PROMINENT PHILOSOPHERS and THEORISTS

 

  

Wilhelm Wundt is the Father of Modern Psychology, was a German physician, physiologist, philosopher, and professor, known today as one of the founding figures of modern psychology. Wundt, who noted psychology as a science apart from philosophy and biology, was the first person ever to call himself a psychologist.

 

Sigmund Freud is the Father of Psychoanalysis and Psychosexual Theory. He was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst. Freud was born to Galician Jewish parents in the Moravian town of Freiberg, in the Austrian Empire.

 

Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi is the Father of Modern Education. He was a Swiss pedagogue and educational reformer who exemplified Romanticism in his approach. He founded several educational institutions both in German- and French-speaking regions of Switzerland and wrote many works explaining his revolutionary modern principles of education.

 

Ivan Pavlov is the proponent of classical conditioning theory and he was a Russian physiologist known primarily for his work in classical conditioning. From his childhood days Pavlov demonstrated intellectual curiosity along with an unusual energy which he referred to as "the instinct for research". Inspired by the progressive ideas which D. I.

 

Burrhus Frederic Skinner is the proponent for operant conditioning (Instrument), commonly known as B. F. Skinner, was an American psychologist, behaviorist, author, inventor, and social philosopher. He was the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology at Harvard University from 1958 until his retirement in 1974.

 

Edward Lee Thorndike is the proponent for the Laws of Learning (law of readiness, law of exercise & law of effect). He was an American psychologist who spent nearly his entire career at Teachers College, Columbia University. His work on comparative psychology and the learning process led to the theory of connectionism and helped lay the scientific foundation for educational psychology.

 

Albert Bandura is the proponent for social cognitive learning theory (Modelling), he was a Canadian- American psychologist who is the David Starr Jordan Professor Emeritus of Social Science in Psychology at Stanford University.

 

David Ausubel was an American psychologist. His most significant contribution to the fields of educational psychology, cognitive science, and science education learning was on the development and research on advance organizers since 1960 and the proponent for his Meaningful Learning Theory.

 

Jerome Bruner is responsible human cognitive psychology and cognitive learning theory in educational psychology. He was an American psychologist who made significant contributions to human cognitive psychology and cognitive learning theory in educational psychology. Bruner was a senior research fellow at the New York University School of Law.

Kurt Levin mastered Life Space Concept, known as one of the modern pioneers of social, organizational, and applied psychology in the United States. The approach, developed by Kurt Lewin, is a significant contribution to the fields of social science, psychology, social psychology, organizational development, process management, and change management. His theory was expanded by John R. P. French who related it to organizational and industrial settings.

 

Wolfgang Kohler specialized in Insight Learning or Problem Solving by Insight, was a German psychologist and phenomenologist who, like Max Wertheimer, and Kurt Koffka, contributed to the creation of Gestalt psychology. Insight learning is perhaps the greatest contribution Wolfgang Kohler made to psychology. Building off the influence of Gestalt psychology, Kohler discovered that learning can occur when we gain insight into an entire situation, as opposed to focusing only on an individual part.

 

Urie Bronfenbrenner - Ecological Systems Theory. (1917-2005) developed the ecological systems theory to explain how everything in a child and the child's environment affects how a child grows and develops. He labeled different aspects or levels of the environment that influence children's development, including the: Microsystem. He was a Russian-born American developmental psychologist who most was known for his ecological systems theory of child development. His scientific work and his assistance to the United States government helped in the formation of the Head Start program in 1965.

Sandra Bem - Gender Schema Theory. He was an American psychologist known for her works in androgyny and gender studies. Her pioneering work on gender roles, gender polarization and gender stereotypes led directly to more equal employment opportunities for women in the United States.

 

Howard Gardner - Theory of Multiple Intelligence. He believed that the conventional concept of intelligence was too narrow and restrictive and that measures of IQ often miss out on other "intelligences" that an individual may possess. He was an American developmental psychologist and the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education at Harvard University.

 

Elliot Turiel – Domain Based Moral Education and was an American psychologist and Chancellor’s Professor at the Graduate School of Education at the University of California, Berkeley. He teaches courses on human development and its relation to education.

 

Robert J. Sternberg - Triarchic Theory of Intelligence. These three examples exemplify Robert Sternberg's triarchic theory on intelligence. The triarchic theory describes three distinct types of intelligence that a person can possess. Sternberg calls these three types practical intelligence, creative intelligence, and analytical intelligence. He was an American psychologist and psychometrician. He is Professor of Human Development at Cornell University. Prior to joining Cornell, Sternberg was president of the University of Wyoming.

 

Lawrence Kohlberg - Moral Development Theory. The Theory of Moral Development is a very interesting subject that stemmed from Jean Piaget's theory of moral reasoning. Developed by psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg, this theory made us understand that morality starts from the early childhood years and can be affected by several factors. He was an American psychologist best known for his theory of stages of moral development. He served as a professor in the Psychology Department at the University of Chicago and at the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University.

 

Erik Erikson - Psychosocial Development Theory. He was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He may be most famous for coining the phrase identity crisis. His son, Kai T. Erikson, is a noted American sociologist.

