This is one of the oldest enterprises in human intellectual history
Human thought
What is Epistemology
(This is the nature, origin, acquisition, and purpose of knowledge)
This was a cornerstone of the Greek philosophical tradition
Epistemology
Why has human thought been difficult to study scientifically?
Because of its personal private nature
What has made it possible to study human thought
advances in cognitive theory and scientific methods
This field of psychology has permeated all other fields of psychology
cognitive psychology
What is psychology?
Studying human behavior as a science
When did cognitive psychology started?
in the 20th century after WWII
What is the “cocktail party effect”?
our ability to focus on one out of many voices
What is Cognitive Psychology
is the study of how people perceive, learn. remember, and think about information
Why does apple spend so much money advertising for there iPhone?
bc of availability heuristic
using availability heuristic we…
make judgments on the basis of how easily we call to mind what we perceive as relevant instances of a phenomenon
Why study the history of cognitive psychology?
If we know where we came from, we may have a better understanding of where we are heading, we learn from past mistakes
cognitive psychologist hope to learn what?
how people think by studying how people have thoughts about thinking
The progression of ideas often involves …
dialect
What is dialect?
is a developmental process where ideas evolve over time through a pattern of transformation
what is a thesis
a statement of belief
some people believe that human nature governs many aspects of human behavior. This is an example of a ?
Thesis
What is this pattern in a dialect?
- thesis is proposed
- An antithesis emerges
- A synthesis integrates the viewpoints
Psychology adopted what and evolved out of ______
scientific method
philosophy
Cognitive Psychology evolved from what era?
philosophical area of epistemology
What is epistemology?
(study of knowledge) which investigates the origins, nature, methods, and limits of human knowledge.
Physical properties properties and behaviors of humans which have survival value tend to
increase in the population due to natural selection
Fast and accurate capabilities have
Very High survival value
Organization of related statements that summarize and explain observations
Theory
What are three things that theories do?
Strives for laws (high probability)
Often settles for principles (Reasonable probability)
Avoids beliefs (unmeasured probability)
What do purposes do?
They explain cause and effect relationships in reality
Explain past experiences
Predict the further experiences
Provide methods for organizing experiences to change behavior in specific ways
how many laws are there in psychology?
NONE
are there principles in psychology?
Yes
i.e. Fight or flight
DO we have beliefs in psychology?
yes
Criteria for theories:
-Accurately describes and summarizes reality
-can be understood
-Parsimonious
-make predictions that can be tested
-useful in the real world
internally consistent
-generate laws and principles
-minimizes beliefs and assumptions
-stimulate additional thought and research
Occam’s Razor
Parsimonious, If you have a collection of explanations for the same phenomenon and both predict just as well, go with the one that simpler
What is another word for Parsimonious?
elegant
Good theories are
internally consistent
A good theory makes
a lot of research, hence Sigmund Freud
Science means
a methodology for determining cause and effect in the natural world
science is not a thing, it is
something you do and in order to do it you have to measure it
whether the IV causes
the DV
Control means
to hold other things constant
determining to who the results apply
subject population
subject sample
comparison sample
In order to evaluate a psychology experiment you have to ask 4 things:
are the IV and DV operationally defined
in the sample representative
is the subject bias controlled
Is experimenter bias controlled
The early greeks have framed
almost every question concerning human nature
the early greeks employed what approach
the rationalist approach
This Greek philosopher believed that knowledge was innate and accounted socrates eliciting understanding of geometry from slave boy
plato
antithesis is a
statement that counters a previous statement of belief
an alternative view is that our nurture (the environmental contexts in which we are reefed) almost entirely determines many aspects of human behavior, this is an example of …
antithesis
sooner or later the debate bw the thesis and antithesis leads to a
synthesis
what is a synthesis?
integrates the most credible features of each of two or more views
That is that nature and nurture both take part in human behavior
Culture influences…
many cognitive process
He observed this dialectal progression of ideas. was a German philosopher who came to his ideas by his own dialect (1770-1831)
George Hegal
The earliest roots of psychology to 2 approaches to understanding the human minds:
Philosophy
Physiology
general nature of many aspects of the world, in part through introspective
Philosophy
the examination if inner ideas and experiences
introspective
seeks a scientific study of life-sustaining functions in living matter, primarily through empirical
Physiology
These 2 Greek philosophers have affected modern thing in psych.
plato and his student arise.
Plato was a rationalist meaning that
the route of knowledge is through thinking and logical analysis
A naturalist and biologist as well as a philosopher was an
empiricist
empiricist believes
that we acquire knowledge through empirical evidence
This person viewed the introspective, reflective method as being superior to empirical methods for finding truth
Decarte
“cogito, ergo sum”
Decarte I think therefore I am
I think therefore I am means:
hat his existence is that he was thinking and doubting and TF this is the only thing that you can be certain of bc everything else is deceptive
This person believed that humans are born without knowledge and tf must seek knowledge through empirical observation
Locke
Tabula rasa
blank slate
the idea of “blank slate” is that
the study of learning was the KEY to understanding the human mind, there are no INNATE IDEAS
this person believed that both rationalism and empiricism have their place
Kant
this seeks to understand the configuration of elements of the mind and its perceptions by analyzing those perceptions int their constituent components (affection, memory, attention, and perception
structuralism
In the human mind structuralist sought to
deconstruct the human mind into elementary components and were also interested in how these elementary ,components work together to create the mind
this as a German psychologist whose ideas contributed to the development of structuralism and is viewed as the founder of structuralism in such.
