers section of the chapter. I think I liked reading about Hall so much that these guys were not as interesing to read about. I will also go on to talk about what I thought was the most important thing to psychology, what tpic I would like to learn more about, and finally some thoughts that I had while reading.
The section that I found most interesing was the modern university section of the chapter. I liked reading about how men and women were treated differently, and the obsured ways that men were thought to be superior that women. Also, the lack of oppurtunites that african americans had when trying to get into college. The reason that the modern university came about was the growing popularity in education to become successful in the world. More kids were going to high school and therefore more people were going to college. This meant that more teachers had to have higher education. Graduate programs became a bigger neccessity. More univeristies were built to suit the growing mass of people. One of the main ways that universities were built was because of rich men that founded the building process. Their names are forever assocaited with the repsected universities. I thought this was intersting because while I knew that some universities were named after famous people, I did not know that it dated back so far. One of the most famous ones that the book talked about was John Hopkins university. Like I talked about before women were not given the same oppurtunities as men when tryig to attend college. There were plenty of excuses that men came up with to show that they were superior to women. One of the best examples that the book used was that women were made from a mans rib as stated in the bible. Another one that the book mentioned was the periodic function. This was the time that women had their periods and were not able to be as smart during this time. I thought this was hilarious becasue clearly this had nothing to do with the measure of ones intelligence. The man that really opened the metaphorical door of oppurtunity was Matthew Vassar. He opened a all womens college called Vassar college. After that college had opened many others did as well, and women quickly became able to attend college. African Americans were in the same position as women when it came to attending college. Just like women they were looked at as not ont he same intelligence level as white males. One of the examples that the boook used was the reflex test that they performed on whites, native americans, and african americans. African americans and native americans had faster reflexes that whites did, so they were thought of as to be more "primitive", and therefore less intelligent. Some colleges began to open up for african americans, but most were far away from home and proved to be to costly to attend. One of the most important african american gradutate students was Francis Clark. He went to attend college and graduated with a B.A. and then went to graduate school. Most african americans that did graduate from college went to teach at black high schools, and were limited with resources and pay, but made the best of the oppurtunity.
William James was also very intersting to read about. He was very influencial to psychology, William James was one of three children. He had a very strict father that basically forced education on his children in a liberal way. This included taking his children to Europe and making them learn another language. James did not attend public school until he was 10. After High school he attended Lawrenece science school of Harvard. After graduating from there he went to Harvard Medical school. During his time there he became suicidal. James then took a psychology course that his chemistry teacher reccommended. He Alice Gibbens who helped him write his first psychology book called The principles of psychology. Some of the main methology of his first book included introspection which is the careful self-observation, an examination and reflection on the states of consciousness that characterizes mental health. The main methodology was consciousness. Habit and emotion were two important counterparts in consciousness. The James-Lange theory of emotion is the most popular theory that James had. It states that perception of some emotion arousing event then subjective experience of emotion then bodily reaction. Bascially saying that bodily changes that are emotions are felt immediately upon the perception of an emotion arousing stimulus, prior to the awareness of a cognitively recognizable emotion. Another thing that I found interesting while reading about James was his ideal on spiritualism. James believed that the spirt lived on, and that these spirits could be contacted through mediums. I thought this was interesting because it goes against most scientific theory.
The last thing that I found interesting about this chapter was Stanley Hall. The part of Halls life that I found most interesting was his influence in developmental psycholgy. I like this feild of psychology, so I found it intersting to read about his influence. Hall was very important to psychology because he created the american psychology association. Hall was the first to do studies on children at Johns Hopkins Univeristy. His research paper "The contents of childrens minds" was reaseach his compiled on city children and country raised children. THe study showed that children raised in the country were smarter that children raised in the city. I found this interesting because my first conclusion was that children in the city would have better accessabilty to education. Like we talk about in class, Hall, did not like the education system. Hall believed that the education system was to rigid. He believed that the classroom should be more permissive, nad pertain to childrens natural curiosity. I thought this was interesting to read baout because Hall had been to so many prestigous institution and grew up in the academic system, so I thought he would favor it. His main theory in devlopmental psychology was the recapitulation theory. Basically this stated that an organisms stages in development, from the cell to a fully formed individual can be seen as a recapitulation of the evolution of the species. Hall thought that while in the first stages of perganany a child looked like a fish becasue that represented our years when we were a fish species in evolution. I like developmental psychology, and I enjoyed reading about this section.
The part of the chapter that I did not find to be interesting was the last part of the chapter. It was about other people that were important to psychology. I did not enjoy reading about these people mainly becasue they were not as relevant as Hall and James. Ladd and Baldwin were pioneers for ther time, but James and Hall are the ones that will be most famous. They will be talked about more intext books, and frankly are more relevant. I understand the importance on Ladd and Bladwin, but they did not do as much, so I found they to be less intersting to read about.
The thing that I found to be the most important to psychology is the foundin of the college university. I think this is he case becasue so many importnat people to psychology attended these famous universities. The great minds of psychology came up with all of their theories and experiments in these instituitins. Also I believe that the universities provided a environment were intellects could further their education. It seems obviuos, but I do not think that they could have came up with some of their theories if there were not universities.
The part of the chapter that I would like to learn more about would be Stanley Hall. I thought that he was a big influence to psychology in the developmetal field, and also creating the american psyhology association. Hall was aslo infliencial in psychoanalytics. I did not talk about this when I was talking about Hall mainly because the developmental section was more intersting to me, but it is something that I would like to reaserch more about on the next assignment.
This chapter build off the last chapters becasue we are seeing psychology to branch off into different areas. Psychologists from the present are using the ideas of the past psychologists and expanding on their ideas. You can see this in James theory of spiritualism. In the last chapter we read about Darwin and his theory of evolution. In this chapter James stated his theory of spirtualism which is a possible because of Darwin. Like anything else there is also another side to a theory. People are always going to question others, so James believed that there is this higher power and spirits of a person do exsist which Darwin would never admit because it went agaisnt his theory.
