Psychological science - ANSWER The scientific study of behaviour, the mind and brain.
Cognitive psychology - ANSWER The study of cognitive (mental) processes such as
thinking
Perception, memory, attention and language
Biological psychology (or cognitive neuroscience) - ANSWER The study of the biology
that gives rise to cognition and behaviour.
Nativism - ANSWER • Supported by Plato.
• Nature not nurture
Philosophical empiricism - ANSWER Aristotle
Nurture not nature
Galton - ANSWER Both
What was Descartes the first to do? What does Descartes say about the mind and the body -
ANSWER Discoveries
•The mind and the body are materially separate and obey different laws. Mind = spiritual =
soul. The body cannot exist without the mind. The mind, however, can exist without the
body. The mind can have consciousness when body is in coma. He was the first to look at
brain anatomy this way: that one structure does one thing
1
,•The mind and the body come together in the pineal gland (top of spinal cord where the
spinal cord joins the mind). The pineal gland tilted within the mind to allow the animal
spirits to flow down and control the body (like lifting up an arm). The pineal gland is the
structure that does so because it is in the midline between the two hemisphere and there is
only one unlike all other structures in the brain.
Societal reaction
Public thought this was weird and later was formally argued against it saying there was no
ghost in the machine. All mind is the result of biological activity occurring at the cellular level
(which is called scientific materialism)
What did Hermann von Helmholtz study - ANSWER Studied human reaction time;
estimated the length of nerve impulse
Discovered that signals are transmitted up the body
27 meters/second are the speed of the fibers
Wundt's psychology field - ANSWER Started structuralism
Studied consciousness
Behaviourism and its fall (3 people) - ANSWER -Introspection is subjective and
unreliable (according to Watson)
-Psychologists should restrict themselves to the scientific study of objectively observable
behaviour
-Skinner and Watson "took it too far"
--Skinner did not like free will
-Behaviorists = nurture
-Ignores mental processes (emotions) and the evolutionary history of organisms
The downfall
Neisser (cognitive psychologist) "it was supposed that no psychological phenomenon was
real unless you could demonstrate it in a rat"
2
, Chomsky: as young children generate sentences they have never heard before, language
learning cannot occur by reinforcement. Agreed with nativism
Garcia (behaviourists): Rats can associate taste with sickness, but not a light with sickness
because of evolutionary psychology
Led to the cognitive revolution
The cognitive revolution - ANSWER During WWII, the military needed help
understanding the human interface with technology.
Donald Broadbent: Discovered attention has limited capacity
George Miller: Found consistency in capacity limits in memory
The mind as a computer (analogy)
Cognitive neuroscience in the treatment of conditions - ANSWER Wilder Penfield
Cortical ablation (for epilepsy)
Electrical stimulation of the cortex
Sensory and motor homunculi
Neuroimaging
PET in 1980's, using radioactivity
MRI in 1990's, to show both structure and function in the brain
William James - ANSWER -functionalism
-our brains evolved into what they are
-questioned things like why disgust and why the face, well to communicate and to protect
-proof: its universal among all humans even if some groups didn't have contact
3
Cognitive psychology - ANSWER The study of cognitive (mental) processes such as
thinking
Perception, memory, attention and language
Biological psychology (or cognitive neuroscience) - ANSWER The study of the biology
that gives rise to cognition and behaviour.
Nativism - ANSWER • Supported by Plato.
• Nature not nurture
Philosophical empiricism - ANSWER Aristotle
Nurture not nature
Galton - ANSWER Both
What was Descartes the first to do? What does Descartes say about the mind and the body -
ANSWER Discoveries
•The mind and the body are materially separate and obey different laws. Mind = spiritual =
soul. The body cannot exist without the mind. The mind, however, can exist without the
body. The mind can have consciousness when body is in coma. He was the first to look at
brain anatomy this way: that one structure does one thing
1
,•The mind and the body come together in the pineal gland (top of spinal cord where the
spinal cord joins the mind). The pineal gland tilted within the mind to allow the animal
spirits to flow down and control the body (like lifting up an arm). The pineal gland is the
structure that does so because it is in the midline between the two hemisphere and there is
only one unlike all other structures in the brain.
Societal reaction
Public thought this was weird and later was formally argued against it saying there was no
ghost in the machine. All mind is the result of biological activity occurring at the cellular level
(which is called scientific materialism)
What did Hermann von Helmholtz study - ANSWER Studied human reaction time;
estimated the length of nerve impulse
Discovered that signals are transmitted up the body
27 meters/second are the speed of the fibers
Wundt's psychology field - ANSWER Started structuralism
Studied consciousness
Behaviourism and its fall (3 people) - ANSWER -Introspection is subjective and
unreliable (according to Watson)
-Psychologists should restrict themselves to the scientific study of objectively observable
behaviour
-Skinner and Watson "took it too far"
--Skinner did not like free will
-Behaviorists = nurture
-Ignores mental processes (emotions) and the evolutionary history of organisms
The downfall
Neisser (cognitive psychologist) "it was supposed that no psychological phenomenon was
real unless you could demonstrate it in a rat"
2
, Chomsky: as young children generate sentences they have never heard before, language
learning cannot occur by reinforcement. Agreed with nativism
Garcia (behaviourists): Rats can associate taste with sickness, but not a light with sickness
because of evolutionary psychology
Led to the cognitive revolution
The cognitive revolution - ANSWER During WWII, the military needed help
understanding the human interface with technology.
Donald Broadbent: Discovered attention has limited capacity
George Miller: Found consistency in capacity limits in memory
The mind as a computer (analogy)
Cognitive neuroscience in the treatment of conditions - ANSWER Wilder Penfield
Cortical ablation (for epilepsy)
Electrical stimulation of the cortex
Sensory and motor homunculi
Neuroimaging
PET in 1980's, using radioactivity
MRI in 1990's, to show both structure and function in the brain
William James - ANSWER -functionalism
-our brains evolved into what they are
-questioned things like why disgust and why the face, well to communicate and to protect
-proof: its universal among all humans even if some groups didn't have contact
3
