The impact of the computational sciences on the premises

of cognitive psychology (1943-1957)

Borocco Etienne and Boutherin Thibault
Sommaire
Introduction
................................................................................................................................................................ 1
The context of the cognitive revolution: the domination of the behaviorist approach .........................2
The domination of the behaviorist approach in experimental psychology.........................................2
The failure of the anti-theoretical approach of Behaviorism
............................................................................................................................................................ 2
The teleological criticism....................................................................................................................2
The inadequacy of behaviorism..........................................................................................................
The systemic approach of mind and the computational metaphor
............................................................................................................................................................
The emerging computer science constituted a ne! formal frame!or" for modeli#ing intelligence......
The Turing $achine and the %on &eumann's architecture:................................................................
The $acy conferences (1)*+-1),-: the cyberneticist dream of a ne! transdisciplinary approach......*
The importance of the information theory in the information-processing approach.........................*
The ideal of .ybernetics or a systemic explanation for every phenomenona ....................................,
1),+: the birth year of cognitive psychology/........................................................................................,
0eorge 1. $iller: the introduction of information's theory in experimental psychology....................,
.homs"y: the revolution of language.................................................................................................,
The beginning of artificial intelligence !ith 2erbert 3imon and 1llen &e!ell....................................+
The influence of the computational metaphor on psychology...............................................................+
The progress in the emerging computer science led some psychologists to vie! the brain as a "ind
of computer........................................................................................................................................ +
The rather indirect influence of computational theory......................................................................+
.onclusion.............................................................................................................................................. +
4eferences.............................................................................................................................................. 5
Introduction
Developments associated with the theory of computation led some psychologists
and neurophysiologists to view the nervous system as kind of information processor, a
theoretical metaphor that made it legitimate to think in terms of goals and
representations. (Baars, 1986)
The computational metaphor that results from the development of the computational
sciences inspired a new approach in experimental pscholo! entitled co!nitive
pscholo!" #o!nitive pscholo! is also called information$processin! pscholo!,
%ecause co!nitive pscholo!ists are interested in representations that human %ein!s
have of themselves and of their environment and how these representations are
transformed"
&n this paper, we focus on the ver %e!innin! of the co!nitive revolution, which is
in fact a process that too' decades to %e completel fulfilled" To %e more specific, the
co!nitive revolution is the passa!e from the %ehavioristic approach of experimental
pscholo! to the co!nitive approach" (e can define %ehaviorism as a particular
conceptual framewor' of experimental pscholo! that dominated the field of pscholo!
%etween the 19)*s and the 19+*s" (e will develop the principles and the limits of this
approach" The transformation of representations is the principle of information
processin!" ,ven thou!h the co!nitive revolution has its roots in the -*s and +*s, and
was completed % the 6*s, the term co!nitive pscholo! appeared late, with a %oo' %
.lric /eisser in 1960"
1ur period of stud starts in 19-), when the mathematician /or%ert (iener, his
assistant 2ulian Bi!elow and the phsician and phsiolo!ist 3rthur 4osen%lueth
pu%lished an article entitled Behavior, 5urpose and Teleolo! inspired % the
en!ineerin! wor' of (iener and Bi!elow on tar!et$see'in! mechanism" This article
provided a stron! criti6ue of %ehaviorism %ased on the concept of teleolo! (the stud of
final causes)"
(e end our stud with the pu%lication of the lecture notes of the lin!uist /oam #homs'
%ecause we thin' that this event mar's (with the pu%lication of the article the ma!ical
num%er seven plus or minus two % the pscholo!ist 7eor!e 8iller in 19+6) a turnin!
point in pscholo!, with a !rowin! 6uestionin! of the %ehaviorism" These two
contri%utions are lin'ed with a multidisciplinar conference that too' place in 19+6 at the
8&T a%out information theor" 9rom our point of view, it si!nals the decline of %ehaviorism
and the %e!innin! of the institutionali:ation of the co!nitive sciences"
1ur analsis concerns the .nited ;tates of 3merica onl as it is difficult to tal' a%out a
co!nitive revolution outside of the .;3< %ehaviorism has never reall %een dominant
somewhere else" &n ,urope, in addition to the fact that war caused trou%les in the
practice of science, a variet of movements were represented in pscholo! (7estalt
pscholo!, pschoanalsis and the wor' of 2ean 5ia!et and 9rederic Bartlett) and
%ehaviorism was not the most important of them" &n the ;oviet .nion, a phsiolo!ical
analo!ue to %ehaviorism prevailed, %ut it has remained lar!el confined to the ;oviet
sphere of influence (Baars, 1986)"
1ur main interest is the contri%ution = direct and ma%e more importantl indirect
= of the dawnin! computational science to the movement called co!nitive revolution that
affected experimental pscholo! in the middle of the >>th centur" (e aim to show that
the %e!innin!s of computational sciences and the new ideas that emer!ed at the time
constituted 'e elements to explain the profound chan!e that affected the field of
pscholo!"
