9.00 Introduction to – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner The Ubiquity of Freudian Theory in Everyday Life • “He drives that Corvette because it’s really phallic” Major Approaches to Psychology • “My roommate is busy alphabetizing her shirts. She’s so anal!” Part I • “His mother is really domineering. No wonder he’s so screwed up.” The Psychoanalytic (Freudian) • “She’s unhappy because she’s so uptight and Approach repressed.” • “If only Mel had an outlet so that he could vent his hostility and channel it into more productive activities, he wouldn’t have shot up the post office with an Uzi.”

Sigmund Freud

• Some biographical facts. 1856-1939. • Background in neurology: – Aphasia – – Cocaine

1 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Sigmund Freud, continued Components of Freudian Theory

• Radical themes: • 1. Psychic energy (The hydraulic model) – – – Irrationality – Sexuality – – Hidden conflict – Importance of childhood – Lack of accidents • Comparison with Copernicus, Darwin

Components of Freudian The Id (“it”) Theory, continued • The pleasure principle: Gratification of desire. • Primary process thinking. • 2. The Structural Theory – Infancy – Superego – Dreams • House = body – Ego • King & Queen = mom & dad – Id • Children = genitals • Playing with children = ... • Journey = death • Stairs = sex • Bath = birth – “Freudian Slips” – Free – Psychosis

2 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Primary process thinking of the Structural theory, cont.: Id, continued 2. The Ego • Symbolization & displacement – Phallic symbols • The . – Father figures • Delay of gratification. – Etc… • Secondary process thinking. • Uses libido to control id: • Repression and censorship

Structural theory, cont.: 3. Components of Freudian The Superego Theory, continued • Conscience • The Topographic Theory • Identification with parents, internalization – The conscious mind of their rules and values before they are – The mind understood. – The unconscious mind • Anxiety

3 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Relation of the topographic Components of Freudian theory to the structural theory Theory, continued • The Developmental Theory (“Psychosexual Stages”) • Each stage: – Physical focus of libido (erogenous zones) – Psychological theme – Adult character type • The advancing-army metaphor. Fixation, .

Freud’s Developmental Freud’s Developmental Theory,continued Theory,continued • 1. (Birth – 18 months) • 2. (Two’s) – Breast-feeding: Automatic gratification of – Theme: control, self-control, obedience desire – Conflict: toilet training – Theme: dependency – Too tough: “Anal retentive.” Orderly, stingy, – Conflict: weaning stubborn – Too early: too independent – Too easy: “Anal expulsive.” – Too late: too dependent and entitled – Toilet training à Ego – Oral fixation, regression

4 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Freud’s Developmental Freud’s Developmental Theory,continued Theory,continued • 3. (Three -- Four) • Boys: – Notice that boys and girls are different – Oedipal feelings – Focus on penis • Desire for mother, hostility to father – Themes: – • Love – Identification with father • Sex – If unresolved: • • anxious promiscuity or asexuality • Jealousy • homosexuality

Freud’s Developmental Freud’s Developmental Theory,continued Theory,continued • Girls: • Formulation of superego through – identification – Electra • Freud vs. : • Desire for father, hostility to mother – Penis envy – Identification with mother – Castration – If unresolved: – Seduction theory. • Flirts with older men, or dominates (castrates) them

5 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Freud’s Developmental Neurosis Theory,continued • 4. (Four – puberty) • Anxiety from superego (conscience) & ego • 5. (practicality) repressing id. – “Generative” stage; maturity. Not always • Defense mechanisms of the ego: reached – – Productivity; artistic, scientific creativity – Repression (don’t deny it, but don’t think about – “To love and to work” it either) – Theory of female orgasm – Reaction formation (gay-bashing, anti-porn, protesting too much)

Psychoanalytic Neurosis, continued • Psychotherapist: Anyone who treats people with psychological problems (MD, PhD, social worker, guidance counselor, minister) – Projection • Psychiatrist: MD specializing in psychological – Rationalization (e.g., punishing for own good) problems. Can prescribe drugs – Displacement (smoke pipe, kick dog, throw • Clinical psychologist: PhD specializing in psychological problems. Can’t prescribe drugs; darts) can do testing. – (e.g., dentistry, law, painting) • Psychoanalyst: Psychiatrist or psychologist who – Intellectualization has been trained in Freudian theory at a Psychoanalytic Institute and has undergone .

6 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, Psychoanalysis in continued Intellectual Life • Identify conflicts via free association, slips, • Literary criticism, e.g., Hamlet dreams, resistance, defenses. Higgledy-piggledy, • Bring conflicts into ; deal Hamlet of Elsinore rationally & emotionally with them Ruffled the critics by dropping this bomb: • “Talking cure.” “Phooey on Freud and his Psychoanalysis. • , schmoedipus, I just loved Mom.” • Practical trappings: couch, 50-minute hour, daily, for years. Cure?

