Course: Experimental Psychology

Chapter# 1
Introduction to Experimental Psychology
Definition:
Experimental psychology is a branch of psychology that studies behavior and mental processes
in a controlled environment under lab conditions.
Nature of Experimental Psychology
It is method of studying psychological phenomena and processes. The experimental method in
psychology attempts to account for the activities of animals (including humans) and the
functional organization of mental processes by manipulating variables that may give rise to
behavior; it is primarily concerned with discovering laws that describe manipulability of
relationships. The term generally connotes all areas of psychology that use the experimental
method.
These areas include the study of sensation and perception, learning and memory, motivation, and
biological psychology. There are experimental branches in many other areas, however, including
child psychology, clinical psychology, educational psychology, and social psychology. Usually
the experimental psychologist deals with normal, intact organisms; in biological psychology,
however, studies are often conducted with organisms modified by surgery, radiation, drug
treatment, or long-standing deprivations of various kinds or with organisms that naturally present
organic abnormalities or emotional disorders.
Experimental psychology is important because the findings discovered by psychologists play a
vital role in our understanding of the human mind and behavior. By better understanding exactly
what makes people think, psychologists and other mental health professionals are able to explore
new approaches to treating psychological distress and mental illness.
Experimental Psychology: A Quick Overview
Why do people do the things they do? What factors influence how personality develops? And
how do our behaviors and experiences shape our character? These are just a few of the questions
that psychologists explore, and experimental methods allow researchers to create and empirically
test hypotheses. By studying such questions, researchers can also develop theories that enable
them to describe, explain, predict, and even change human behaviors.
For example, researchers might utilize experimental methods to investigate why people engage
in unhealthy behaviors.
By learning more about the underlying reasons why these behaviors occur, researchers can then
search for effective ways to help people avoid such actions or replace unhealthy choices with
more beneficial ones.
Experiments
In some cases, psychologists can perform experiments to determine if there is a cause-and-effect
relationship between different variables. The basics of conducting a psychology experiment
involve randomly assigning participants to groups, operationally defining variables,
developing a hypothesis, manipulating the independent variables, and measuring the depending
variables. For example, researchers could perform a study to look at whether sleep deprivation
impairs performance on a driving test. The experimenter could control for other variables that
might influence the outcome, but then vary the amount of sleep that participants get the night
before a driving test. All the participants would then take the same driving test via a simulator or
on a controlled course. By analyzing the results, researchers can then determine if it was changes
in the independent variable (amount of sleep) that led to differences in the dependent variable
(performance on a driving test). Experimentation remains the primary standard, but other
techniques such as case studies, correlational research, and naturalistic observation are
frequently utilized in psychological research.
What Do Experimental Psychologists Do?
Experimental psychologists work in a wide variety of settings including colleges, universities,
research centers, government, and private businesses. Some of these professionals may focus on
teaching experimental methods to students, while others conduct research on cognitive
processes, animal behavior, neuroscience, personality, and many other subject areas.
Those who work in academic settings often teach psychology courses in addition to performing
research and publishing their findings in professional journals. Other experimental psychologists
work with businesses to discover ways to make employees more productive or to create a safer
workplace, a specialty area known as human factors psychology.
The History of Experimental Psychology
• 1874 - Wilhelm Wundt published the first experimental psychology textbook,
Grundzüge der physiologischen Psychologie (Principles of Physiological Psychology).
• 1875 - William James opened a psychology lab in the United States. The lab was created
for the purpose of class demonstrations, rather than to perform original experimental
research.
• 1879 - The first experimental psychology lab was founded in Leipzig, Germany. Modern
experimental psychology dates back to the establishment of the very first psychology
laboratory by pioneering psychologist Wilhelm Wundt during the late nineteenth
century.
• 1883 - G. Stanley Hall opened the first experimental psychology lab in the United States
at John Hopkins University.
• 1885 - Herman Ebbinghaus published his famous Über das Gedächtnis ("On Memory"),
which was later translated to English as Memory. A Contribution to Experimental
Psychology. In the work, he described his learning and memory experiments that he
conducted on himself.
• 1887 - George Truball Ladd published his textbook Elements of Physiological
Psychology, the first American book to include a significant amount of information on
experimental psychology.
• 1887 - James McKeen Cattell established the world's third experimental psychology lab
at University of Pennsylvania.
• 1890 - William James published his classic textbook, The Principles of Psychology.
• 1891 - Mary Whiton Calkins established an experimental psychology lab at Wellesley
College, becoming the first woman to form a psychology lab.
• 1893 - G. Stanley Hall founded the American Psychological Association, the largest
professional and scientific organization of psychologists in the United States.
• 1920 - John B. Watson and Rosalie Rayner conducted their now famous Little Albert
Experiment, in which they demonstrated that emotional reactions could be classically
conditioned in people.
 • 1929 - Edwin Boring's book A History of Experimental Psychology was published.
Boring was an influential experimental psychologist who was devoted to the use of
experimental methods in psychology research.
• 1955 - Lee Cronbach published Construct Validity in Psychological Tests, which
popularized the use of the construct validity in psychological studies.
• 1958 - Harry Harlow published The Nature of Love, which described his experiments
with rhesus monkeys on attachment and love.
• 1961 - Albert Bandura conducted his now-famous Bobo doll experiment, which
demonstrated the effects of observation on aggressive behavior.
While experimental psychology is sometimes thought of as a separate branch or subfield of
psychology, experimental methods are widely used throughout all areas of psychology.
Developmental psychologists use experimental methods to study how people grow through
childhood and over the course of a lifetime. Social psychologists utilize experimental techniques
to study how people are influenced by groups. Health psychologists rely on experimentation and
research to better understand the factors that contribute to wellness and disease.