Terms: Modern University, Education for women and minorites, Johns Hopkins, Lawrence college of science, Harvard medical school, periodic function, Francis Clark, William James, introspection, methodology, priciples of psychology, Consciousness, Habit, Emotion, James-Lange theory of emotion, Stanley Hall, APA, recapitulation, Developmental psychology, psychoanalysis, Ladd, Baldwin
Chapter six was a quick read for me, and I thought it was interesting. When thinking of the three most interesting areas of the chapter I would choose the portion on William James and his faculty psychology, James’s metaphoric idea of mind, and the last portion about the influence of women in psychology. This chapter overall had great information on each person, this made it hard for me to choose what aspect I liked most. The first part of the chapter explained the Scottish movement on realism ( Faculty psychology.) This is my first exposure to this theory and I was surprised that I did not know anything about it. From what I understand it is the view on human thinking about reality and the mind having its own existence that is consistent. The chapter starts with the idea of reality and many historical people and how they would view reality. This is interesting to me, but I guess I do not really understand it. I think in discussion I would be able to grasp it more. I would like to learn more in this area of division of faculty for intellectual and active mind. Overall I would like to learn more on the faculty of psychology view. It would be useful to understand this to understand psychology as a whole, but I have a feeling it is another area that has no right answer. I also found that William James was a very interesting individual. He really hit on most areas of psychology and developed the idea for what we have today for several fields of psychology. Although, the whole time he does not want himself to be called a psychologist. I found this very weird, but somewhat humble. He calls himself not a psychologist, yet he publishes a manual on psychology. The chapter then moves on to the ides of introspection. James develops a foundation for understanding consciousness. On thing I remember thinking about a lot on from the text was his statement about how there is always a sense of self within consciousness. This made me think deep in a non-cheesy way. If you think about it everything on your surface is a modification of your true thought via subconsciousness. There is self within it, but it is a modification. He makes multiple metaphors in this part of the text comparing drawings to our consciousness. I found this to be a very non-science thought, and it was refreshing. He was an artistic person who was continuously criticized, but always persisted. He is by far more interesting than an entire chapter on Darwin. The final area that was interesting to me was at the end. They include an area about women testing the psychological boundaries. I found it interesting that the author names four women, yet only goes on about two. Mary Whiton Calkins has the most descriptive paragraph. Yet most is about her life, not her development in psych. I found it funny that she was found to be “out-spoken”. maybe that is why we know the most about her. This made me think about the guidelines for that word, out spoken, is it on a smaller scale for women than men. I guess it just annoys me about how the author ends the chapter with this point and yet it is so weak. I want to learn more about the women named in this chapter. I understand they obviously did not discover as much as the men in the book, but perhaps they would have given the opportunity. The finding that I found least interesting was the section on Francis Summer. He did not discover anything and his studies were not that big of a deal. I would have much preferred a section on one of the women, or a larger portion about Hall’s study on recapoltulantion theory or the area of self psychology from Calkins. I understand that he is the first black man that is somewhat reportable in history, but it was weak. This chapter built on other chapters by being the first step to spread the knowledge of psychology. Many of the previous chapters were about study and collecting data, this is the first chapter to talk about publications, classes, and organizations such as the APA.
Key Terms: Faculty psychology, William James, introspection, Mary Calkins, Francis Summer, recapitlatlation theory, self psychology,
RB
The first thing that I found interesting in chapter 6 is William James’ ideas about consciousness. Consciousness is a term that is frequently used in my psychology classes and it is something I have always found very fascinating. However, James did not find consciousness as intriguing as I do. In fact, he saw the construction of forming the “mind” to be a meaningless and artificial exercise. I was mostly interested in the idea that consciousness is constantly changing and that no two states of consciousness are ever quite the same (once a state has disappeared, there will never be another one like it). I also found it interesting that James discovered that consciousness is “sensibly continuous”. Consciousness is apparently continued on and on in a stream and even when interrupted, will come right back to the same stream of consciousness. This is a crazy idea to me.
The next item that I found interesting was James’ idea of emotion. Normally we are taught that the sequence of emotion goes: 1) emotion-arousing event (i.e. getting into a car crash) 2) subjective experience of the emotion (i.e. fear) and 3) bodily reaction (i.e. heart pounding, and shaking). What James says however is that bodily changes (emotions) are felt immediately upon the stimulus. James says that our heart pounds before we feel fearful. This idea that we do not even control our actions to the emotions is a very interesting concept. Even more interesting, is that this involves each and every emotion to have its own bodily reaction in correspondence.
The third thing that I found interesting in this chapter is Stanley Hall’s ideas about adolescence. Hall has zero interest in children but had much interest in adolescents. He is the person most responsible for identifying adolescence as a specific stage within development. He even went as far as to describe this stage as one of “storm and stress”. At first I thought this was really funny, but after thinking about it, I find some truth. Hall then went on to explain all of the stages of development in a human life and called it recapitulation.
I honestly thought the most boring part of this chapter was the beginning background about psychology and the information about the universities. I understand that it is important to understand where all this information is coming from and the history behind the science. But, I can’t help but want to doze off while reading it. I am much more interested in the content and theories than the background history.
This whole chapter was pretty beneficial in understanding the history of psychology. Each chapter builds upon one another and goes into more depth about the evolution of psychology as a whole and with individual theorists. Darwin’s theories played a large role in this chapter too. He really kind of was the start to psychological theories about consciousness and behaviors. It is cool to see how one man and one idea can stray off and develop into tons of other ideas and theories. Each chapter connects to one another in this aspect. Theorists are constantly building upon ideas and concepts and are proving and disproving them all of the time.
One idea that I would like to learn more about is the concept of mazes used in experiments. I would like to know if any other specie besides rats are used or have been used. I think it is an interesting way to study behaviors and thought processes. While I would not want to be the one put in the maze, I think it would be cool to watch humans as well as a variety of animals work through different courses.
Terms used:
William James, Stanley Hall, Charles Darwin, consciousness, behavior, psychologist, developmental stages, adolescence, stimulus, species, mazes, experiments,
The first thing that I found interesting after reading chapter 6 would have to have been the belief that women were intellectually inferior to men. They called this period of the month the periodic function and was a handicap that could be related to biblical stories of women’s creation compared to that of men. This in turn kept women down from expanding on their education and having men take their ideas seriously. I found this interesting because it tends to come up on a regular basis in history as a means to keep women held back from doing activities. An example of this other than the book would have to have been when menstruation was known as a sickness in the early 1900’s and women were given things like cocaine to make them calm down and basically not yell at everyone.
