Physical features directly related to personality and metal processes Physiognomy Physical features directly related to personality and metal processes

Franz Joseph Gall That moral and intellectual faculties are innate     Franz Joseph Gall That moral and intellectual faculties are innate That their exercise or manifestation depends on organization That the brain is the organ of all the propensities, sentiments and faculties That the brain is composed of as many particular organs as there are propensities, sentiments and faculties which differ essentially from each other. That the form of the head or cranium represents the form of the brain, and thus reflects the relative development of the brain organs.  

He was a pioneer in the study of the localization of mental functions in the brain. Around 1800, he developed "cranioscopy", a method to divine the personality and development of mental and moral faculties on the basis of the external shape of the skull.

Claimed there are some 26 "organs" on the surface of the brain which affect the contour of the skull, including a "murder organ" present in murderers. Brain organs that were used got bigger and those which were not used shrunk, causing the skull to rise and fall with organ development. Gall's early work was with criminals and the insane and his brain "organs" reflected this interest. Phrenology

phrenological theories best accepted in England, where ruling class used it to justify the inferiority of colonial subjects. popular in the United States from 1820 to 1850

Debunking In 1808, the Institute of France assembled a committee of savants. - declared phrenology was not to be trusted (may not have had scientific evidence) Napoleon Bonaparte was furious because Gall's interpretation of his skull "missed" some noble qualities he thought he had.

Anthropometry In the 19th and early 20th centuries, used mainly to classify potential criminals by facial characteristics. Cesare Lombroso "Criminal Anthropology" 1895, associated certain craniofacial features to criminal types. (e.g., murderers have prominent jaws, and that pickpockets have long hands and scanty beards). Popular among the police and judicial systems in Italy and in many other countries. Well until the 30s, many judges ordered "lombrosian" anthropometric analyses of defendants in criminal charges, which were used against them by the prosecution in the trial procedures.

Craniology Influential during the Victorian era, Used by the British to justify racism and dominance of "inferior people", such as the Irish and the black tribes of Africa. "Inferior" races were said to be similar to apes and monkeys, so that they were considered to be more kin to these animals than the main European people (such as the Anglo-Saxon, of course...). Jonh Beddoe, the founder and president of the British Anthropological Institute, The Races of Man" (1862), developed "Index of Nigressence", stated that the Irish had crania similar to those of the Cro-Magnon pre-historic men and thus were a kind of "Africanoid" white race ! Bumps(1932)

National Hygiene Department in the Ministry of the Interior and in the Bureau for Enlightenment on Population Policy and Racial Welfare, proposed the "scientific" classification of Arians and non-Arians Official craniometric certification required by law “Many persons were sent to the death camps or denied marriage or work as a result of this "mismeasurement“. Stephen Jay Gould

Popularity in US 1838 - 1911

Quack Quack!! Phrenology gave rise to the invention of the psychograph by Lavery and White, a machine which could do a phrenological reading complete with printout. It is said that this device netted its owners about $200,000 at the 1934 Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago.

Localization of Function As it turns out, Gall and the phrenologists were correct when it came to the central debate of neurology of the time. The brain is compartmentalized, with each piece serving a specific function modern map is based on fundamental functions, such as Broca’s and Werinike’s Areas.

Franz Anton Mesmer

Early Studies of the Central Nervous System

Stephen Hales (1677–1761) English Botanist Worked with frogs. Hales showed that some reflexes are mediated by the spinal cord. Hales studied stones taken from the bladder and kidneys and suggested solvents which might reduce them without surgery. He also invented the surgical forceps.                        

Luigi Galvani~ 1780 Luigi Galvani touched the nerves of a frog's spinal cord with metal electrodes which caused contractions of the leg muscles. Galvanic Skin Response named after him, but not invented by him.

Charles Bell - 1823 Scottish surgeon-anatomist published "Essays on the Anatomy of Expression in Painting" Nerves of the senses could be traced from specific areas of the brain to their end organs.

Germany – birthplace of Psychology 1815 – 1871 – federation of 38 principalities. Wissenschaft – philosophy of education encouraged research, teaching academic freedom students wandered from university to university degrees involved sitting examinations or writing of thesis. Methods from Physiology Development of measurement instruments Replication of results Public data and academic debate Experimental methods

Johannes Peter Müller 1840 – further developed Bell’s research . The doctrine of Specific Nerve Energies Nervous stimulation is the link between the physical world and our psychological experience of it. For example, the visual nerves, however they may be stimulated, are only capable of transmitting visual data.

Mechanistic View of Human Behavior Müller – proposed that there was in addition to physical and chemical properties of the physiological system, there was also a “Vital Force” that could not be reduced further. (Vitalism) Mechanistic View – vitalism is a myth. All living organisms can be reduced to physical, chemical and mechanical principles. (Müller’s Students, Helmhotz).

Emil Du Bois-Reymond - 1850 Developed very sensitive galvonometer. Was able to measure the role of electrical impulses in neural conductance “No force other than the common physical chemical ones are active within the organism.”

Hermann Ludwig von Helmholtz Physicist Speed of neural conductance. (90 feet per second) Established Reaction Time As a measure of Psychological Processing.

More Helmholtz … Invented ophthalmoscope – for examining retina. Trichromatic theory of Color Vision

Opponent Process Theory Herring

Charles Wheatstone (1833)

Psychophysics Ernst Weber – two point threshold.

Weber’s LAW Thresholds – just noticeable differences. How much does a stimulus need to change before it can be detected. JND/S = k Studied the relationship between the physical and the psychological.

Gustav Fechner Studies on afterimages led to blindness. - became an invalid, depression. Recovered vision by “taking control over his life”. Mind-Body Controversy In his last work Fechner, aged but full of hope, contrasts this joyous "daylight view" of the world with the dead, dreary "night view" of materialism.

JND depends on the intensity of the standard Weber’s Law I/I = k Change in Intensity divided by Intensity of the standard is a constant. Not “Absolute” but it is predictable.