Wundt
Wundt used _____
introspection: looking inward at pieces of pieces of info. passing through consciousness
What is the aim of introspection
is to look at the elementary comp. of an object or process
What are the challenges associated with introspection?
1) people may not always be able to say what goes through there ming
2) what they say may not be accurate
3) The fact that people are asked to pay attention to their thoughts or to speak out loud while they are working on a task may itself alter the process that are going on.
Wundt American student who is known as the first full-fledged structuralist
Edward Titchener
Titchener’s experiments relied solely on the use of what?
Introspection, exploring psychology from the vantage point of the experiencing individual
the critics of method (introspection) and the focus (elementary strutters of sensation) gave rise to what?
functionalism
Functionalism focus is:
processes of thought rather than on its contents
Seeks to understand what people do and why they do it
What is the key to understanding the human mind and behavior for functionalist?
was to study the processes of how and why the mind works as it does, rather than to study the structural contents and elements of the mind
American Psychologist who founded “Pragmatism”
James William
He believed that the Human mind to be inherently purposive
William James
This person believed in the “stream of consciousness”
William James
What is the “stream of consciousness”?
Considered consciousness as a non-recurring mental process
Wrote the Principles of Psychology (1890) and what did it discuss?
It discussed a wide variety of cognitive topics such as consciousness, attention, and perception
This person emphasized driving structures as driving behavior
Freud
Developed a highly detailed theory of mind
Freud
Emphasized consciousness and mental processes
Freud
Has been criticized for developing untestable theories
Freud
Has stimulated enormous research and debate
Freud
However a cigar is just a cigar :D
Freud; the oral complex
Both of these individuals were polymaths
William james and Freud
Pragmatism means
The only ben. that you are going to study is the ben. that is useful to the world
Employed the scientific approach
lacked the tools to study thought, so just studied ben.
Behaviorists
They believed that learning is change in observable motor beh. in response to observable external experience
American Behaviorists
Stimulus-> response
Both of these can be physical and observable responses; are the view of American Behaviorists
Behaviorist part take in External Processes
This is where they take part in observing the physical environment and external behavior
He states that Psychology as the “behaviorist views it is an objective and experimental branch of natural science…”
John B Watson (1878-1958):
He states that “introspection forms no essential part of its methods, nor s the scientific value f its data dependent upon the readiness with which they lend themselves to interpretation in terms of consciousness”
John B. Watson (1878-1958)
this person left John Hopkins and invented advertising at the J. Walter Thompson Company
John B. Watson (1878-1958)
Invented “infomercial” with radio broadcast on the healthful effects of salvation from Pebeco toothpaste
John B. Watson (1878-1959)
Who was the most influential behaviorist
Studied in detal the relationship between ben. and consequences ( both good and bad) of beh.
B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
Studied in detail the acquisition and extinction of learned responses:
B.F.Skinner (1904-1990)
Wrote Verbal H=Behavior(1957) in which he argued that language could be explained with just behaviorist concepts of stimulus and response.
B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
This person qualifying mathematical and theoretical
B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
Verbal Beh. is that the use of language is all earned from our environment/ Language ben. is 100% learned
B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
This employs a scientific approach
Has the tools to study thought
Cognitive approach
Learning is change in observable motor beh. or unobservable internal mental beh. in response to observable external experience of unobservable internal mental experience
Cognitive approach
Stimulus –> Thought –> Response –>
Cognitive Approach
Stimulus and response can be observed of inferred
Cognitive Approach
This person was a Neo-behaviorist and believed that ben. was “purposeful”
EDWARD TOLMAN (1886-1959)
Animals developed “expectations” concerning the outcomes of their ben.
Edward Tolman (1886-1959)
Animals developed “cognitive maps” of their environment
Edward Tolman (1886-1959)
This person was a Neo-behaviorist who proposed “meditational constructs”
Donald Hebb (1904-1985)
These are mental processes that connect stimuli to responses
“meditational constructs”
“Hebb’s Rule” suggests:
a neural mechanism for learning which involves the strengthening or weakening of synapses i the brain
In other words how the neurons become linked together in the brain
Max Wertheimer (1880-1943) Wolfhang Kohler (1887-1967) Kurt Koffka (1886-1941) Where labeled as the Berlin Group
the Berlin Group
This approach to a molar one and is German for “whole”
“The whole is different from the sum of the parts”
Gestalt Psychology
Grouping people together does not get you more
This means you are missing the big picture
This approach did not distinguish between perception, cognition, and problem solving
Gestalt
Emphasized the organization of perceptions and memories rather than individual perceptions and memories
Gestalt
Organization of perceptions and memories is knowledge that allows organism to learn, dove problems through insight, and thus predict and control its environment.
Gestalt
The word “datum” is singular whereas the word “data” is plural (T/F)
True
The human memory system is like a filing cabinet. Data are accurately filed, stored and retrieved (true/False)
false
We directly perceive reality. when we look around us, what we perceive is exactly identical to what is actually out there
false
Which of the following sentences is grammatically correct?
a) me and Billy-Bob done gone to the icehouse to see where the beer be at
b) Jesse and Frankie ain’t gonna rile up them bees no more
c) After carefully analyzing the data, Dr. Stanglove concludes that they do not support the hypothesis
d) After carefully analyzing the data, Dr. Strangelove concludes that it does not support the hypothesis
c