The second thing that I found interesting about this chapter would have to have been how different races were defined as superior or inferior on what seemed like the worst theory of all time. The theory that this was being based on was the Galtonian idea that reaction time and being quick was related to intelligence levels in those people. After they had tested all races it came back that whites had the slowest reaction time out of all of the races, therefore we would assume least intelligent. The problem I feel with this was the people in power at the time were all white males and therefore the outcomes of experiments were going to reflect better on them no matter what the results were, it seemed pretty optimistic. So, the people decided that due to our slow reaction time it would mean that whites were reflective and therefore a higher human form, the blacks and Native Americans on the other hand were swifter in their times because they were more primitive in their impulsive reactions and therefore showed an immature and intellectually backward impulsiveness. The reason this was interesting to me was because it was just another example of how the people in charge, white males, can make any outcome benefit them and essentially keep them in power to reflect their needs and wants.
The final thing that I found interesting in this chapter would have to have been when the author starts getting into the book “The Principles of Psychology” and starts talking about the books content when it came out and how it was a classic in psychology. The book has a section in it that the author quotes that talks about what exactly psychology is, “the Science of Mental Life, both of its phenomena and their conditions”. What makes this interesting to me is when the author actually has to take the wording and expand on it even more to make it look right to people who are in this modern day and age. The reason this would be interesting is because these people were very smart and had great ideas but we have to constantly expand on them to make them better and better and it never seems like anyone has anything perfectly right. So after reading this I thought it would be interesting to see what 100 years down the road the next people will be saying about how we didn’t quite get it all right in the textbooks that we’re reading currently.
The thing that I didn’t like about this chapter would be just the entire layout of how the chapter moved along. It started out kind of showing how women and minorities weren’t involved in psychology as much and I thought it would expand on that a little bit more but then it went into a whole section on William James and his work he was doing at the time, then back into a little bit more on feminism and minority matters that led us to where we are today. So the reason I guess I didn’t like this is because I like it better when the book chapter sticks to a single topic and doesn’t really bounce around, I guess I just didn’t see why that happened. Other than this I enjoyed the chapter very much.
I think the thing that I come away with from this chapter that will be the most useful in understanding psychology would be the way that women and minorities were viewed in their work. This was an interesting and good thing to know to kind of teach you a lesson that you can’t really judge people by the differences that make us up. It seems like in psychology you would have to keep an open mind to anybody’s work and just kind of hear them out no matter what.
The topic that I would like to learn more about would be testing on people to show how some people were more superior then others. I guess it was just the concepts that made me chuckle on how they were deciding who had a valid opinion and who didn’t. This also reminded me of a few examples ranging from when people were sent back from Ellis Island to people being judged on the shape of their head and different bumps. The idea that I had about this chapter was still about how people knew results from studies such as the reaction time test being related to intelligence but still made up their own way to interpret the results to benefit them. This then spurred the idea of how people in the past could interpret other languages that were doing experiments and research and kind of put in there what they did and didn’t want, so this would be interesting to learn what was left out of some major research projects.
Terms: periodic function, women, education, men, superior, inferior, theory, Galtonian, reaction time, intelligence levels, immature, impulsiveness, “The Principles of Psychology”, psychology, phenomena, conditions, William James, research projects.
I find it interesting that William James is yet another famous successful person who happened to be raised in a wealthy family, which strengthens my beliefs about rich people having a huge advantage when it comes to opportunities for success.
I think that James really hurt psychology with introspection, because we now know that this is an extremely biased method of research. It also severely limits the extent to which you can study a person, because if you want to at least attempt to offset the biases, you can not be researching anything that the test subject has strong feelings about, or your results would be majorly biased. However, perhaps the only way that we learned that was by having James show us why it wasn't such a good idea.
I didn't really like the "women and minorities" section because I feel like that's an obligatory section that's only in there to be politically correct. We already know that work outside the home was dominated by men in this time period.
However, what I did not know and found very interesting was the thing about the "women's sphere"...that it was believed that education was poor for a woman's health, and that it reduced a woman's fertility. I really wonder how much of psychology was made up of people trying to justify the status quo as opposed to trying to find the truth based on scientific observation. I think that they did this for the same reason that Spencer coined the term "social darwinism." It wasn't anything based on science...it was only to justify capitalism and why it's okay that some people have millions of dollars while others starve to death. If he had based his "theory" on observation, he would have found the concept of altruism, which discredits him.
I really liked the "close up" on maze learning. A maze is such a versatile apparatus that can test so many things...it's a-maze-ing! (I'm so cheesy!)
There are other forms of apparatus like the skinner box that appear throughout history in a range of studies. Having a good versatile apparatus is essential to conducting research. The apparatus also can sometimes inspire a researcher to think of new experiments to conduct.
Terms:
William James, Introspection, Psychology, Biased, Women's Sphere, Social Darwinism, Justify, Altruism, Maze, Apparatus, Skinner Box
Chapter six was interesting because it is beginning to talk about more modern historically important events that had large roles in the development of psychology. I thought a lot of things were interesting. The first thing I thought was interesting in this chapter was the section about education for women and minorities. Obviously we all know that women and minorities were not given the same opportunities as white males, but it is not often that we hear about the details of the breakthroughs. The "women's sphere" is a set of entrenched beliefs that women are wives and mothers. This was a common theme in history. I thought it was odd that a Harvard medical professor believed that women should not pursue education after puberty because it could inhibit their reproductive organs. This theory is just ridiculous. I wonder if he actually believed it to be true or if he was just trying to make up reasons for women to stay out of college. I always find it interesting when it is brought up that women were thought of as intellectually inferior to men. I do not understand what evidence could have possibly led to this thought process. It wasn't until the beginning of women only colleges that women were given a fair chance of gaining a quality college education.
The next thing I found interesting was the struggles that minorities went through to gain a college education. It surprising how prejudices could even impact scientific research on intellectual capabilities. The study the book gives is interesting because a researcher collected data and made the data reflect the common prejudices. He used quick reflexes of African Americans to say they were more instinctive and primitive, and the slower reactions of whites to say they were more intellectual because they thought before they performed actions. These biases played a huge role in holding back African Americans from higher education opportunities.
The third thing I found interesting was about William James. It is interesting how he did not think of himself as a psychologist, but he was thought of so highly by psychology focused people. It is amazing how someone can be so influencing on the subject of something but not want to be known for the subject they have explained so excellently. James had an interest in science that eventually led him to studying psychological concepts. It was interesting to read about how during James' life he went through times of great depression and even considered suicide. It is interesting how James wrote that psychology was a science of mental life but earlier in the section he wrote that psychology had a long ways to go before it could be a science. I think this section about James was very interesting and I enjoyed reading about him. Before reading this chapter I did not know anything about James or his great contributions to the field of psychology.