9irstl, we will tac'le the reasons of the dissatisfaction a!ainst %ehaviorism, a
method which dominated experimental pscholo!" (e will summari:e the context of this
domination and present some important criticisms that were addressed to %ehaviorism"
(e will also see how the computational metaphor com%ined with the teleolo!ical
outcomes in feed%ac' and information theor influence the emer!in! co!nitive
pscholo!" (e will introduce the sstemic vision of the mind and its lin' with the
computational metaphor, and we will explain how the dawnin! of computational science
influenced the theoretical framewor' of co!nitive pscholo!"
(e will then deal with the 8ac conferences and determine the contri%utions of
teleolo! to the co!nitive pscholo!" The 19+6 8&T smposium conference and the
ma?or contri%utions that were presented here will %e mentioned"
9inall, we will insist on the importance of the computation metaphor over the
co!nitive revolution"
The contet of the cognitive revolution! the domination of
the "ehaviorist approach
The domination of the "ehaviorist approach in eperimental psychology
.nder the influence of a few pscholo!ists, includin! 2"B" (atson, B"9" ;'inner, and #"@"
Aull, the %ehaviorist approach in pscholo! !ained influence in the 19B*s and was
dominant in the earl 19-*s"
The main %elief that %inds to!ether %ehaviorist is the conception of pscholo! as the
science of %ehavior" CBy behavior is meant any change of an entity with respect to its
surroundings. This change may be largely an output from the object, the input being then
minimal, remote or irrelevant; or else the change may be immediately traceable to a
certain input. ccordingly, any modification of an object, detectable e!ternally, may be
denoted as behavior.C (4osen%lueth, (iener, Bi!elow, 19-))
8oreover, accordin! to this approach, pscholo! should %e scientific and o%?ective" 1ne
of the main conse6uences of this view is that the su%?ects of pscholo! should %e
pu%licl o%serva%le" &ndeed, %ehaviorists mainl focus on inputs and outputs. B output
is meant an chan!e produced in the surroundin!s % the o%?ect" B input, conversel, is
meant an event external to the o%?ect that modifies this o%?ect in an manner" &n other
words, %ehaviorists were not concerned with what happened in the mind of people" The
refused concepts li'e ima!ination, the mind, or mental representation, which the
re!arded as too imprecise" The used a limited num%er of concepts that were defined
operationall, % precise and relia%le experiments, so that their results were interpreted
within narrow theoretical limits"
They argued that mental events are not publicly observable. The only objective
evidence available is, and must be, behavioral. By changing the subject to the study of
behavior, psychology could become an objective science based on scientific laws of
behavior. The behavioral revolution transformed e!perimental psychology in the "#.
