Edward Chance Tolman

Tolman’s Purposive Behaviorism

TIMELINE OF TOLMAN’S LIFE

Born in Newton, Massachusetts on April 14,1886Died on November 19, 19591911: Earned BS from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in electrochemistry1912: Introduced to Gestalt psychology1915: Earned Doctorate from Harvard-retroactive inhibitionHe spent most of his career at the university of California(Berkeley)

PURPOSIVE BEHAVIORISM-It combines the objective study of behavior while also considering the purpose or goal of behavior

-Tolman thought that learning developed from knowledge about the environment and how the organism relates to its environment.

-He is the only behaviorist who found the stimulus-response theory unacceptable.

SIGN GESTALT THEORY

-He put forth the notion that there are three parts to learning which work together as a gestalt.

-These are the “significant,” the “sign” and “means-end relations”

COGNITIVE MAP

-an internal perceptual representation of external environmental features and landmarks.

Tolman was a “centralist.”

Tolman also worked on “Latent Learning.”

INTERVENING VARIABLES

a.Dependent

b.Independent

c.Intervening

TOLMAN IDENTIFIED AT TLEAST SIX TYPES OF LEARNING

I. Learning by cathexes.II.Equivalence beliefs.III.Field Expectancies.IV.Field cognition modes.V.Drive discrimination.VI.Motor patterns.

TOLMAN WANTED TO DISPROVE THORNDIKE’S LAW OF EFFECT AND REPLACE IT WITH:

A.Law of motivationB.Law of EmphasisC.Law of Disruption