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Tolman's goal was to identify the complex cognitive mechanisms and purposes that guided behavior. [3] His theories on learning went against the traditionally accepted stimulus-response connections (see classical conditioning) at his time that had been proposed by other psychologists such as Edward Thorndike.
[1] [2] 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 (1929). [3] A Review of General Psychology survey, published in 2002, ranked Tolman as the 45th most cited psychologist of the 20th century. [4]
Tolman showed that behavior is goal directed and not controlled by random drives and reinforcement. Tolman used maze experiments with rats to show that rats can learn without reinforcement and are better understood as directed by goals and driven by cognitive expectancies. This finding provided a serious challenge to much of Hull's learning theory.
Behaviorism is a systematic approach to understand the behavior of humans and other animals. [1] [2] It assumes that behavior is either a reflex elicited by the pairing of certain antecedent stimuli in the environment, or a consequence of that individual's history, including especially reinforcement and punishment contingencies, together with the individual's current motivational state and ...
In later years, O'Keefe and Nadel attributed Tolman's research to the hippocampus, stating that it was the key to the rat's mental representation of its surroundings. This observation furthered research in this area and consequently much of hippocampus activity is explained through cognitive map making. [12]
Learning theory (education) – Theory that describes how students receive, process, and retain knowledge during learning Constructivism (philosophy of education) – Theory of knowledge; Radical behaviorism – Term pioneered by B.F. Skinner; Instructional design – Process for design and development of learning resources
One of Oppenheimer’s secretaries claimed he always kept one of Tolman’s letters in his pocket. Rumours of an affair between the two circulated – and are heavily hinted at in the film.
The lack of reinforcement, associations, or motivation with a stimulus is what differentiates this type of learning from the other learning theories such as operant conditioning or classical conditioning. [2] Latent learning is used by animals to navigate a maze more efficiently.