$erception became discrimination, memory became learning, language became verbal
behavior, intelligence became what intelligence tests test. (8iller B**))
The main purpose of %ehaviorism was to tr to place experimental pscholo! on the
same footin! as natural sciences li'e phsics or %iolo!" B the earl 19-*s, this
approach had %ecome dominant, leavin! little to no place to others points of view that
were considered unscientific" Behaviorists meant to show that even complex
phenomena mi!ht %e understood in terms of principles of learnin!, with %ehavior seen as
made up of learned responses to particular stimuli"
The failure of the anti-theoretical approach of #ehaviorism
3ccordin! to 8iller (B**)), it %ecame clear that %ehaviorism could not continue to
succeed in the mid$19+*s" &n their attempt to reduce pscholo! to o%serva%le facts onl,
%ehaviorists failed to explain all their results" Behaviorists were accumulatin! results of
experiments without %ein! a%le to explain them, which constituted a considera%le
limitation"
The teleological criticism
The %ehavioristic method of stud omits the specific structure and the intrinsic
or!ani:ation of the o%?ect" This ar!ument was at the center of the criticisms addressed to
%ehaviorism even %efore the 19+*s, in particular from teleolo!ists" The teleolo! is the
stud of desi!n or purpose in natural phenomena, and in this perspective, teleolo!ists
have a tendenc to favor a functionalist method< &n their 19-) article (Behavior, $urpose
and Teleology), (iener, Bi!elow and 4osen%lueth hi!hli!hted the fact that in a functional
analsis, as opposed to a %ehavioristic approach, the main !oal is the intrinsic
or!ani:ation of the entit studied, its structure and its propertiesD the relations %etween
the o%?ect and the surroundin!s are relativel incidental"
This article leveled a teleolo!ical criticism at %ehaviorism and aimed to demonstrate the
superficialit of %ehaviorism % decomposin! the motives of %ehavior"
$igure scheme from %#ehavior& purpose and teleology%
The conduct the followin! reasonin!< first, the ma'e a distinction %etween active
%ehavior and passive %ehavior" &n an active %ehavior, the o%?ect is the source of the
output ener! involved in a !iven specific reaction" &n passive "ehavior, on the contrar,
the o%?ect is not a source of ener!D all the ener! in the output can %e traced to the
immediate input"
3mon! the active %ehavior, the author ma'es a new distinction %etween purposeful and
purposeless %ehavior" 3 purposeful %ehavior is meant to denote that the act or %ehavior
ma %e interpreted as directed to the attainment of a !oal" 3t the opposite, a
purposeless %ehavior is not interpreted as directed to a !oal" 3ccordin! to the authors,
the %asis of the concept of purpose is the awareness of voluntar activit"
The point the made was simple, %ut it called into 6uestion the foundations of
%ehaviorism" (hen a human %ein! acts voluntaril (we can tell that he adopts an active
purposeful %ehavior), he thin's directl a%out his purpose and not a%out the succession
of actions that will lead him to his !oal" 9or example, when a person %rin!s a !lass of
water to his mouth, he is thin'in! a%out his !oal (drin'in! water) and he is not focused on
the succession of movements that will allows him to reach his o%?ective" Aere resides,
accordin! to the author, the %ehaviorist error" The harshl critici:ed %ehaviorism
%ecause of its ina%ilit to explain the mechanism of voluntar activit< %e submit that
this failure is due to the fact that when an e!perimenter stimulates the motor regions of
the cerebral corte! he does not duplicate a voluntary reaction; he trips efferent, output
pathways, but does not trip a purpose, as is done voluntarily.C 9urthermore, the
hi!hli!hted the fact that it was possi%le to %uild machines that function % followin! a
purposeful %ehavior" 9or example, a tar!et$see'in! missile has a purposeful %ehavior
that relies on feed%ac' to modif its steerin!" 3ctuall, (iener and Bi!elow wor'ed on
anti$aircraft !uns durin! the ;econd (orld (ar and invented an anti$aircraft predictor" &n
order to calculate its tra?ector, this machine uses a model of the %ehavior of a pilot, and
re!ulates its %ehavior than's to a corrective feed%ac'"
The notion of feed%ac' is important to understand the teleolo!ical ar!ument" To !ive a
%road definition of the notion of feed%ac', we could sa that it is a situation in which a
part of the output of an o%?ect %ecomes an input of this o%?ect" Aowever, the term
feed%ac' is also emploed in a more restricted sense to mean that the %ehavior of an
o%?ect is controlled % the mar!in of error %etween the actual result and the aim"
This is interestin! %ecause % %uildin! machines that %ehave followin! a precise !oal
and adaptin! its %ehavior throu!h the mechanism of feed%ac', (iener and Bi!elow
showed that the %ehaviorist vision of human %ehavior (i"e" stimuli$response %ehavior)
was superficial" The %ehaviorist framewor' is una%le to explain !oal$directed action, and
in order to stud this 'ind of %ehavior, a functionalist approach would %e necessar"
The functionalist approach induced % teleolo! implies to ela%orate theories to explain
the relations %etween %ehavior and purpose" Aowever, this implied to resort to a
theoretical framewor' which does not fit with the anti$theoretical point of view claimed %
%ehaviorists" This refusal of a theoretical framewor' was also the core of the #homs'Es
criti6ue"
The inade'uacy of "ehaviorism
&t %ecame o%vious durin! the 19+*s that the %ehaviorist approach was inade6uate, and
that pscholo! had to overcome its limits"
#homs' used an interestin! metaphor durin! his interview with Baars (1986) to
explain the causes of this failure when he states that reducin! pscholo! to a
%ehavioral science was similar to reducin! natural sciences to meter$readin!
