VLOP – Virtual Laboratory of Psychology
Introduction
The Projects Class of Professor Klaus Dufke and Visiting Professor Rand Evans has spent the past three weeks exploring elements of a long term project devoted to the public understanding of psychology as a science: The Virtual Laboratory of Psychology.
Psychology as a scientific, experimental science began in Germany in the 19th Century and was interested in topics such as sensation (how we experience vision, hearing, smell, taste and touch), perception (how we experience depth, complex experience such as musical chords, melodies), action (how quickly or accurately we respond to stimuli), cognition (how we solve problems, how we think, how we remember) and many others. To study these phenomena, experimental methods were devised and special scientific instruments were used.
The task of the Virtual Laboratory is to present phenomena that relate to these topics, experiments by which the phenomena were studied, the instruments used to study them in the “classic period” (1860-1940), and the explanations for the phenomena. The larger Virtual Laboratory project will take years to develop but what follows are examples of what will be there.
Virtual Laboratory of Psychology: Reaction-time Experiment
The reaction-time was one of the earliest and most important experiments in experimental psychology. It measured how long it takes a person to respond to different stimuli. The experiment always had a stimulus source (a sound, a light, a word), a way to respond (a hand key, a voice key, or a knee jerk) and a timing device (such as a Hipp Chronoscope) to measure the time between the stimulus and the response.
The experiment took many forms and the illustration shows only one of them. This experiment determined the time it takes to associate words. The stimulus is a memory device that shows a word. When the word appears, the clock starts. When the subject or observer sees the word he or she responds by saying the word associated with it. The response device in this case is a voice key. When the associated word is spoken into the voice key, the clock stops. The experiment measured the strength of an association by how short the reaction-time is. Strong associations produce short reaction-times, weak ones longer times.
Ansprechpartner Prof. Klaus Dufke und Prof. Rand B. Evans
Raum Haus 5 / 3.16
Telefon 0331 / 580 1414
Sprechzeiten Mi nach Vereinbarung
Prof. Rand B. Evans
Department of Psychology
College of Arts and Sciences
East Carolina University
Greenville, NC, 27858
USA
Raum Rawl 210
Telefon 252-328-1371