PSYC 2272 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Psychophysics, Wilhelm Wundt, Behavioralism
Document Summary
Goal: establish psychology as separate discipline and as rigorous empirical science. Model: observing effects of applying current to frog leg. Participant reports what was going on in his/her mind (self-report) External, physical world not same as internal, psychological world. Magnitude or strength of external, physical stimulus compared to psychological magnitude or strength. Psychophysics: the branch of psychology that deals with the relationships between physical stimuli and mental phenomena. Buying a ,00 car for ,001 is not salient but buying a . 00 candy bar for. Internal scale of money value is different from that of external world. Careful observation experiment: detection of increase in brightness, weight, etc. depends on absolute level of energy in stimulus. Participant presented with dim light (not much physical energy) small increase in brightness is noticed by participant. Participant presented with bright light (lots of energy) takes much more of an increase in brightness to be noticed by participant.