sciences"
The main point of the ar!ument is that % refusin! to consider theoretical ar!uments,
%ehaviorists closed the door to am%itious explanations of the human %ehavior" The
comparison with other sciences, and especiall those considered at the time to %e the
most scientific (i"e" natural sciences), allows us to understand this criticism a!ainst
%ehaviorism"
&ndeed, in the natural sciences, theoretical wor' and ima!ination often plaed a 'e role
in the pro!ression of scientific 'nowled!e" The theories of /ewton, Farwin or ,instein
were %orn from intuition, and the did not have stron! empirical proof to support their
ideas" Aowever, the scientific communities of their time too' their contri%ution in
consideration" &n the case of pscholo!, the domination of %ehaviorism prevented an
different approach from %ein! favora%l received in the scientific communit, which
constituted a serious limitation to the advances of pscholo!" ;ome scientists wor' in an
intuitive and theoretical wa, and ima!ination is sometimes a powerful tool that led to
!reat scientific advances" B narrowin! their field of stud and the diversit of the tools
accessi%le, %ehaviorists were preventin! some potentiall explanator theor to emer!e"
The systemic approach of mind and the computational metaphor
The o%?ect of stud of the functionalist method implied % the teleolo!ical epistemolo! is
the intrinsic functionin! of o%?ects" 3ccordin! to this method, some entities wor' than's to
functions puttin! the different elements of the entit in interaction" The entit is not
composed onl % the sum of the elements %ut is also defined % their interactions"
system can be defined as a set of elements standing in interrelations& (Bertalanff, 1969)"
The important point is that teleolo! !ives us an incentive to %e interested in the finalit
of sstem< researchers must investi!ate the utilit of sstems" The purpose of a sstem is
to maintain itself % satisfin! the needs that condition its functionin!" The main pro%lem
encountered % the stud of sstems is the complexit en!endered % the interactions of
the elements that compose it" &ndeed, %ecause of the importance of interactions,
reductionism cannot %e used, and %ecause of its complexit, studin! the human$%ein!
sstem as a whole needs sometimes a transdisciplinar approach" &ndeed, the sstemic
approach was %rou!ht up to date % the emer!in! computers science"
lready by the late '()*s, the conceptual apparatus e!isted to provide a formal
justification for cognitive psychology (Baars, 1986)" 3 computer en!ineer does not loo'
onl at the inputs and the outputs to understand how the machine is wor'in! when he is
runnin! a pro!ram on it" Ae has to stud the mechanisms inside the computer" The
mechanisms are phsical (the hardware) as much as functionals (the software)" 3s a
comparison to a human %rain, ou can descri%e oneEs %rain phsicall (neurophsiolo!)
or what happens in the mind of the individual (the pscholo!)" The mind was a %lac'%ox
for %ehaviorist and notions li'e intelli!ence, memor or consciousness were not studied
%ecause it could not %e o%served" #omputers are e6uipped of a memor and can
compute al!orithms than's to formal tools" This development led pscholo!ists to re!ain
interest in such concepts"
The emerging computer science constituted a ne( formal
frame(or) for modeli*ing intelligence
The Turin! 8achine is considered to %e at the %e!innin!s of the computer, and was a
theoretical device which was theoreticall a%le to compute an al!orithm" #omputers
were later at the %asis of artificial intelli!ence" Then, it appeared that the raw material for
artificial intelli!ence to interact with its surroundin!s to accomplish its !oals was
information" The theor of information of ;hannon %rou!ht a mathematical definition
which shed a new li!ht on this concept"
The Turing +achine and the ,on -eumann.s architecture!
