Thorndike American psychologist, pioneer of animal psychology, founder of psychological connectionism and founder of the educational psychology system. As a child, he is not good-looking, shy and lonely by nature. He can only find fun in learning and is particularly talented in l

Thorndike

Thorndike (1874-1949) American psychologist, pioneer of animal psychology, founder of psychological connectionism and founder of the educational psychology system. He proposed a series of laws of learning, including practice law and effect law , etc. He was elected as an academician of the National Academy of Sciences in 1917.

Character experience

Thorndike (Edward LeeThorndike, 1874-1949) was born on August 31, 1874 in Massachusetts, USA. His father was originally a lawyer and later became a pastor. As a child, he is not good-looking, shy and lonely by nature. He can only find fun in learning and is particularly talented in learning. His high school grades have always been in the top two. In 1891, he set foot on Wesleyan University in Middleton, Connecticut, majoring in English. When he graduated in 1895, he achieved the highest average score in 50 years. In his autobiography, he did not remember "heard or seen the word psychology" before he was in college, when he had to choose a compulsory course. He became interested in psychology after reading "Principles of Psychology" by William James . He went to Harvard to continue his graduate work, planning to study English, philosophy and psychology, but after listening to James' two classes, he was completely fascinated by the last course.

1896, he received another bachelor's degree in arts from Harvard and a master's degree in 1897. Despite his great respect for James, he chose a topic that was very uncharacteristic about James, "Chicken's intuition and intellectual behavior." At that time, James no longer engaged in experimental psychology, but he agreed to the topic and provided a place in his basement to Thorndike, who was not in a large enough laboratory, for animal experiments.

1898, Thorndike was hired as a university judge by Columbia University, providing him with scholarships. He brought two best-trained chicks to New York to continue his doctorate in this place that is more convenient for research. The instructor was James McKin Cartel, who was conducting research on measuring intelligence through human tests. Although Thorndike later conducted a mental test, in order to complete his doctoral thesis, he had to continue his animal study and research. He completed his famous cage study, thus earning his Ph.D. In 1899, Thorndike became a psychology lecturer at , Columbia University Normal College. According to the cartel's suggestion, Thorndike applied his animal research technology to children and young people, and then he used more and more people. Be a test subject and spend a lot of time on human learning, educational psychology tests and other fields.

Academic Perspectives

1.Connection-Error Learning Theory

Thorndike first used experimental methods to study the learning psychology of animals. He created experimental tools such as labyrinth circles, labyrinth boxes and cages to test the learning of animals such as fish, chickens, cats, and dogs. Based on these experiments, Thorndike believes that animal learning does not have the thinking of reasoning and deductiveness, and does not have any conceptual effect. The way animals learn is error , that is, animals gain experience by repeatedly trying error . The essence of this learning is to form a connection between stimulation and reaction, that is, "induction knot" . Therefore, the essence of learning lies in forming a connection between situations and reactions, and the connection formula is S-R.

2.Learning Law

Based on the experiment, Thorndike proposed three learning laws:

(1)Law of Readiness. The strengthening or weakening of the connection depends on the learner's psychological preparation and psychological conditioning state.

(2)Law of Exercise. Practice law means that the connection between stimulation and reaction will be strengthened by repetition or practice. If you do not repeat or practice, the power of the connection will be weakened.

(3) Law of Effect.The law of effect means that the connection between stimulation and reaction can be strengthened by the result of satisfactory results or weakened by the result of troubles.

In short, Thorndike emphasizes that all connections formed by stimulation and reaction are enhanced by application and satisfaction. Therefore, education must follow these two main learning laws. Teachers should first tell the students about the fun of homework, or arouse children's preparation with their own enthusiasm; carefully stipulate and strictly control the order of reactions, and finally form the required habits through continuous practice; pay attention to Whether students are tired and bored during the practice process; pay attention to the difficulty of learning content, and do not make students feel very difficult, which leads to discouragement.

3. The same element theory (learning the transfer theory)

Thorndike and others believe that migration is very specific and conditional, and needs to have common elements. Only when there are the same factors among the two functional factors, changes in one function will change the acquisition of the other. Migration occurs only when the stimuli in the two situations are similar and the responses are similar. The more identical elements in both situations, the greater the amount of migration.

Outstanding Contributions

In his academic career, he produced a total of 507 books, monographs and academic papers, which was a record-breaking achievement. Later psychologists may not have the exception of Piaget . People can compare with it. Thorndike's main contribution is as follows:

(1) Founded the discipline of educational psychology, which differentiated educational psychology from education and children's psychology and became an independent discipline. Therefore, Thorndike is known as the founder of educational psychology.

(2) borrows a large number of concepts of biology and physiology to establish his associative psychology theory. Most of its conclusions are based on psychological experiments, which makes his theory highly objective and contributes to the research of experimental psychology .

(3) Developed classical associationist psychology. His learning psychology is used throughout the word "connection", so he calls himself a "connectionist". The main feature of its connectionism is to emphasize the connection between situations and reactions, rather than the association or connection between ideas. Therefore, a completely objective frame of reference is combined with his psychological theory.

Thorndike is one of the important figures in the development of psychology. Although many of his insights have caused controversy and refutations, his learning theory has always occupied an important position in psychology. Some of his views, especially his law of effect, have always been a topic of debate among people. To this day, some people are still busy conducting detailed experimental research to verify the law of effect and strengthen the effect. Although some new learning theories and models emerged after Thorndike, his impact on animal and human learning methods and conclusions in the history of psychology is indelible.

Social evaluation

Thorndike has a wide range of research interests. He is the main representative of the American Columbia school, the pioneer of animal psychology experiments, the founder of the educational psychology system and connectionist psychology , and designed psychology Quiz, one of the leaders of the American Education Quiz movement. Because of this, some historians classified him as the American School of Functionalist Psychology, but many people think that he is more like a figure in the School of Behaviorism, but he himself thinks that he does not belong to any school.