 

Maria Montessori - Montessori Method, Transfer of Learning. She was an Italian physician and educator best known for the philosophy of education that bears her name, and her writing on scientific pedagogy. Montessori is a method of education that is based on self-directed activity, hands-on learning and collaborative play. In Montessori classrooms children make creative choices in their learning, while the classroom and the teacher offer age-appropriate activities to guide the process.

 

Edward Paul Torrance - Creativity Problem Solving and considered to be the Father of Creativity. He was an American psychologist from Milledgeville, Georgia. After completing his undergraduate degree at Mercer University, Torrance acquired a Master's degree at the University of Minnesota and then a doctorate from the University of Michigan. His teaching career spanned from 1957 to 1984.

 

Avram Noam Chomsky - Linguistic (Language) Acquisition Device (LAD). He was an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, and social critic. Sometimes described as "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. Noam Chomsky is a contemporary psychologist, linguist, and political activist known both for his theory of innate grammar and for his political activism.

 

Jean Piaget - Cognitive Development Theory. He was famous through a series of stages, Piaget proposed four stages of cognitive development: the sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational period. He was a Swiss psychologist known for his work on child development.

Piaget's theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemology". Piaget placed great importance on the education of children.

 

John Watson - Behaviorism Theory. He was an American psychologist who established the psychological school of behaviorism. Watson promoted a change in psychology through his address Psychology as the Behaviorist Views it, which was given at Columbia University in 1913. Through his behaviorist approach, Watson conducted research on animal behavior, child rearing, and advertising. In addition, he conducted the controversial "Little Albert" experiment and the Kerplunk experiment. Watson popularized the use of the scientific theory with behaviorism.

 

Edward Chace Tolman - Purposive Behaviorism. He was an American psychologist. Through Tolman's theories and works, he founded what is now a branch of psychology known as purposive behaviorism. Tolman also promoted the concept known as latent learning first coined by Blodgett.

 

Bernard Weiner - Attribution Theory on Achievement. He was an American social psychologist known for developing a form of attribution theory which explains the emotional and motivational entailments of academic success and failure. Bernard Weiner got interested in the field of attribution after the first studying achievement motivation.

 

Daniel Goleman- Emotional Intelligence. He was an author and science journalist. For twelve years, he wrote for The New York Times, reporting on the brain and behavioral sciences. Emotional Intelligence (Goleman) 3 years ago • Motivation Theories • Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is defined as the ability to identify, assess, and control one's own emotions, the emotions of others, and that of groups.

 

Hermann Ebbinghaus - law of forgetting. The forgetting curve hypothesizes the decline of memory retention in time. This curve shows how information is lost over time when there is no attempt to retain it. A related concept is the strength of memory that refers to the durability that memory traces in the brain. He was a German psychologist who pioneered the experimental study of memory, and is known for his discovery of the forgetting curve and the spacing effect. He was also the first person to describe the learning curve. He was the father of the eminent neo-Kantian philosopher Julius Ebbinghaus.

 

John Locke - Theory of Association. According to other social contract theorists, when the government fails to secure their natural rights (Locke) or satisfy the best interests of society (called the "general will" in Rousseau), citizens can withdraw their obligation to obey, or change the leadership through elections or other means. He was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the "Father of Liberalism".

 

Edward Thorndike - Belongingness and Connectionism. In 1898, was famous in psychology for his work on learning theory that lead to the development of operant conditioning within behaviorism. Whereas classical conditioning depends on developing associations between events, operant conditioning involves learning from the consequences of our behavior. He was an American psychologist who spent nearly his entire career at Teachers College, Columbia University. His work on comparative psychology and the learning process led to the theory of connectionism and helped lay the scientific foundation for educational psychology.

 

David McClelland - Needs Achievement Theory or Human Motivation Theory. Human Motivation Theory states that every person has one of three main driving motivators: the needs for achievement, affiliation, or power. These motivators are not inherent; we develop them through our culture and life experiences. He was an American psychologist, noted for his work on motivation Need Theory. He published a number of works during the 1950s and the 1990s and developed new scoring systems for the Thematic Apperception Test and its descendants.

 

Henry Murray - Theory of Psychogenic Needs. He was an American psychologist at Harvard University. He was Director of the Harvard Psychological Clinic in the School of Arts and Sciences after 1930. Murray developed a theory of personality calledpersonology, based on "need" and "press".

 

Victor Harold Vroom - Expectancy Theory. Vroom's expectancy theory assumes that behavior results from conscious choices among alternatives whose purpose it is to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. Vroom realized that an employee's performance is based on individual’s factors such as personality, skills, knowledge, experience and abilities. He was a business school professor at the Yale School of Management. He holds a PhD from University of Michigan and an MS and BS from McGill University.

 

Lev Seymenovich Vysgotsky - Sociocultural Theory or "zone of proximal development" (ZPD). His worked was largely unknown to the West until it was published in 1962. ... It asserts three major themes regarding social interaction, the more knowledgeable other, and the zone of proximal development. He was a Soviet psychologist, the founder of an unfinished Marxist theory of human cultural and bio-social development commonly referred to as cultural-historical psychology.



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