&t is important to note that computers existed theoreticall %efore the %ecame a realit"
The Turin! machine (19)6) was a hpothetical device that manipulates sm%ols on a
strip of tape accordin! to a ta%le of rules" The #hurch$Turin! theorem states that a
function is calcula%le % humans if it is al!orithmicall computa%le % a Turin! machine"
Thus, a computer can act out arithmetic operations, but also logical deductions,
analyses of synta!, representations of objects in space, or control of the movement of a
robot, as long as these events can be represented in terms of some e!plicit set of
symbols and operations (Baars, 1986)" Auman %ein!s are a%le to calculate what is
possi%le accordin! to this theorem" &n 19-8, Turin! said< man provided with paper,
pencil, and rubber, and subject to strict discipline, is in effect a universal machine&. The
Gon /eumannHs architecture (19-+) was %uilt upon the #hurch$Turin! theorem" B
creatin! computers, the man'ind was e6uipped of a machine a%le to compute
al!orithms, somethin! that onl humans were previousl a%le to do"
$igure ,on -eumann architecture
The 3rithmetic @o!ic .nit (3@.) computes %asic operations" The #ontrol .nit (#.)
se6uences operations" 8emor stoc's data and pro!rams which tells to the #. what
calculus to do" There are two tpes of memor< random access memor (438) and
secondar memor (dis' hardware for example)" This architecture is fundamental
%ecause it implies that theoreticall, a machine can %e e6uipped with an information$
processin! sstem associated with a memor"
9urthermore, in 19-), (arren 8c#ulloch, a neurophsiolo!ist, and (alter 5itts, a
lo!ician, showed that a Turin! machine could %e implemented to simulate a neuron"
Then, the created the first artificial neuron networ' which was a net of Turin! machines"
The 8c#ulloch$5itt neuron had limited applications %ut it contri%utes to enhance the idea
that computers were intelli!ent sstems which could %e compared to human intelli!ence"
3t the end of the war, the comparison %etween the computer and the nervous sstem
too' root" #omputers were intelli!ent machines with memor" Then, the idea emer!ed to
appl the results of the vivid computer science to pscholo!"
The +acy conferences (194/-1953)! the cy"erneticist dream
of a ne( transdisciplinary approach
The need of a new transdisciplinar approach was the main idea of 3rturo 4osen%lueth
when he presented his ?oint wor' with /or%ert (iener and 2ulian Bi!elow in 8a of 19-B
at the conference on cere%ral inhi%ition (which was in fact on hpnosis) sponsored % the
2osiah 8ac 2r" 9oundation" 1ri!inall, this or!ani:ation formed % Iate 8ac @add, the
dau!hter of 2osiah 8ac 2r, aimed to fund medical research"
The idea of feed%ac' interested (arren 8c#ulloch" 3fter the war, he convinced
mem%ers of the foundationEs %oard to or!ani:e a set of conferences a%out the
ela%oration of a new sstemic approach which would allow a %etter understandin! of
intelli!ence"
The possi%le connection %etween information theor, pscholo!, neurophsiolo! and
other social sciences led a num%er of researchers to thin' after the war that a new
transdisciplinar field could emer!ed" ;lava 7erovitch (B**B) wrote<
+n early '()) von ,eumann and %iener held an interdisciplinary meeting at $rinceton at
which several computer engineers, physiologists, and mathematicians discussed the
analogy between the computer and the nervous system. %iener evaluated the results of
the meeting with great enthusiasm- .t the end of the meeting, it had become clear to all
that there was a substantial common basis of ideas between the workers in the different
fields, that people in each group could already use notions which had been better
developed by the others, and that some attempt should be made to achieve a common
vocabulary.
This common voca%ular was a ma?or sta'e in the communication %etween different
sciences" ;everal conferences tried to solve this issue"
9rom 19-6 to 19+), a series of interdisciplinarit conferences funded % the 8ac
9oundation too' place with the purpose of !ivin! stron!er %asis to a new scientific
approach whose pillar would %e the concepts of feed%ac' and circular causalit"
3mon! the scientists participatin! in the 8ac conferences were mathematicians,
pscholo!ists and other social scientists, as well as neuro%iolo!ists" The 8ac
conferences aimed to explore the emer!in! parallels %etween machines and livin!
or!anisms" ;cientifics from different disciplines sou!ht application to new concepts
%rou!ht % the %e!innin! of the computational sciences"
The importance of the information theory in the information-processing
approach
The information theor was the pillar of man new ideas that emer!ed in the +*s
toward co!nitive pscholo!" 3ccordin! to this theor, &nformation should not %e
confused with si!nificance (;hannon and (eaver, 19-9)" &nformation is defined as a
choice made between alternatives in some e!isting representation in a message/
receiver, as a conse0uence of the same choice signaled by the sender of the message.
