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Francis Galton (1822-1911), Darwin’s cousin, was keen on evolution and heredity. He founded “Individual Differences” and discovered the uniqueness of finger-prints (1892).
Galton was also an obsessive counter and measurer. He even counted yawns and coughs at lectures and theatres – trying to produce a “boredom measure”!
Galton used and developed 3 particular statistical measurements: Probability, Normal Distribution and Correlation.
Galton’s Hereditary Genius (1869) and English Men of Science (1874) contained many case studies of famous judges, doctors and scientists who were born into families with corresponding talents. From this research, Galton calculated the high PROBABILITY that eminent men will father eminent sons.
Galton published Correlations (1888) which illustrated relationships graphically – for instance, that tall men are not as tall as their fathers and short men are taller than their fathers.
Herbert Spencer (1820-1903, another Englishman) who invented Social Darwinism. (Spencer wore earmuffs to stop his thoughts from being disrupted!)
The Id develops first. It is inborn and alone for a couple of years. It operates by The Pleasure Principle – the baby seeks pleasure (e.g. drink, food, warmth, comfort) and avoids the unpleasurable (e.g. hunger, being wet and cold). The Id is selfish and typically wants immediate gratification.
The Ego develops from about 2 years and operates by The Reality Principle. To survive, we must sometimes be realistic and plan for the future. Thus, the Id can’t always be allowed its own way, so the Ego often has to battle with it. (Id is Latin for it – Freud used the German “das es”, translated as Id.)
The Superego starts to develop about age three (influenced by parents), then gradually develops throughout childhood, becoming fully mature after puberty.
The Superego is the “conscience” or “moral watchdog” that stops us from doing wrong, especially in the sense of being anti-social. Whereas the Id and Ego are selfish, the Superego considers others too.
Learning is a relatively permanent change in behaviour due to experience.
In general, punishment is simply less effective because it causes SLOWER and LESS learned responses. It’s better to use a combination of reward (Positive Reinforcement) and withdrawal of reward (Non-Reinforcement).
Punishment often causes the individual to AVOID BEING PUNISHED rather than stop the undesired behaviour…
Punishment can cause the individual to associate the punishment with the PUNISHER, rather than the BEHAVIOUR.
Punishment may train an individual about what NOT to do, but it doesn’t train WHAT to do.
each individual has his or her own needs. Therefore, which reinforcement will “work”, or not, must be found by experimenting with that particular animal or person.
There is also some evidence of gender differences. Linguistically, males show more left-hemisphere dominance; women show more bilateral, symmetrical patterns of function. (Kimura, 1987)
Right hemisphere (spatial perceptions, patterns)
Left hemisphere (languages, arithmetic)
The Angiogram is essentially an X-ray picture of dyes injected into the blood. It is therefore limited to blood vessels and activity.
it is valuable for detecting potential stroke diseases, tumours, etc.
PET or Positron Emission Tomography scan (from the 1980s), uses mildly radioactive glucose injected into the body and detectors to create MOVING pictures of the active brain. Thus, the brain can be seen working while someone is active – speaking, listening to music, drawing…
Acetylcholine (or ACh) excites and may be responsible for memory.
Dopamine excites and is involved in movement, attention and learning.
Serotonin (or 5-HT) usually inhibits and is involved in arousal and sleep (e.g. inhibiting dreaming), mood (e.g. inhibiting depression), appetite and sensitivity.
The testes produce “testosterone” which is an “anabolic steroid”. “Anabolic” means “building up” – it builds muscle and breaks down fats. Testosterone is produced relatively constantly and is one cause of aggressive behaviour (Hutt, 1972).
testosterone has been seen as a possible innate cause of gender differences. For example, most violent crimes are committed by men.
Oestrogens are “catabolic steroids”. “Catabolic” means “breaking down” – they break down muscle and build fat. (They also cause water retention, hence the weight increases at certain times of the month.)
Progesterone prepares the female for pregnancy (“gestation”) – lining the uterus, lactation, stopping egg production.
Birth control pills increase their levels to trick the body into thinking that it's already pregnant
Male hormones are CONSTANT and SIMPLE (like a glass of spirits!) Female hormones are CYCLIC and COMPLEX (like a cocktail!)
children under 6 years cannot “Conserve Number” – they do not realize the number is the same even if the arrangement is different. From about 6 years they can Conserve Number, realizing that the arrangement is not relevant. Understanding about volume comes later.
maternal deprivation correlates positively with juvenile delinquency (Bowlby, 1944), and so produced his (emotive!) conclusion that mothers should stay at home with their children.
This argument was used by governments to persuade mothers not to go out to work – a convenient ploy to get unemployed ex-servicemen back to work in the early 1950s.
Anna Freud and Sophie Dann published a case study (1951) about a group of 6 orphans, all around three years old, rescued from a World War II concentration camp. They were brought to England and ended up at the Bulldog’s Bank refugee centre, where they were extremely aggressive.
However, they apparently survived their psychological traumas, by bonding with each other, and became socially normal within about three years.
Compatibility: people tend to “pair off” with those who are generally similar or “matching”. This applies to physical attractiveness (Murstein, 1972) and other factors, such as education, IQ (Hatfield et al, 1978). Culture, especially religion, can also be important (Newcomb, 1961). Sometimes, though, it’s a case of “opposites attract” (Winch 1955).
Rewards and Costs: attention, affection, trust, security, sharing, skills, information, status, money, energy, reproduction, sex…
Profit = reward - cost
There may also be a sense of investment in a relationship, and compromises based on expectations, e.g. “I don’t expect a good-looking, rich wife/husband”.
Physical Attraction is initially important, especially for men (Walster et al, 1966)
Familiarity and Exposure seems to increase liking (Festinger et a...
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Reciprocal Liking – we tend to like people who we think like ...
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An attitude can be divided into 3 aspects: 1. Cognitive – the beliefs (factual & neutral) e.g. “Smoking is a major cause of cancer”. 2. Affective – the emotional feelings e.g. “I hate the smell of cigarettes”. 3. Behavioural – the actions taken e.g. “I only eat in non-smoking restaurants”.
Prejudice can be easily created, for instance, by saying that brown-eyed people are better than blue-eyed – as demonstrated by Jane Elliott (1977).
Asch (1951) found that a small group of people can influence a person to agree with an incorrect statement with about 1/3 always agreeing, and about 3/4 at least once. (Only 3 other people were required for maximum influence.) Reasons included…
This highlights the “sheep-like” nature of many people – very useful for socially acceptable behaviour (obeying the law, being polite, etc.); sometimes unfortunate (e.g. “fashion victims”); and potentially dangerous,
IQ Tests The first tests were created by Alfred Binet (1905) for use by French schools to identify and help less able school children. These tests produced a simple number, or quotient, summarizing abilities.
An IQ of 100 was chosen as the convenient average
Intelligence is probably the most controversial topic in Psychology! This is partly due to the use of IQ tests as selection tools – especially in schools. Instead of, for example, using them to help children (as Binet intended), the British only helped some.
