William James. Father - Henry studied theology, philosophy, and mysticism.

Transcription

1 William James

2 William James Father - Henry studied theology, philosophy, and mysticism. Swedenborg had a prolific career as an inventor and scientist. At the age of fifty-six he entered into a spiritual phase, in which he experienced dreams and visions. This culminated in a spiritual awakening, where he claimed he was appointed by the Lord to write a heavenly doctrine to reform Christianity. He claimed that the Lord had opened his eyes, so that from then on he could freely visit heaven and hell, and talk with angels, demons, and other spirits. From Wikipedia

3 William attends school in New York School and private tutors in England and France Back overseas. School and private tutors in Switzerland and Germany. Attends Geneva Academy (a European university) Studies painting with William Morris Hunt, Newport, R.I Enters Lawrence Scientific School, Harvard University William enters Harvard Medical School Joins Louis Agassiz on an expedition to the Amazon.

4 resumes medical school... but had assorted ailments back pain, weak vision, digestive disorders, and thoughts of suicide some or most of which were related to his indecision about his future. Seeking relief, he went to France and Germany for nearly two years, took the baths, studied under Helmholtz and other leading physiologists, and became thoroughly conversant with the New Psychology (Wundt) James receives his MD from Harvard. He made no effort to practice because of his poor health Spent his time studying psychology, sunk in gloom about his prospects and troubled by the profound differences between his scientific views of the mind and the world and his father's mystical and spiritual ones. In 1870, at twenty-eight, after nearly a year in these doldrums, he had an abrupt emotional crisis."

5 For almost three years after graduation, James lived in the family home. Had increased periods of depression after a young woman whom he had befriended died following a prolonged illness. Later described his depression as a descent into a profound crisis of spirituality, of being, of meaning, of will. He suffered panic attacks and even hallucinations and sought help through spiritual quests. Feared that his depression was a biological destiny he would be unable to overcome. One day in April of 1870, he recorded in his journal that he had come to believe that free will was no illusion and that he could use his will to alter his mental state. "My first act of free will," he wrote, "shall be to believe in free will."

6 James was now 30, three years out of medical school, and with no career prospects or plans except for a vague desire to devote himself to philosophy. Harvard president Charles Eliot, a neighbor and former teacher of James, offered him a post at Harvard teaching physiology for the modest sum of $600 per year. Within three years of arriving at Harvard, he began offering courses in physiological psychology and performing demonstrations for students in his little laboratory.

7 There were no professors of psychology in American universities (except phrenology) before James began teaching it in James had never taken a course in the New Psychology because there were none. He once jested, 'The first lecture in psychology that I ever heard was the first I ever gave. James introduced experimental psychology to America. He began giving laboratory demonstrations to students at least as early as Wundt, and he and his students started performing laboratory experiments about the same time as Wundt and his students, if not earlier. Ironically, while James made much of the value of experimentation, he himself found it boring and intellectually confining. He usually spent no more than two hours a day in the laboratory, told a friend that "I naturally hate experimental work," and said of the Leipzig style of laboratory work, "The thought of psycho-physical experimentation and altogether of brass-instrument and algebraic-formula psychology fills me with horror."

8 1890 Principles of Psychology (2 volumes), chapters on habit, attention, perception, association, memory, reasoning, instinct, emotion, imagination, psychological methods, and even hypnotism. The Jimmy

9 Theory Functionalism James opposed the structuralism focus on introspection and breaking down mental events to the smallest elements. Instead, James focused on the wholeness of an event, taking into the impact of the environment on behavior. Psychology is the study of mental activity (e.g. perception, memory, imagination, feeling, judgment). Mental activity is to be evaluated in terms of how it serves the organism in adapting to its environment. The functionalists tended to use the term 'function' rather loosely. It can refer to the study of how a mental process operates. This is a major departure from the study of the structure of a mental process, the difference between stopping a train to tear it apart to study its parts (structuralism), and looking at how the systems interact while it is running (functionalism). The term 'function' can also refer to how the mental process functions in the evolution of the species, what adaptive property it provides that would cause it to be selected through evolution.

10 On Introspection: felt that a naturalistic kind of introspection an effort to observe our own thoughts and feelings as they actually seem to us could tell us much about our mental life. This was, for him, the most important of investigative methods; he defined it as "looking into our own minds and reporting what we there discover." Stream of Consciousness All people unhesitatingly believe that they feel themselves thinking, and they distinguish the mental state as an inward activity or passion, from all the objects with which it may cognitively deal. I regard this belief as the most fundamental of all the postulates of Psychology, and shall discard all curious inquiries about its certainty as too metaphysical for the scope of this book. The proper subject of psychology was, therefore, the introspective analysis of the "states of mind" that we are conscious of in daily life and of the functions they perform for the organism.