(Baars, 1986)" ;hannon stressed a fundamental idea, which is that information allows to
ma'e choice"
;econd, the transmission of information is a 'e point" The sender has to ma'e
the receiver understand its order" ;hannon, as a Bell Telephone en!ineer, conducted
researches a%out the noise pro%lem" ,xternal distur%ances in the channels harm
communication" This led him to 0uantify the limits of a channel1s capacity and the use of
redundancy (9ranJois, 1990)" The redundanc is the repeated occurrences of the world
that contri%utes to decrease uncertaint"
$igure 0hannon.s diagram (1941)
The uncertaint !enerated % the noise can distur% the communication of
information of which communication is limited % the transmission capacit" ;hannon
raised another ma?or sta'e of information which is communication" &ndeed, the
information transmitted could %e distorted durin! the act of communication" ;hannon
made a fundamental issue emer!ed for telecommunication, maximi:in! the amount of
information which is transmitted while limitin! the distur%ance"
(eaver, the co$author of The mathematical theory of communication,
emphasi2ed the connections of KinformationEsL theory with stochastic processes
(9ranJois, 1990) in particular 8ar'ov chains" Then, ;hannon and (eaver su!!ested a
lin!uistic where each sentence would %e a chain of word" The pro%a%ilit for a word to
appear depends onl on the previous word, independentl of all of the others words used
%efore" The onl feasi%le wa to learn the pro%a%ilit of each word is to !ather statistics
from data and introduce some smoothin! method for the man cases where there is no
data"
To summari:e, the Turin! machine which is the theoretical representation of an ideal
computer showed that it could do onl what a human %ein! is a%le to do" Then, if
computers are a%le to process information with a feed%ac' and to transmit it, an Auman
%ein! can do that"
The ideal of 2y"ernetics or a systemic eplanation for every phenomenon
&nspired % the conferences, (iener pu%lished his foundin! article in 19-8, #%ernetics
or #ontrol and #ommunication in the animal and the machine, which esta%lished a new
theor com%inin! feed%ac' and information theor" The etmolo! of the word
c%ernetics is the !ree' word 'u%ernetes which means pilot of a political entit" The
c%ernetics is the science of self$!overnin!, or !oal$directed, sstems" The context was
favora%le to the development of the idea, %ecause there was a stron! movement of
diffusion of the information theor at this time" #%ernetics emer!ed as a utopia< for
some of the pioneers, everthin! could %e modeled under the form of a sstem and
explained % the information theor, which is the mainsta of c%ernetics" Aowever, li'e
man other encompassin! theories, c%ernetics proved to have a limited explanator
power even thou!h it had the merit to create an interdisciplinar interest a%out the
development of the computational sciences"
The ideas presented durin! the 8ac conferences would have pro%a%l not
emer!ed and %ecome popular had the discussion ta'en place within a sin!le discipline"
9or example, concepts li'e circular causalit and feed%ac's that came from
computational sciences found an application in a wide variet of phenomena in different
discipline, includin! experimental pscholo!"
3ccordin! to Baars (1986), number of the leading thinkers in each field attended the
conference repeatedly, and we may suppose that they found the meeting worth their
while, but the impact of the new computational theories did not seem to affect the
scientific work of most participants.
195/! the "irth year of cognitive psychology3
The 11 septem%er 19+6, three ears after the 8ac conferences, a conference too'
place at 8&T entitled .the #ymposium on +nformation Theory& in which all the core ideas
of the co!nitive revolution were alread contained" 8an important actors of the comin!
co!nitive movement were present< 7eor!e 3" 8iller, /oam #homs', Aer%ert 3" ;imon
and 3lan /ewell" 7eor!e 3" 8iller later claimed that this conference was the %irthda of
co!nitive science (8iller, B**))" The revolutionar idea at the %asis of co!nitive
pscholo! emer!ed< a parallel can %e stressed %etween the wa human %ein!s process
information and the functionin! of computers"
3 review of the most important wor's presented durin! this conference is useful to
understand how the computational sciences affected pscholo!"