I would like to learn more about Hall and developmental psychology, because I think developmental psychology is quite interesting. I would like to learn more about the specific contributions of Hall and how they helped influence the history of developmental psychology.
Terms: prejudice, developmental, bias,
This chapter regarded William James as a very important psychologist in the history of psychology. Naturally I found James’s ideas as fascinating. The first thing that I found interesting was the James-Lange theory of evolution. The way he approached the idea of emotions was very intelligent and should be applied to all scientific findings. James suggested that the sequence of emotions is not perception of an event causing an experience of emotion, which results in a bodily reaction, but the other way around. James suggested that the bodily changes follow directly the perception of the event, and that the experiences we feel actually are the emotions. I think that this kind of thinking is vital to the understanding of any phenomenon. An example of how this could be applied would be “do testosterone levels in humans cause increased aggression, or do acts of aggression cause spikes in testosterone levels?” Scientific thoughts like these are what propels science forward.
The second thing that I liked in this chapter was James’s interpretation of consciousness. The manner in which he describes conscious cleared up the idea for me on a concept that is somewhat difficult to fully comprehend. I liked the words James used to describe consciousness: it is personal; the idea of the consciousness of self and the idea that all thoughts depend on the person experiencing them was very interesting to me. James goes on to say that consciousness is constantly changing, that it is one continuous stream of thought, and that it is selective. I really liked this part because it made me realize how selective the human brain really is in the things that it chooses to focus on.
The third thing that I found interesting in this chapter was just reading about the background of James’s personal and academic life. I loved the fact that he hated traditional research and the experimental method of psychology, as I can relate to that. I loved the term “brass instrument psychology” as it was not only humorous, but showed James’s sense of humor and added to his humanity for me. While reading about him I kept getting the idea that although he was very well educated and knowledgeable, he appeared not to really care about anything. James seemed indifferent about a lot of things, which may be attributed to his depression, but it was still interesting to think about how someone who contributed to a science in so many ways seemed not to care about anything in particular.
One thing that I did not care for was the section on the “other pioneers.” These individuals simply did not interest me and seemed to drag on forever. I feel like one or two examples of these individuals and their studies would have sufficed.
I think the most important concept to take away from this chapter is how psychology was modeled to the American mindset. No specific finding or example could encompass the fact that, although the methods were based on German psychology, they were molded and changed into a American psychology. I think it is important to know that this is where the psychology that we study today here in America officially began.
This chapter builds on the other chapters just in the manner I expected. We have seen psychology slowly develop into a real science. Now that science is spreading throughout the world and adapting to different cultures. I feel like the book is taking a natural progression of the development of the history of psychology in a way that makes sense. I see it almost like the growth and development of a child. At first, there was a wide-eyed hopeful baby filled with questions, amazement, and wonder. The child grows, develops certain characteristics, gets answers to those questions and can start to categorize things in its mind. Later the child is able to think for itself and develop its own questions, and is also able to problem solve and find the answers on its own. Eventually, the child reaches an age when it can think abstractly and develop its own ideas and thoughts that are different from those of its parents. I believe the natural progression is for the field of psychology to grow and become even more defined and divided into many different categories.
The thing that I would like to learn more about is James’s ideas on the consciousness and his other theories related to it. I think he has many interesting ideas.
Terms: William James, James-Lange theory of emotion, consciousness, Consciousness of Self, brass instrument psychology
My first reaction of this chapter was that it was incredibly boring and dragged on forever. I found certain things rather interesting, but there usually wasn’t much information on those things. My lack of interest could have been due to other things in life, but I swear this chapter was very long.
Instead of writing about 3 things that I found interesting, I’m deciding to write about many short things that I was interested in because all of the things I liked were in very short excerpts. So instead of writing about three things, I will be writing about 5 or more.
First thing that I stumbled upon was the fact that the Scottish were the first to really come across the American psychology we know today. This was quite baffling to me because I hadn’t really ever heard about this and thought that the Scottish realists should get more recognition within the history of American psychology. I thought for sure that while taking intro to psychology, I would have come across this but I hadn’t. The Scottish realists are the ones who really came up with the idea that the mind was an active part of the body, rather than a passive part. They also talked about how the brain was responsible for 3 very important things. The brain was thought to be two parts; the intellectual (involving memory, reasoning, and judgment) while the other part was active (emotions and the will). I thought this was a huge step in the right direction and had to have been a great influence on modern American psychology. This is especially a step in the right direction from phrenology.
I was really entertained by looking at how modern universities came to be. It’s great to see that the idea of being educated spread so quickly. I very much like the idea of scholarliness and want to be well educated in my life. While reading this part, I was thinking about how college, back in the late 1800s and early 1900’s was a privilege to go to. This is a huge difference in comparison to college now-a-days where it’s almost expected for someone to go to college in order to be a contributing part of society. It feels like one would be looked down upon for not getting some sort of college degree. I wish it wasn’t like that because people are now in college because they feel like they have to be and less because they want to learn. It really takes away from the point of a university, but there isn’t much you can do about it. I liked that the book gave a look into the early years of formal education of psychology. It’s really nice to see the roots of the field you are pursuing.
I’ve heard a lot about William James, and I knew that he was a very important figure of psychology, but it was also nice for the book to put into context how important he was to the field of psychology. Unfortunately, he is another example of success coming from those with power and money, but that isn’t a discredit from the work that he did. I was unaware of how much Mr. James hated to be associated with psychology. It’s as if it was an insult to be in the field of psychology. If that was the case, it’s a bit understandable because psychology wasn’t really seen as a science on the same level as biology or chemistry at the time. After looking at William James’ life, I really wish that I had the opportunity to pursue many majors so that I could be so widely educated.
Back to talking about universities, I just wanted to add that I found it very interesting how women were not allowed in some universities and how it was rather frowned upon. It was looked down upon so much that people in medical school said that women being educated could affect the intelligence of their children. I believe somewhere in this chapter, there was a quote about women pursuing education past high school were endangering their future offspring. I also liked how some schools paid people to go to school; I wish it was like that now.