Psychoanalysis in Scientific Evaluation Intellectual Life • Literary criticism, e.g., Hamlet • Burden of proof for: • The arts, e.g., Psycho – Unparsimonious theory about unobservable entities • Politics, e.g., The Sixties – Remarkable claims (e.g., penis envy, Oedipal conflict) • Hidden desires + defense mechanisms = • Widespread assumptions unfalsifiability – Importance of early childhood • Contradictory predictions: Unresolved Oedipal – Hydraulic model feelings à asexuality, promiscuity, homosexuality – Repression • “Heads I win, tails you lose.” – symbolism

7 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Scientific Evaluation, continued Scientific Evaluation

• Where’s the evidence that: • Failures of some tests: – Weaning too early causes independence? – Oedipal conflict (Trobrianders) – Weaning too late causes entitlement? – Dreams – Toilet-training too early causes obsessiveness? – Schizophrenia, autism, etc. – Toilet-training too late causes laxness? – Childhood & personality – Etc. – Psychoanalytic psychotherapy (vs. drugs)

The Behaviorist Approach (-Response, Skinnerian) • Behaviorist ideas in every life: Major Approaches to Psychology – “He’s really fat because he was brought up to Part II associate food with love.” – “Women have been conditioned to be nice and The Behaviorist Approach to defer to men.” (Stimulus-Response, Skinnerian) – “Our culture reinforces boys for .” – “I don’t believe that your dog is feeling guilty; you’re just anthropomorphizing him.”

8 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

The Behaviorist Approach, continued • Rolling Stones: – Oh, yeah, when you call my name I salivate like Pavlov’s dogs.

1. Environmentalism &

– Traditional idea: criminality, genius, morality, etc., were “in the blood.” Components of the – John B. Watson: Behaviorist Approach • Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.

9 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

3. Stimulus-Response 2. Theory

• A philosophy of psychology: Anti- • Two major learning mechanisms • Taboo: beliefs, desires, wishes, , (“conditioning”) images, emotions, ideas, feelings, perceptions, – Classical conditioning expectations, … – • OK: stimuli, responses, reinforcers (rewards) • Explanation by – Current stimulus situation – Past history of learning

Classical Conditioning

• Other names: Pavlovian conditioning, respondant conditioning, conditioned • Respondants versus operants – similar to “involuntary” versus “voluntary.”

10 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Operant Conditioning

• Other name: Instrumental conditioning; ; the Law of Effect. • Thorndike and his cats.

11 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Operant Conditioning, continued

• Positive versus negative reinforcement. • Positive versus negative . • • Continuous versus Intermittent schedules of reinforcement. – Fixed or Variable Ratio – Fixed or Variable Interval • Stimulus generalization (what animal does) • Stimulus discrimination (what experimenter trains animal to do).

12 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Operant Conditioning, continued

• successive approximations. • Secondary reinforcers & chaining. • Pigeons & pingpong. • Which other organisms?

13 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

Skinner and Human Behavior

• Programmed learning. • Token economies. • Behavior therapy. • Utopian visions: Walden Two; Beyond Freedom and Dignity

Scientific Evaluation

14 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

1. Chomsky’s Critique of Chomsky’s Critique of Verbal Behavior Verbal Behavior, continued • Skinner explained language as reinforced • Behaviorists’ answer: “Stimulus generalization” behavior. and “response generalization” – these sentences are similar to ones that have been reinforced under • But virtually every sentence a person utters similar stimuli. is creative. • Problem with answer: similar in what way? – “Mommy, can I put my head in the mailbox so – Physical definition of stimulus, response, reinforcement: wrong. the mailman can know where I are?” – Abstract definition of stimulus, response, – “We holded the baby rabbits.” reinforcement: just common sense – doesn’t explain anything!

• Another example of creative behavior: • “Your money or your life!” • Appropriate responses for the first time, but how? • Again: – Physical explanation: “In the past, when the guy was in the presence of a mugger-in-striped-jerseystimulus, – Physical definition of stimulus, response, the response of handing over his wallet was positively reinforcement: wrong. reinforced by not being killed, and the response of not – Common-sense definition of stimulus, response, handing over his wallet was positively punished by reinforcement: empty. being killed.” • Behaviorism redescribes old-fashioned, – Abstract explanation: In the past, when the guy was in the presence of a threat, the response of compliance common-sense ideas about “beliefs” and was reinforced by safety. “desires” as bogus stimuli and responses, not physical things you can measure.

15 9.00 Introduction to Psychology – Fall 2001 Prof. Steven Pinker Week 2, Lecture 1: Major Approaches to Psychology I: Freud & Skinner

2. Innate Constraints on Learning • Equipotentiality as a keystone of behaviorism. • Chomsky: Innate basis for human language. • Garcia: Preparedness (belongingness). • If learning is biologically prepared, general laws of learning explain only a small part.

3. Computers

• Rehabilitation of internal representations, processes. – “Why isn’t my computer printing?” – “Because the program doesn’t know you replaced your dot-matrix printer with a laser printer. It still thinks it is talking to the dot -matrix and is trying to print the document by asking the printer to acknowledge its message. But the printer doesn’t understand the message; it’s ignoring it because it expects its input to begin with ‘%’ … • Demise of the homunculus objection.

16