4eorge 56 +iller! the introduction of information.s theory in eperimental
psychology
7eor!e 3" 8iller presented his foundin! article, The 8a!ical /um%er ;even, 5lus or
8inus Two< ;ome @imits on 1ur #apacit for 5rocessin! &nformation" &n introduction of
his article, he claimed that the e!periments on the capacity of people to transmit
informations K"""L would not have been done without the appearance of information theory
on the psychological scene, and since the results are analy2ed in terms of the concepts
of information theory"
The information theor shed a new li!ht on the concepts of information and
communication"
5scholo!ists conducted experiments to see how information was used % human
%ein!s ma'in! choices and a%ove all how the communicate and share information" The
!oal of the experiment was to measure the proportion of the information that is
transmitted when the amount of information increase" The su%?ect of the experience is
considered as a communication channel" The limitation of the su%?ectEs a%ilities to
transmit information is a channel capacity" The AumanEs channel capacit is determined
% the limitations of the memor span" 3ccordin! to 8iller, the informationEs theor
constitutes an interestin! 6uantitative wa to stud the human transmission of
information"
2homs)y! the revolution of language
3t the opposite, #homs' was critical a%out the informationEs theor" Ae applied the
mathematical automata theor to lan!ua!e and su!!ested for the first time his tree
theor of !rammar" Ae thou!ht that lin!uistic should %e understood as a set of rules and
not in terms of pro%a%ilit, which is the ar!ument of the information theor of ;hannon
and (eaver" #homs' defended the followin! thesis< statistical models do not provide
an insi!ht and do not reveal the underlin! principles of lin!uistics" &n information theor,
information measurement is based on probabilities and increasingly the probabilities
seemed more interesting that their logarithmic values, and neither the probabilities nor
their logarithms shed much light on the psychological processes that were responsible
for them.& (8iller, B**))" #homs' disa!reed with ;hannon a%out learnin!" #homs'
thou!ht that a lan!ua!e is or!ani:ed % a set of rules, the !rammar, that allows a user
to produce sentences" The memor plas a role in the production of sentences" &ndeed,
people donHt decide what the third word of a sentence should %e % consultin! a
pro%a%ilit ta%le 'eed on the previous two words, rather the map from an internal
semantic form to a sntactic tree$structure, which is then lineari:ed into words" This is
done without an pro%a%ilit or statistics"
#homs' stated in introduction of the articleEs a%stract, %e find that no finite/state
3arkov process that produces symbols with transition from state to state can serve as an
English grammar. Ais %oo' #yntactic structures& (19+0) is a !oin! deeper that his
presentation at the 8&T smposium" Ae demonstrated mathematicall usin! automata
theor that the class of chaining theories 4technically called 3arkov processes5 cannot
in principle represent even the simplest kind of grammar that is needed to represent the
linguistic competence of human beings. (Baars, 1986)"
The #homs'Es wor' was a ma?or %low to the %ehaviorist meta$theor, not onl in
lin!uistics, %ecause #lar' @" Aull, a %ehaviorist, showed that stimulus/6esponse models
are only a subclass of 3arkov models.& (&nterview with 2ames 2" 2en'ins % Baars,
1986)" &f 8ar'ov chains are inade6uate, then the ;timuli$4esponse scheme is not
ade6uate to explain human processes neither" &t was an electric shoc' inside the
pscholo!ist communit which provo'ed an awareness of the %ehaviorismEs inade6uac"
The dominant paradi!m %e!un to decline and the co!nitive movement started to
develop" ;ome %ehaviorists, li'e ;'inner, tried to resist and conserve their influence %ut
to no avail" The lost their dominant position" The shift occurred and nothin! could stop it"
/onetheless, the 19+0 %rea' is the end result of a lon! evolution which starts in the
middle of the -*Es with the renewal of teleolo!ical epistemolo!"