I’m very interested in finding out more about the French philosopher Charles Renouvier. His work brought William James out of depression, and I would be interested in seeing what it was exactly that would have caused this. I also just want to be enlightened on the information that he has to bring.
There were many more little tid-bits that I found interesting that I didn’t have the time to write about, but some of them were; habits, consciousness, emotion, and the growth of psychology throughout different colleges.
Terms: Charles Renouvier, William James, Universities, depression, emotions, habits, consciousness, emotion, Scottish Realism, American Psychology,
The first thing I found interesting in chapter 6 was the section on education for women and minorities. It was not surprising to read that the growth in opportunities were not equal for all. This only applied if you were upper or middle class while males—women and minorities excluded. Women were supposed to be wives and mothers only. This Idea was known as the “women’s sphere.” Women who wanted a higher education and wanted a career were often discouraged. There was a Harvard study done that concluded that women who perused higher education after puberty would slow the development of the reproductive organs. Along with this, women were believed to be inferior to men based on biblical beliefs which were known as the periodic function. There was also the variability hypothesis which says men had a greater variability than women in intelligence. Even though women had fewer opportunities, minorities, especially African Americans had it worse. In the beginning on the Civil War, it was widely believed that African Americans were inferior to whites. Even studies were skewed to show that blacks were primitive compared to white superiority. Because of these prejudices, it was hard for African Americans to peruse a higher education and oaten jobs.
Another thing I found interesting was William James. William James was dead set against being considered a psychologist and preferred to be considered a philosopher. James did not consider psychology to be a science but only a hope of a science. Though he didn’t think of himself as a psychologist, many considered him to be one because of his Principles of Psychology. Throughout James’s life he dappled in many sciences. He couldn’t find what suited him best and because of this, James was driven to a point of despair, was depressed and had thoughts of suicide. Later on, James met his wife, Alice Gibbions, and on their honeymoon, started writing The Principles of Psychology.
One of the last things I found interesting was the close up on mazes. Maze experiments reached its peak of popularity from 1920 to 1950. Mazes studies and how they came about are often credited to John Lobbock who used a maze with ants to follow the scent of food or Thorndike who would put chicks in mazes. Rat is maze studies where first conducted by William Small though. Small and his partner Kline wanted to test the rat’s ability to find their home. This began the big push for the maze studies.
There wasn’t anything in this chapter that stuck out to me to be uninteresting. I found the information in this chapter to be relevant and interesting. I thing this chapter has helped me in understanding the history of psychology because it is finally moving a tiny bit away from philosophy and we are seeing the beginning of psychologies acceptance. It is also building on information I have learned in other classes. I would like to learn more about Mary Whiton Clarkins. I more or less skimmed the section about her and I would like to take more time on association. While reading the chapter, I couldn’t get passed how research was skewed in favor of whites because of prejudices.
Mary Whiton Clark, maze, John Lobbock, Thorndike, Kline, William James, Principals of Psychology, women’s sphere, periodic function, variability hypothesis
This chapter was interesting in its discussion of New Psychology and its introduction to America. Early psychology in America was drastically different from what it is today, and the German model influenced its evolution so that it would become what it is today. While this chapter certainly discusses the evolution of the field of psychology at length, it also highlights the evolution of higher-level education in general.
The first thing that interested me in this chapter was the discussion of education for women. While the stereotypes and biases of the past are well known and even linger on into today, the root of their development is sometimes less concrete. For example, a Harvard Medical Professor advocated for the education of men only because he thought that too much intellectual stimulation would hinder the development of reproductive organs in women. This discrimination was furthered by the belief that women were somehow intellectually disabled during menstruation, and this belief came to be known as periodic function. Darwin’s variability hypothesis also fed into the prejudice, since scholars believed that there was a greater variability between the cognitive capacities among men versus women. This meant that men were better adapted, and that the most intelligent men would always be smarter than the most intelligent women. This meant that women were better suited for the home and men were the ones encouraged to attend universities and get degrees. Similarly, discrimination played a very real role for minorities seeking an upper-level education. With slavery in existence, scholars sought to justify their behavior of enslavement with scientific evidence. When this scientific evidence could not be found, they either ignored it or found a way to reinterpret the data to support their views. For example, when Stetson found no difference between the abilities of black and white children in memorizing poetry, he chalked the results up to ‘’memorization not being an indicator of intelligence’’. Few minorities were admitted into schools, and when they were, they had a poor curriculum and few opportunities for advancement. Minorities such as Francis Sumner were seen as exceptional and unusual when they did well.
Another thing that interested me was Mary Calkins’ research on association. She pinpointed a lot of paramount factors included in the process of encoding, storing, and retrieving information, including: frequency, recency, vividness, and primacy. Although she did not come up with the term, the finding of pared-associated learning is attributed to Calkins. I found this interesting because her scientific findings, as well as her eagerness to study psychology (despite the prejudice she encountered) was ahead of her time.
The thing I liked least about this chapter was how prevalent “names and dates” were. I know we are told that we are free to write about whatever interests us, but it seems like this chapter was so laden with these psychologists’
What shocked me the most about this chapter is how scientists of the past have been so self-serving. It really irks me that anyone bearing the title “scientist” would either misrepresent or reinterpret their data only to support their preconceived notions. This goes against everything science stands for. This also relates to past chapters: while in the past, I have been more willing to take a historicist point of view when reading this book, I have a much harder time with this chapter. Perhaps it is because the discrimination runs so firmly against everything I believe that I am unwilling to put it aside and see where these people. However, this also made me wonder— we see data misinterpreted history books and it makes us sick to our stomachs. But what about that is so appalling? Is it the false (and frankly, sick) hypotheses they are trying to support? Or is it the unethical practice of science? More than likely, it is a combination of these two factors that is problematic. At the same time, I have to wonder how often this still occurs. We hear about researchers skewing their data to support their hypothesis and come up with new “findings” to get published. This is in itself unethical. But what if, like the false findings of Stetson, these publications also have unethical implications?
Terms: New Psychology, periodic function, variability hypothesis, Charles Darwin, Stetson, Francis Sumner, Mary Calkins, Association, frequency, recency, vividness, primacy, paired-associated learning, historicist, presentist.
I am happy that we are getting into the 1900’s. This is much more interesting to me because I feel like this history is somehow closer to our lives. I have a vague idea of what was going on in America and throughout the world at this time, and I feel like I have learned about this time period much more than earlier ones. For this reason, I think it will be easier for me to connect what I am reading with knowledge that I already know.
