Download Systems of Psychology

Systems of Psychology
A. Proto-systems emerge in the middle and late 19th century
B. Influences on American Psychology (British Psychology) ... Early
developments ... 1850-1930
1. Psychophysics
2. Differential Psychology
3. Structuralism
4. Functionalism
5. Gestalt Psychology
6. Behaviorism
C. Developments 1930 -1960
1. Neo-Behaviorism
2. Developmental Psychology
3. Social Psychology
4. Biological Psychology - Neurobehaviorism
D. Recent Developments ... 1960-Present
1. Information Processing
2. Human Factors
3. Cognitive Psychology
4. Neural Networks
E. Central Controversies
1. h 2 ( Malleability)
2. Meaning
3. Associationist vs Holistic Approaches
4. Reductionism
5. “Theory” vs “Prediction”
6. Developmental accounts vs Static accounts
Functionalism
A. Founder : Wm James (Early 20th Century) … virtually all subsequent
developments in N. Amer. Psychology can be traced back in one way or
another to James.
B. Not a coherent “school”. A set of working ideas or hypotheses … as
James would have it! “Pragmatic”
C. Focus on mental activity/events and biology but NOT reductionistic
D. Empirical but not necessarily experimental in the Robt. Sessions
Woodworth sense of that term
E. Concerned with “adaptation” and individual differences
(Darwin/Galton)
F. “Purpositive”
G. Often very “applied”
H. Evolutionary/Developmental
I. Often interested in instinctual behavior (Kantian)
K. Tradition:
1. G. Stanley Hall ... founded lab. at Johns Hopkins/ APA / Pres.
Clark Univ.
2. John Dewey ... (“Chicago School”) ... Moved to Columbia
Univ. ... “learn by doing”
3. James Rowland Angell
4. Harvey Carr
5. James McKeen Cattell (“Columbia School”) ... Psychological
testing
6. Robt. Sessions Woodworth ... study of motivation
Watsonian Behaviorism
A. Morgan’s Canon: “In no case may we interpret an action as the
outcome of the exercise of a higher psychical faculty, if it can be
interpreted as the outcome of the exercise of one which stands lower in
the psychological scale.” However, Morgan supported idea of
“emergent evolution”.
B. Jacques Loeb (Univ. of Chicago) was one of Watson’s professors
who rejected concept of emergent evolution arguing that all animal
behavior and all types of “cognitive” explanations of behavior could be
reduced to associative processes.
C. Edward L. Thorndike LAWS
1. Law of Effect ... early version of “reinforcement”
2. Law of Exercise ... early version of “ habit strength” ...
“connectionism”
3. Law of Instinct
D. Pavlov ... “conditioned reflex”
E. John B. Watson ( Travelers Rest/ Furman/ U. of Chicago/
Controversies) Is credited with establishing the school of behaviorism in
1913 while a professor at Johns Hopkins.
1. Was a functionalist who argued that animal behavior was the
only legitimate topic of psychology.
2. Heavily influenced by Pavlov ... conditioned reflex replaced
“associations” as fundamental principle of conditioning ...
emphasis on “classical conditioning”
3. All “mental” activity can be translated into terms of conditioned
behaviors ... “overt” and “covert” behaviors (e.g., thinking could
be viewed as “covert or inner speech”). Cognition was seen as
perceptual motor responding.
F. Contributions of Watsonian Behaviorism
1. Psychology is the science of publicly observable animal
behavior
2. The purpose of psychology is to “predict” and “control”
behavior ... psychology is atheoretical ... “inductivist”
3. Emphasis on classical conditioning ... S-R psychology
4. Reduces Psychology to “learning” and “conditioning”
5. Tended to be an anti-reductionist
6. Rejects James’ idea that psychology is about “consciousness”
and James’ eclectic view of psychology
7. Rejects Thorndike’s law of effect
8. Promotes “experimental” psychology
9. By 1930’s referred to by some as “naive behaviorism”
10. “Free samples”, “Coffee Break”, Candy at supermarket
checkouts!
