Psychological Curriculum
Psychological foundations can be divided into three major theories: behavioral, cognitive, and constructivism. The behaviorist looks at learning as a series of stimulus responses and conditioning through reinforcement of behaviors. Cognitive psychology looks at how information is processed. The constructive theorist finds that learning occurs when the student constructs their own knowledge, and it is built on what the student already understands.
Behaviorism
Behaviorist Theorists
Edward Thorndike
Edward Lee "Ted" Thorndike was an American psychologist who spent nearly his entire career at Teachers College, Columbia University.
Ivan Pavlov
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov was a famous Russian physiologist. From his childhood days Pavlov demonstrated intellectual brilliance along with an unusual energy which he named "the instinct for research".
B.F. Skinner
Burrhus Frederic "B. F." Skinner was an American psychologist, behaviorist, author, inventor, and social philosopher. He was the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology at Harvard University from 1958 until his retirement in 1974.
Albert Bandura
Albert Bandura is a psychologist who is the David Starr Jordan Professor Emeritus of Social Science in Psychology at Stanford University.
Robert M. Gagne
Robert Mills Gagné was an American educational psychologist best known for his "Conditions of Learning". Gagné pioneered the science of instruction during World War II when he worked with the Army Air Corps training pilots.
Cognitive Theories
Cognitive Theorists
Maria Montessori
Robert Mills Gagné was an American educational psychologist best known for his "Conditions of Learning". Gagné pioneered the science of instruction during World War II when he worked with the Army Air Corps training pilots.
Jean Piaget
Jean Piaget was a Swiss developmental psychologist and philosopher known for his epistemological studies with children. His theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemology".
Lev Vygotsky
Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky was a Soviet psychologist, the founder of an original holistic theory of human cultural and biosocial development commonly referred to as cultural-historical psychology, and leader of the Vygotsky Circle.
Existentialism and Humanism Theories
Existentialist and Humanist Theorists
Carl Rogers
Carl Ransom Rogers was an influential American psychologist and among the founders of the humanistic approach to psychology.
Otto Rank
Otto Rank was an Austrian psychoanalyst, writer, and teacher. Born in Vienna as Otto Rosenfeld, he was one of Sigmund Freud's closest colleagues for 20 years, a prolific writer on psychoanalytic themes, an editor of the two most important analytic journals, managing director of Freud's publishing house and a creative theorist and therapist
Abraham Maslow
Abraham Harold Maslow was an American psychologist who was best known for creating Maslow's hierarchy of needs, a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, culminating in self-actualization.
Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic.