I found the James-Lange Theory of Emotion to be very interesting. Prior to this theory, it was believed that and event caused and emotion which caused the physiological response to that emotion. James believed that the physiological response is the emotion, that they are one in the same. He also explained that we feel emotions because of the physiological responses of our bodies. If this is true, then chemically or mechanically activating the sympathetic nervous system in the right way should trigger the feeling of the emotion in any individual. I am not sure how likely this is, however, there has been research done that suggests simple actions under voluntary control can produce emotion. For example, smiling when you are not feeling happy can increase the pleasant emotion.
I also thought the section on mazes was really interesting. It is such a common tool in psychology research that I think many take it for granted. It surprised me that the researchers involved thought of the idea basing it off of a real hedge maze made for human enjoyment. It never occurred to me that researchers would not have simply created their own mazes first. It was concluded that kinesthetic sense is most important for rats learning a maze by comparing blind rats to seeing rats. I wondered if there had been experiments done where the rats’ kinesthetic sense was taken away, perhaps by cutting the posterior roots of the spinal cord as Francois Magendie did on puppies. In chapter 3 we learned that Magendie discovered that the posterior roots controlled sensation, therefore, a rat whose posterior root has been damaged would not be able to feel or experience kinesthetic sense. It would be interesting to see how a rat described above would compare to healthy rats or blind rats. This section also made me wonder, if you closed off all of the paths except for the right path the first time the rat entered the maze, would the rat then be able to go through the maze with all paths open right to the end?
I thought Hall’s research on child development and the child’s mind was also interesting. He found that children who grew up in the country knew considerable more upon entering school than those who lived in the city. From this he concluded that growing up in the country was only natural and the only way to experience a full and intelligent life, while the city was unnatural and therefore these kids were missing something. Of course we know today there must have been some other factor such as socioeconomic status, the amount of time children spent with their parents, or the amount of knowledge parents perceived children to be able to handle. It is amazing how much research Hall began in psychology, although it seems he did not, himself, make many big and correct discoveries.
I did not enjoy reading about the history of education, the education of women, or the education of other minorities. I found this all to be very dry.
This chapter builds on all of the other chapters by expanding information given previously. The other chapters have given me a base of information to further question and wonder about the information in this chapter.
I would like to learn more about experiments done with mazes or the current theory of emotion held by most psychologists.
Were Christine Ladd-Franklin and George Trumball Ladd related/of the same family line?
Terms: William James, James-Lange theory of emotion, physiological response, maze, kinesthetic sense, posterior roots, Francois Magendie, G. Stanley Hall, child development
I personally really enjoyed reading about the women psychologists, like Mary Whiton Calkins. I felt bad that her schools considered her an “unofficial guest.” However, I’m glad she endured things like this in order to open doors for more women. If men believed women were incompetent to psychology then, she probably aided in the slow process of changing their minds. Furthermore, I enjoyed reading about her theories on paired-associate learning. By reading through her study process and results, one can tell how intelligent she really was. Her method of study was genius. It also amazed me that it was not until 1992 that Madigan and O’Hara discovered some of Calkin’s research would become a large object of study fifty years later. I didn’t understand why her school would not consider her official even after completing her whole dissertation as well as her Ph.D. It was ridiculous that even after other men appealed her unofficial degree, Harvard would still not award it to her! It is obvious from this reading and previous readings, that many male psychology professors were way ahead of their time when it came to not discriminating against women in the professional world (and many were not). I thought it was funny that she turned down a Ph.D. offered to her by Radcliffe College as a kind of “slap in the face” to Harvard. I’ll bet that when she did that, Calkins realized she would never be getting the actual degree; she stuck to her guns and I respect her for that. She was a very brilliant woman and I’m sorry that she was born into a time that did not accept her as a woman psychologist, even though she was a genius.
Christine Ladd-Franklin was another woman from the chapter whom I have respect for since she, like Calkins, had to endure being “unofficial,” yet kept on and got an education. However, she received a degree, unlike Calkins, but not until the age of seventy-nine. I liked reading about how outspoken she was, and I wonder if I would have been if I lived during that time period. My views now are pretty liberal, but I’m not sure what they would have been back then. Franklin is famous for challenging the Experimentalists, saying she was, “shocked to know that you are still—at this year—excluding women from your meeting of experimental psychologists. It is such a very old fashioned standpoint.” I loved this quote.
I thought it was crazy that Titchener, the same man who led the Experimentalists and whom Franklin challenged, allowed women into his laboratory. Furthermore, Margarent Floy Washburn received her Ph.D. under Titchener, and was his first student to do so. Washburn was also the first woman to earn a doctorate in psychology. Her studies were also published in Wundt’s journal and were not even performed at the Leipzig laboratory. She also published many works, like The Animal Mind, that psychologists still draw inspiration from today.
I did not personally enjoy reading about the creation of The Principles of Psychology; I am not very interested in the subject of writing or writing of textbooks. It would honestly not be something that I would enjoy doing. Although I know this book is very important, it was also very boring to read about. I would really like to learn more about woman psychologists of this time like Mary Whiton Calkins. The feminist movement has always been something that has fascinated, as well as the fact that women were discriminated against by our society as a whole at one time. However, I can only be glad that it has changed and have a greater appreciation for my opportunity to attend college as well as receive a degree.
Terms: psychologists, Mary Whiton Calkins, psychology, theories, paired-associate learning, study process, results, method, research, Experimentalists, Christine Ladd-Franklin, Margaret Floy Washburn, The Principles of Psychology
The first thing I found interesting was the section on women and education. I didn't realize before reading this chapter just how sexist the culture at this time was with the idea of the women's sphere. The belief that too much mental activity after puberty could harm the development of the reproductive organs seems crazy to me. As someone who is educated, I would ask to see the proof of this before I would believe it. I'm not sure whether men actually believed this, or if this was just a measure to keep women in their place.
I believe there is still the belief that a woman should take care of her family, no matter what. My aunt is the only girl in her family and she is expected to be the person who looks after her parents, even though all her brothers live closer to her parents than she does. This is the kind of thinking that everyone held at this time.
Scientists at this time also believed in the periodic function. This says that women are not as smart as men. Even the smartest woman is not as smart as the smartest man. When women were admitted to college, it was for home economics classes, or to be teachers.
