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Cognitive Theorists

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Submitted By jawbreaker
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Cognitive Theorist
PSY/390
Elizabeth Schnobrich
September 15, 2014

The cognitive theory is an approach to psychology that attempts to explain human behavior by understanding the thought process. In humans, it is assumed that thoughts are the primary determinants of emotions and behavior. The cognitive theory mainly rejects behaviorism because it reduces complex human behavior to simple cause and effect. However, there has been a trend going around the past decade or so that leans towards merging the two into what is known as cognitive behavioral theory. This allows therapists to use more techniques to help achieve goals. One cognitive theorist who is well known throughout psychology is Edward C Tolman. Edward C Tolman was a very influential theorist who introduced many new concepts and vocabulary into the field of psychology. Before psychology, Edward C Tolman studied engineering. He spent a majority of his career at Berkeley and eventually earned his Ph.D. at Harvard. He enjoyed working with his research students and confesses that he received many of his ideas from the students themselves.
Behaviorist said that psychology should study observable behavior and that nothing happens between stimulus and response. Basically, there are no cognitive processes that take place. Edward Tolman challenged these behaviorist by proposing that people and animals are active information processes and not passive learners as suggested. “Tolman believed individuals do more than merely respond to stimuli; they act on beliefs, attitudes, changing conditions, and they strive toward goals. Tolman is virtually the only behaviorists who found the stimulus-response theory unacceptable, because reinforcement was not necessary for learning to occur. He felt behavior was mainly cognitive. Tolman coined the term cognitive map, which is an internal representation (or image) of

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