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What is comparative psychology?
Anthropology
Sociology
Ecology
Social
Psychology
Population
Biology
Evolutionary
Psychology
Behavioral
Ecology
Comparative
Cognition
Cognitive
Psychology
Paleontology
Patterns of
Behavioral
Evolution
Cladistics
Behavior
Genetics
Molecular
Biology
Comparative
Psychology
Developmental
Psychobiology
Genetics
Behavioral
Neuroscience
Behavior
Analysis
Behavior
Modification
Associative
Learning
Motivation
Simple
Model
Systems
Neural
Network
Models
Neuroethology
Developmental
Psychology
Comparative
Neurology
Cognitive
Neuroscience
Aristotle (384-322 BCE)
Descartes (1596-1650)
Lucretius (95-55 BCE)
Lamarck (1744-1829)
Plutarch (46-127 CE)
Darwin (1809-1882)
Aristotle and the scala naturae
[384-322 BCE]
Lamarck: inheritance of acquired traits
[1744-1829]
Lamarck and brain evolution: a teleological view
STRUCTURE
•Highly developed hypocephalon
•Brain
•Spinal cord
•Rudimentary hypocephalon
•Ganglionic cord
•Special senses
•Rudimentary brain
•No hypocephalon
•Separate ganglia
•Nerves
•No special senses
•No CNS
•No muscles
LEVEL
Man
Mammals
Birds
Reptiles
Fish
Crustaceans Arachnids
Insects Annelids
Cirrhipeds Mollusks
Radiarians
Infusorians
Polyps
Plants
FUNCTION
•Attention
•Thinking
•Memory
•Judgment
•Will
Inevitable
increased
complexity
•Emotions
•Inner feelings
•Simple ideas?
•Vision, touch
•Instincts
•Little or no learning
•Emotions?
•Irritability
•No instincts
•No intelligence
•Irritability
•No instincts
•No intelligence
Darwin and the phylogenetic tree
[1809-1882]
A phylogenetic tree
Darwin’s contributions to comparative psychology
Natural selection: differential reproductive success of alternative characters.
(1) Phenotypic (and genotypic) variation
(2) Differential reproductive success
(3) Heredity
Mental continuity: common ancestry provides continuity in morphology and function
(1) Homology of brain organization
(2) Deep functional similarities
(3) Continuity of behavioral mechanisms
Darwin’s research on mental representation in earthworms
Percentage of Total Observations
100
90
80
70
60
Leaves f rom English plants
50
Leaves f rom f oreign plants
40
Leaves with narrow base
If worms are able to judge, either
before drawing or after having drawn
an object close to the mouths of their
burrows, how best to drag it in, they
must acquire some notion of its
general shape. This they probably
acquire by touching it in many places
with the anterior extremity of their
bodies, which serves as a tactile
organ. [...] If worms have the power
of acquiring some notion, however
rude, of the shape of an object and of
their burrows, as seems to be the
case, they deserve to be called
intelligent; for they then act in nearly
the same manner as would a man
under similar circumstances.
30
Darwin (1881, p. 97). The formation of
vegetable mould, through the action of
worms, with observations on their habits.
20
10
0
Apex
Middle
Base
Morgan’s method of double induction
Method of
double
induction
[1852-1936]
Morgan’s canon of parsimony
…any animal may be at a stage where certain higher faculties have not yet been evolved from
their lower precursors; and hence we are logically bound not to assume the existence of these
higher faculties until good reasons shall have been shown for such existence. In other words, we
are bound to accept the principle above enunciated: that in no case is an animal activity to be
interpreted as the outcome of the exercise of a higher psychical faculty, if it can be fairly
interpreted as the outcome of the exercise of one which stands lower in the psychological scale.
Morgan (1894, p. 59). Introduction to comparative psychology.
Watson’s behaviorism
[1878-1958]
Psychology as the behaviorist views it is a purely objective
experimental branch of natural science. Its theoretical goal is the
prediction and control of behavior. Introspection forms no
essential part of its methods, nor is the scientific value of its data
dependent upon the readiness with which they lend themselves
to interpretation in terms of consciousness. The behaviorist, in
his efforts to get a unitary scheme of animal response,
recognizes no dividing line between man and brute. The
behavior of man, with all of its refinement and complexity, forms
only a part of the behaviorist's total scheme of investigation.
Watson's (1913, p. 158). Psychology as the behaviorist views it.
Fear learning in
babies (1920s)
Nature vs. Nurture
There is no escape from the
conclusion that nature prevails
enormously over nurture when
the differences of nurture do not
exceed what is commonly to be
found among persons of the
same rank of society and in the
same country.
Galton (1883, p. 241). Inquiries into
human faculty and its development.
Give me a dozen healthy infants,
well-formed, and my own specified
world to bring them up in and I'll
guarantee to take any one at random
and train him to become any type of
specialist I might select—doctor,
lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and,
yes, even beggar-man and thief,
regardless of his talents, penchants,
tendencies, abilities, vocations, and
race of his ancestors.
Watson (1924, p. 104). Behaviorism.
The epigenetic approach to behavioral development
Weiss, 1959.
An epigenetic approach holds that all
response systems are synthesized
during ontogeny and that this
synthesis involves the integrative
influence of both intraorganic
processes and extrinsic stimulative
conditions. It considers gene effects to
be contingent on environmental
conditions and regards the genotype
as capable of entering into different
classes of relationships depending on
the prevailing environmental context.
In the epigeneticist’s view, the
environment is not benignly
supportive, but actively implicated in
determining the very structure and
organization of each response system.
Moltz (1965, p. 44). Contemporary instinct
theory and the fixed action pattern.
Field and laboratory research
Tool use in chimpanzees
Self-recognition in
pigeons
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ga5o9cyg9A
Spatial learning in
rats
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2TBicMRLtA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPazQm_hvT4
Levels of causal analysis
Genes
(next generation)
Proximate causes
Niko Tinbergen
[1907-1988]
Ultimate causes
Inheritance
PHYLOGENETIC
HISTORY
Reproductive success
Selective
pressures
Behavior
ADAPTIVE
SIGNIFICANCE
Sensory-motor
Morphology
Physiology
Environment
Hormones
MECHANISM
Cell metabolism
Enzymes
Morphogenesis
Nutrients
DEVELOPMENT
Genes
(regulatory, structural)