This section interested me because it shows what women have overcome. We have now had a woman secretary of state, women on the supreme court, and women go to space. I still think there is a long way to go, however. We have not had a woman president, and there are still people who believe that women belong at home, or that they aren't able to do things as well as men. I'm proud of how far women have come, especially given the obstacles that were put in their way.
The second part of the chapter I was interested in was the section on G. Stanley Hall's life. Hall did not come from a wealthy family. He was able to attend college, but was unable to afford the cost it would take to go to Europe to further his education. Because of this he joined the church. This way the church would pay for him to go to school and to even study in Europe. While he was away, he realized he did not want to join the church, and married a woman in Germany. When he came back to the United States he had a hard time finding a job as a teacher. Because of this he would give lectures whenever he was asked. One of these lectures got him noticed by a university, and he was finally awarded a full time teaching position at the age of forty.
I liked this section because Hall did not have the typical life of the people we read about. He did not come from a rich, prestigious family. He had to work for what he had, and was unemployed for a good part of his life. His dedication won out, however, and he was eventually recognized for his talent. This shows that no matter where you come from, you can achieve your goals. All you need is a strong work ethic.
The last section I liked was the one about the creation of maze learning. Willard Small was the person who's research started the use of mazes for rats and other small animals. Small and his research partner, Linus Kline, were discussing their study with their lab director, when he came up with the idea of using mazes.
I found this part interesting because I had taken it for granted that we used mazes for rats and other animals. I never thought about the fact that there must have been a time before this was used, or that someone came up with this idea. This is such an integral part of science today, and I can't image what we would have done without it.
One section I did not find interesting was the part on American Psychology's first textbook. This was created by Thomas Upham. He put together notes from his lectures and turned them into a book. It was first published in 1827 under the title, Elements of Intellectual Philosophy. It quickly became the main text used by universities and colleges. In this book there were three main parts: the intellect, the sensibilities, and the will.
I did not find this interesting because it was never something I wondered about. If you think reading a textbook is boring, try reading a textbook on creating a textbook. While I agree it is important that we developed our own books, it just doesn't interest me. I would rather learn about experiments or something along those lines.
This chapter builds on the previous chapters because we are now learning about psychology and its start in America. Before, it was something that was mainly practiced in Europe, or not considered a real science. In this chapter, people are starting to take psychology seriously.
I would like to learn more about the struggles women faced in education at this time. I know we started to have a couple women psychologists, but the majority are men. I want to know more about how women were able to break out of their gender roles and become scientists as well.
women's sphere, periodic function, G. Stanley Hall, maze learning, Willard Small, Linus Kline, Thomas Upham, elements of intellectual philosophy, the intellect, the sensibilities, the will
I was most interested in the work of Mary Calkins at Harvard, all done in an unofficial capacity. It occurred to me that Harvard was so male-dominated an institution that it refused to acknowledge a brilliant female researcher in their midst. Even with the arguments of her professors like William James and Hugo Munsterberg, Harvard would not award her a Ph.D. when she had clearly earned one. Calkins then refused the “female version” of a Harvard Ph.D. when it was offered as being from Radcliffe. Ultimately, she never received the hard copy of a Ph.D. although she knew she did have one, and all of that because of her gender. I thought it was interesting that she was also interested in self psychology.
William James was a advocate for Calkins, although his advocacy did not get Harvard to issue the Ph.D. certification to Calkins. He did influence her ideas about self psychology and he also was a believer in using repetition to ingrain habits and learning. I thought that much of his work was crucial to educational psychology because his ideas are still in use today. James was more of a philosopher and he did not like the hands on experimentation of the lab, and that may have held him back (although he was very successful without being a researcher). However, I do believe that he could have been much more effective if he had put his theories to test, and if they were disproved then he could have modified some of those theories. I would have liked to have seen what his modification on emotion and physiology might have looked like.
Christine Ladd-Franklin also caught my interest because she also earned a Ph.D. unofficially but was not awarded it upon completion She did receive the official document from Johns Hopkins before she died. At least Johns Hopkins righted the wrong by awarding the degree, unlike Harvard (I suppose Harvard felt that they had vindicated themselves by offering Calkins the Ph.D. from its women’s institution, although I would have to disagree). Anyway, Ladd-Franklin seemed to me to be n instrument of change for women’s causes by successfully pressuring Edward Titchener to allow her to speak at one of his boys’ club meetings (the Experimentalists). I found it interesting that men who seemed so sure of their own superiority would have felt so threatened by the research of a woman.
I am beginning to wonder if I am more interested in the philosophical side of psychology, because every time I have to read about someone’s research findings I doze off or become distracted. That is what happened when I had to read the data on paired-associate learning, and I am wondering if I am the only one in the class who is bored by the data. I love reading about the results and how the research can be applied, but the statistics are so boring. I realize that statistics are the only tangible proof of the theory, but I still could fall asleep reading that mess.
I am going to take the feminist approach at this time and say that the most useful thing to the history of psychology in this chapter is finding out what was probably omitted due to women being ignored or excluded from participating. History is not only what we read about, but it is also what we do not have the opportunity to learn about. The take away from this chapter is that I may have to research more history in order to know all of the made by women or minorities during the time of all of these psychological breakthroughs. The things we read about are usually what were agreed to by the establishment, but there is so much more we are not learning.
This chapter moves us from things that were happening in Germany and other European nations and makes it more relevant to what was happening in our nation. We had the Civil War and women’s rights, colleges were being established, and it becomes clear that this nation was undergoing rapid changes trying to establish itself as the intellectual equivalent to other powerful nations. Graduates began earning doctorates here in the United States, and the colleges started importing intellectual instructors from other nations. Colleges and universities were being established with different levels of social standing – white males, African Americans, and women’s institutions.
I was most interested in William James and his approach to psychological introspection as a way of controlling one’s self. I read that he had gone into a depressive state, but not much mention of what he did to get out of that depression. James may have developed his theory concerning self controls as he worked himself out of depression. As an intellectual he may have used his own mind as a case study, and he may have found a purpose in figuring out the causes of depression and suicidal thoughts which may have been what led to his own psychological recovery.