G. Tradition: The Neo-Behaviorist and Radical Behaviorists
Neo-Behaviorism
A. Hypothetico-Deductive Behaviorism
1. Theory is okay
2. Intervening Variables ... S-O-R psychology
3. Operationalism ... Psych. still study of behavior but behavior
might be controlled by intervening variables which must be
operationally defined
B. Tolman ... behavior is purposive ... “Cognitive Maps” ... “Latent
Learning”
Tolman
C. Hull ... “drives’ and “habits” ... early form of “connectivism”
Radical (Descriptive) Behaviorism
A. Pragmatic ... A theoretical ( in theory!) ... Like Watson ... purpose of
Psychology is to develop empirical laws that can be used to predict and
control behavior
B. In tradition of Kant ... Psychology of mind impossible
C. Rejects idea that Psychology is about “mind”/”consciousness” ... it is
science of behavior
D. Watson’s rather than James’ form of functionlism
E. “Methological behaviorists” ... again more consistent with Watson
than James
F. From about 1930 to 1960 there are only two kinds of Psychology in
U.S. ... neobehaviorism and radical behaviorism and radical behaviorism
wins out, in the end, over neobehaviorism.
G. Very popular (and hated) with general public and educators to this
day ... almost disappeared in academic psychology
H. Emphasis on learning
I. We are going to examine two very different ways to approach radical
behaviorism ... one approach developed by B. F. Skinner and one by
Edwin R. Guthrie
B. F. Skinner
A. The single most important psychologist in the 20th century
B. Why?
1. Clear, well thought out, easy to understand approach to
Psychology
2. Practical implications
3. Ideas can be put to direct test
4. Public personality and appeal to general public (like Watson)
5. Zeitgeist ... Institutions (e.g., states, schools) looking for ways to
control behavior of people
C. Skinner’s “theory” ... “Experimental Analysis of Behavior” ... a
“functional” account of learning
1. Two kinds of behaviors: Operant and Respondent
a. Respondent ... behaviors that are “elicited” by stimuli ...
classical conditioning
b. Operant ... behaviors are “emitted” ... we don’t need to know
why ... operant conditioning
2. Law of Acquisition ... if a behavior is followed by reinforcement
there will be an increase in the probability of that behavior
occurring again ... “functional” account of learning
3. Schedules of reinforcement will affect rate of learning and rate of
extinction
4. Shaping ... successive approximations
5. Identifies various ways that response contingent outcomes of
behavior can affect subsequent behavior ... e.g., punishment,
negative reinforcement
D. Two kinds of problems: 1) empirical and 2) logical
1. Empirical
a. systems works reasonably well as long as you have
tight control of environment and behavioral options ... tends to
fall apart otherwise
b. can not give adequate account of complex symbolic behaviors
(e.g., language, math, music)
2. Logical
a. Definition of behavior
b. Definition of reinforcer
c. Definition of response
E. Collapse of radical behaviorism ... “Verbal Learning”
1. Watson/Skinner had to come up with an account of language in
terms of learning and some type of behavior
2. Skinner’s idea was that babies emit vocalizations that are in
some cases reinforced by parents’ responses ... process shapes
verbal behavior ... which we think of as language ... early on in
his career Skinner recognized that language was a problem for his
approach to psycholgy
3. In 1957 Skinner publishes “Verbal Behavior” ... two years later
Noam Chomsky (a linguist) publishes a review article criticizing
the book and at the same time radical behaviorism. The article
along with several other developments in psychology lead to the
collapse of radical behaviorism in academic psychology.
F. Skinner’s take on the scientific method (adapted from Koch, Vol. 2)
1. The importance of Serendipity
2. Control your conditions and you will see order (may be the
source of the downfall of radical behaviorism)
3. If you find something interesting, drop everything else you are
doing and study it
4. Some ways of doing research are easier than others (pellet
dispenser/rat pellets)
5. Some people are lucky ( pellet dispenser break down )
Guthrie
A. Not well known outside of psychology
B. Advocated a very pure form of behaviorism: associationism
C. All learning is controlled by the “Law of Contiguity”
D. One trial learning
E. Spoke of “movements” rather than “responses” and “environments”
rather than “stimuli”
F. Reinforcement simply changed the environment in which movement
occurs
G. Habits form when many components of movements are associated
with many components of the environment
H. Extinction occurs when environmental components of one habit
become associated with a different set of movements
I. Gave riase to “statistical learning theory” (Estes) and later to
connectionist theory