11 Pragmatism - wrote considerably on the concept of pragmatism. According to pragmatism, the truth of an idea can never be proven. James proposed we instead focus on what he called the "cash value," or usefulness, of an idea. James-Lange Theory of Emotion The James-Lange theory of emotion proposes that an event triggers a physiological reaction, which we then interpret. According to this theory, emotions are caused by our interpretations of these physiological reactions. Both James and the Danish physiologist Carl Lange independently proposed the theory. Influence on Psychology In addition to his own enormous influence, many of James' students went on to have prosperous and influential career in psychology. Some of James' students included Mary Whiton Calkins, Edward Thorndike, G. Stanley Hall, and John Dewey. In 1894 he was the first American to call favorable attention to the recent work of relatively obscure Viennese physician, Sigmund Freud.

12 William James Quotations Human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives. The stream of thought flows on; but most of its segments fall into the bottomless abyss of oblivion. Of some, no memory survives the instant of their passage. Of others, it is confined to a few moments, hours or days. Others, again, leave vestiges which are indestructible, and by means of which they may be recalled as long as life endures. Whenever two people meet, there are really six people present. There is each man as he sees himself, each man as the other person sees him, and each man as he really is. There is only one thing a philosopher can be relied upon to do, and that is to contradict other philosophers.

13 Hugo Munsterberg Hired by James in 1892 One of Munsterberg's intentions was to treat psychology as broadly and as widely as possible. He did not have any patience with approaches like Titchener's, which he viewed as too restrictive. Munsterberg was known to speak of Titchener's structuralism as precise but not useful. However, Munsterberg did not like giving a concrete definition of psychology becasue he thought that any definition would create rules and restrictions that he did not want and could not accept. Instead, Munsterberg was interested in functions or acts such as, memory, understanding, learning, a search for beauty, empathy, love, and faith. Munsterberg saw psychology in a purpose-oriented functionalist manner. For him, it was "more natural to drink the water than to analyze it in the laboratory into its chemical elements" (Hothersall, 1995, p163). Dr. Munsterberg's lifetime interest was in the application of psychological knowledge, specifically in the service of humanity. Munsterberg always considered himself to be an experimental psychologist.

14 Applied Psychology Application of research methods to applied areas of human behavior. Basic Research research into general, abstract laws.

15 Clinical Psychology He had an unusual style when treating patients; he would meet them in his laboratory instead of a clinic, and his only patients were those who were of scientific interest to him. None of Munsterberg s patients ever had to pay a fee for his counseling services. He believed that mental illness had a physiological basis. Direct suggestions and autosuggestions were used to encourage the patient to "expect" to get well. His main objective was to give his patients immediate relief. For example, he did this by assuring his patients that they would get a good night's sleep and low-and-behold, they would wake up feeling rested. He wrote about these clinical experiences in his book, Psychotherapy. Reported that he saw success using these techniques in the treatment of a wide range of problems, including hallucinations, drug addiction, phobias, sexual disorders, alcoholism, and obsessions.

16 Industrial Psychology He studied problems with monotony, physical/social influences on the working power, attention and fatigue, the effects of advertising, and the future development of economic psychology. In 1913, Munsterberg's work in I/O psychology was presented in his book, Psychology and Industrial Efficiency. The book was divided into three main sections: "The best possible man for the job", "the best possible work", and "the the best possible effect." "The best possible man for the job" dealt with selection of workers, "the best possible work", discussed factors affecting worker efficiency, and "the best possible effect" discussed sales, marketing, and advertising techniques.

17 Forensic psychology & Eyewitness Testimony Published On the Witness Stand. Reality Experiments Lie Detection Group Decision Making

18 False Confessions Munsterberg wrote about people who confessed to have committed a crime, but really had not. He looked at situations in which these untrue confessions were likely to occur. Munsterberg found that with intense interrogation of those who have a strong need to please and that with those who have a need to comply with powerful authority, untrue confessions were likely to arise. He also found that these same results occurred with deeply depressed individuals who feel a need for punishment.

19 On December 16, 1916, Munsterberg died on the lecture platform while beginning a lecture at Radcliffe. He was not even able to finish his opening sentence.

20 Hermann Ebbinghaus (1885) Scientific Study of Memory Stimulus - nonsense syllable method (e.g., DAX, BUP, GEJ). Presented on a Memory Drum Tested his own memory Each list learned to criterion of 2 errorless tests.

21 IV: Retention time (minutes, hours, days) Dependant Measures 1) Number recalled - fast loss at beginning, then levels out.

22 2) Savings # of trials to relearn Large Savings at short retention, Rapid decreased with longer retention Then leveled out. E.g., After 6 days 30% savings.

23 3) Overlearning - learn to criterion then rehearsed thirty times more. Greatly increased savings. E.g., At 6 days 64% savings. Appears Rehearsal leads to Memory. Reductionist Methods - claims that everything that exists can be explained as the interactions of a small number of simple things. In Ebbinghaus case, what effects memory of nonsense syllables also effects memory of words, dates and other information.