James’ own self-control of his moods made me think of Dr. John Forbes Nash and the movie A Beautiful Mind. Dr. Nash has struggled throughout his adult life with delusions due to paranoid schizophrenia, but he still managed to become a world-renowned mathematician and economist. At the end of the movie, Dr. Nash is still having his hallucinations, but he has made a determination to know them for what they are - delusions. In that way, Dr. Nash was controlling his mental illness by controlling his reactions to the delusions. As I read about Dr. William James’ ideas on self-control and the formation of habits, it makes me think of Dr. Nash. It makes me wonder if Dr. Nash had known about James’ theories of habit and control and so put those ideas to work, or (because Dr. Nash is brilliant) he thought of it himself.
Terminology:
Mary Calkins, Harvard, William James, Hugo Munsterberg, Radcliffe, Christine Ladd-Franklin, Johns Hopkins, Edward Titchener, statistics, feminist, introspection, paranoid schizophrenia, Dr. John Forbes Nash
After reading this chapter I found three things interesting. The first thing I found interesting was the education for women and minorities. I am in a minority group relations class right now so we have been talking a lot about women and minorities. Even though women are equal now we still get paid less than men. I liked hearing about the ideas people had about how women weren’t as equal as men. It is crazy some of the things they came up with. The second thing I found interesting was William James and how he didn’t like being called a psychologist. He thought that psychology had a long way before it could be called a science. It was “no science…..only the hope of a science” (James 1892) I find it interesting that he didn’t want to call it psychology because I feel like that would have helped psychology’s advancement. I also found is past interesting. He had an unusual upbringing. The last thing I found interesting was the first psychology textbook. There are so many textbooks today so I find it interesting to learn about the first one written in the subject of psychology. I like how it was broken up into different categories like intellect, sensibilities, and will. I also found it interesting that it wasn’t even called a psychology textbook. The thing I found least interesting was the breakdown of The Principles of Psychology. I feel like it went into too much depth. I feel like it’s good to learn about this book but it didn’t need to get into so much depth.
I feel that the most useful thing in this chapter is the history of the universities that teach psychology. That is important to know the history of our universities that teach us about psychology. This chapter builds on the last chapter because in the last chapter we learned about Darwin and then we learned about how they teach about Darwin in the universities. I would like to learn more about the minorities and women in education of psychology. As a social work major I am interested in minorities. I was thinking about the program here at UNI and our psychology program. I was comparing it to what I read. I think that we have a good program here.
Terms: Darwin, Principles of Psychology, William James
1a) The Women’s Sphere
1b) This is interesting to me because of all of the excuses that continued to come about as to why women should not get an education. The fact that they were using the families and the maintaining of the families as one of the biggest excuses, when it was just that; an excuse. When they brought up that if a women becomes too educated it would affect her reproductive organs therefore making her infertile and unable to bare children. Finally the fact that during their menstrual cycle they were basically unable to retain anything that they were taught because of their menstrual cycle. All of these excuses were used to try and convince people that it was not a good idea for women to gain knowledge and were even more encouraged to stop attending school in their teenage years. It is the fact that people would use just about anything to convince people of this time that women were not worthy of an education but should remain the caregivers instead is what peaked my interest because you look at schools now and it seems that there are more women in college and pursuing degrees than men.
2a) Hall and psychoanalysis
2b) I found this interesting because well first he was able to get Freud over to America for Freud’s first and only trip to America. The second was the fact that Hall appeared to be obsessed with the idea of sex relating to psychology and it being and explanation for why people do what they do, this being why Hall was able to bring Freud to lecture. After bringing Freud over though these ideas what Hall had thought and believed so much were changed and questioned by himself because he realized how complex Freud’s ideas of psychoanalysis actually were. It was interesting to find out that someone who seemed to be as obsessed with sexuality as Freud would begin questioning things all of his ideas after learning the real extent of Freud’s theories.
3a) Self-psychology
3b) I found this interesting because it was a new way of thinking of things. Everyone before described consciousness as something that occurs when one is awake and helps them to make decisions as well as function. No one before ever really went into the idea that consciousness is one’s self. While a person is conscious their own personality and opinions become apparent whether those personalities and opinions of personalities were negative or positive it didn’t make a difference, it was the fact that it was one’s own self choice that made it who they were. The idea that the conscious you is what makes your own self real is interesting to me because then it leaves the unconscious or subconscious to be discovered. The conscious is the voice of reason, the Ego in Freud terms according to Calkins. This is a different way of seeing things because Freud didn’t always describe them in these terms. The whole idea of being one’s self while conscious was interesting.
4a) Consciousness in the section about William James
4b) Consciousness is something that is quite complex and the different levels of consciousness are sometimes difficult to understand but how James went about it seemed to be more confusing that it’s just the basics, therefore it lost me a little. I didn’t like how he used the gap in thinking to describe something, I guess I never thought about the tip of the tongue thing, not being able to remember something but his description of what it actually meant didn’t make much sense to me, instead it just seemed like it was something put together without real thought to it. The last part of that section is what made the most sense and that is just that while you are in a state of awake consciousness you are able to make decisions and process things in order to make the best decisions.
5) I believe that the most useful thing from this chapter in regards to psychology was how it developed through this chapter. The fact that women were finally being able to study psychology and go in depth about things such as the women’s sphere were discovered and explained about how small minded people were when it came to change. In bringing in women into the psychology field they were able to learn much more. This chapter was able to get more into the recent day knowledge of psychology and broke down more of what was the main interests of psychologists of that day.
6) This builds on the previous chapters because the previous chapters were more about the outbreak of people thinking outside of the church and the prosecution that they received for thinking differently. This chapter is more about how now people are able to study psychology but there was still a bias against women and minorities. The bias tried to keep people from learning but it didn’t work for forever just like the Church trying to instill fear in those who chose to think differently. It built on the fact that now people are able to explore psychology and in that exploration people were able to break down the complex mind and learn more about the individual.
7a) Women’s Sphere
7b) I think this would be interesting to learn more about because it is such a complex idea that really had no standing. It was something that ignored what was going on in learning and just used a bias thinking to hold women back because people were scared. People were scared of what would happen if a woman was able to understand what was going on around them as well as where they would go with knowledge so they used horrible explanations to try and keep them home. I would be interested to know where they come up with all the different ideas related to the Women’s sphere.
8) While reading I just kept thinking about how women were so held back but them helped to advance the psychology field in the end and how sex and sexual orientation continues to be a constant in psychology, such as Hall’s ideas and Freud.
9) Women’s Sphere, consciousness, Willam Hall, self-psychology, Mary Calkins