Эдвард Чейс Толмен: Жизнь и вклад в психологию

American psychologist (1886–1959)

Edward Chace Tolman (April 14, 1886 – November 19, 1959) was an American psychologist and a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. 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). A Review of General Psychology survey, published in 2002, ranked Tolman as the 45th most cited psychologist of the 20th century. Tolman was one of the leading figures in protecting academic freedom during the McCarthy era in early 1950s. In recognition of Tolman's contributions to both the development of psychology and academic freedom, the Education and Psychology building on Berkeley campus, the "Tolman Hall", was named after him. Tolman attended MIT because of family pressures, but after reading William James' Principles of Psychology he decided to abandon physics, chemistry, and mathematics in order to study philosophy and psychology. Later, Tolman transferred to Harvard University for graduate studies and worked in the laboratory of Hugo Munsterburg.

Some of Tolman's early researches were early developments of what is now called behavioral genetics. Tolman would selectively breed rats for the ability to learn the mazes he constructed. Despite the fact that his major research focus involved instinct and purpose, he was open to the idea of researching innate abilities in the rats. Tolman's study was the first experiment to examine the genetic basis of maze learning by breeding distinct lineages of rats selected for their maze performance. Tolman started and continued this research project until 1932, where, after coming back from Europe on a sabbatical leave, his interest started to decrease. Tolman's theoretical model was described in his paper "The Determiners of Behavior at a Choice Point" (1938). The three different variables that influence behavior are: independent, intervening, and dependent variables. The experimenter can manipulate the independent variables; these independent variables (e. g., stimuli provided) in turn influence the intervening variables (e. g., motor skill, appetite). Tolman assessed both response learning and place learning. Response learning is when the rat knows that the response of going a certain way in the maze will always lead to food; place learning is when the rats learn to associate the food in a specific spot each time. In his trials he observed that all of the rats in the place learning maze learned to run the correct path within eight trials and that none of the response learning rats learned that quickly, and some did not even learn it at all after seventy two trials. Tolman was very concerned that psychology should be applied to try to solve human problems, and in addition to his technical publications, he wrote a book called Drives Toward War. Moreover, in one of his papers, "A theoretical Analysis of the Relations between Psychology and Sociology", Tolman takes independent, dependent, and intervening variables under the context of psychology and sociology. Then he puts them together and show the interrelations between the two subjects in terms of variables and research. In another publication, "Physiology, Psychology, and Sociology", Tolman takes the three subjects and explains how all three depend or interrelate with each other and must be looked at as a whole. Tolman creates a hypothetical situation and shows the conditions and interrelations between the three subjects in the situation. Tolman developed a two level theory of instinct in response to the debate, at the time, of the relevance of instinct to psychology. Instinct was broken down into two parts: determining or driving adjustments and subordinate acts. Adjustments are motivations or purposes behind subordinate acts, while the subordinate acts fulfill that purpose. Adjustments are the response to a stimulus and can be arranged in a hierarchy with the lowest adjustment producing subordinate acts. Subordinate acts are randomized independent actions, excluding reflexes, that are part of larger groups of activity. While considered infinitely numerous, the amount found in a grouping is limited with identifiable boundaries. The cycle begins with a stimulus that produces a determining adjustment or a hierarchy of adjustments. The lowest adjustment then cues subordinate acts that persist until the purpose of the adjustment is fulfilled. Humans are unique in that we can think out our actions ahead of time. Tolman called this thoughts of acts or thinking of acts. This prevents us from acting completely random until something finally works. Thinking of acts triggers an inhibitory process that prevents the determining adjustment from cuing subordinate acts. Following the thinking, a prepotent stimulus turns those thoughts into acts. There are two ways a stimulus would be considered prepotent: (a) the original adjustment is favorable to the act produced by the foresee stimulus, or (b) the stimulus creates an alternative adjustment more favorable than the original.

Edward Tolman started his academic career in Northwestern University, where he was an instructor from 1915 to 1918. The resulting court case, Tolman v. Underhill, led in 1955 to the California Supreme Court overturning the oath and forcing the reinstatement of all those who had refused to sign it.

Tolman received many awards and honors. He was president of the American Psychological Association (APA) in 1937 and chairman of Lewin's Society for the Psychological Study of Social issues in 1940; he was a member of the Society of Experimental Psychologists, the United States National Academy of Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. APA gave him an award in 1957 for distinguished contributions. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1949.

Tolman was married to Kathleen Drew Tolman. They had three children, Deborah, Mary, and Edward James. Noted singer songwriter, music producer Russ Tolman, is Tolman's grandson. As mentioned previously, Tolman's father wished for his son to eventually take over the manufacturing company. Tolman was more interested in pursuing psychology than pursuing his father's career. Fortunately his family was very supportive of this decision.