The "eginning of artificial intelligence (ith 7er"ert 0imon and 5llen -e(ell
;ince the %e!innin!, computers %ecame 6uic'l interestin! for mathematical applications
%ecause the could compute without doin! attention error li'e humans" Aer%ert ;imon
noticed that if we can use computers for calculus, we could use them for lo!ical theor" +
saw that hierarchical structures in computers ought to have something to do with
hierarchical structures in thinking processes (&nterview with Aer%ert ;imon in Baars,
1986)" The comparison %etween computer and the thou!ht was at the center of the
artificial intelli!ence" 3len /ewell and Aer%ert ;imon put forward the idea that %oth
Aumans and computers are intelli!ent sstems which process sm%ols" ,ver intelli!ent
sstem is a phsical sm%ol sstem e6uipped of control, memor, a set of operations,
input and output" 3 sm%ol is a meanin!ful pattern that can %e manipulated" 3 sm%ol
sstem creates, copies, modifies, and destros sm%ols" ,ssentiall, a sm%ol is one of
the patterns manipulated as a unit % a sm%ol sstem" The term phsical is used
%ecause sm%ols in a phsical sm%ol sstem are phsical o%?ects that are part of the
real world, even thou!h the ma %e internal to computers and %rains" The ma also
need to phsicall affect action or motor control" Then a phsical sm%ol sstem involves
production sstems M an operation which is carried out if a certain specific condition is
met" The intermediation is provided % 5ro!rams" C$rograms consist of long se0uences
of such production systems operations on the data base"C (7ardner, 198+)" Then 3"
/ewell, 2" #" ;haw and A" ;imon desi!ned a pro!rammin! lan!ua!e named &nformation
5rocessin! @an!ua!e (&5@)" /ewell had the role of lan!ua!e specifier$application
pro!rammer, ;haw was the sstem pro!rammer and ;imon too' the role of application
pro!rammer$user" &5@ was the first lan!ua!e a%le to order sm%ols in lists" The first
pro!ram coded with &5@ was the logic theorist which was presented at the smposium" &t
was the first pro!ram to prove a lo!ical theorem usin! methods that Aumans (expert in
mathematics) can do" Their application was a%le to simulate human pro%lem$solvin!
processes< the logic theorist was considered as the first artificial intelli!ence pro!ram"
The term artificial intelli!ence comes from 2ohn 8c#arth who or!ani:ed the
first artificial intelli!ence conference at the Fartmouth #olle!e in summer 19+6 with 3lan
8ins' and #laude ;hannon" 8c#arth and 8ins' %ecame later famous %ecause the
founded in 19+9 the 8&T #omputer ;cience and 3rtificial &ntelli!ence @a%orator and
%rou!ht important contri%utions to the field of artificial intelli!ence" 2" 8c#arth created
the @&;5 lan!ua!e which is a enhanced version of &5@ and %ecame ver popular in
artificial intelli!ence pro!rammin!" 3llen /ewell and Aer%ert 3" ;imon also presented at
this conference their logic theorist" &t corresponded to the conferenceEs am%ition which
was to stud learnin! and intelli!ence with machines a%le to simulate it" 2ohn 8c #arth
and al wrote in the Fartmouth 3& 5ro?ect 5roposal< n attempt will be made to find how
to make machines use language, form abstractions and concepts, solve kinds of
problems now reserved for humans, and improve themselves.& This attempt did not meet
the expectations of 2" 8c#arth and 3" 8ins' %ut it institutionali:ed the field of artificial
intelli!ence and it stressed the aims of this new discipline in pscholo!"
3ll these scientists thin' that the theory of computation/could guide research in both
psychology and computer science (2ohn T" Bruer)" The 3& upholders shared the same
dream that c%erneticists< creatin! a new transdisciplinar science which would %e a%le
to stud Aumans as machine"
The influence of the computational metaphor on
psychology
The progress in the emerging computer science led some psychologists to
vie( the "rain as a )ind of computer
&n the a%ove, we tr to explain the emer!ence of the concept of computational metaphor"
(e saw that the %e!innin!s of c%ernetics and artificial intelli!ence influenced the wa
pscholo!ists thin' a%out the human mind"
The computational metaphor that emer!ed at this time was a powerful vector of chan!e
in experimental pscholo!" &ndeed, the emer!in! computer sciences and its offshoot,
3rtificial &ntelli!ence, appropriated li'e memor, reasonin!, pro%lem solvin!,
cate!ori:ation, decision$ma'in!, and lan!ua!e" 3ll these concepts recovered the
le!itimac the had lost more than thirt ears %efore with %ehaviorism" 8oreover, the
computers cataly2ed things that would be happened more slowly anyhow. 7omputers
give us an e!istence/proof of the comple!ity that is possible in information/processing
systems. This made us all feel a lot freer (interview with 7eor!e 3" 8iller in Baars,
1986)" This is an important point" The pro!ress of the emer!in! computer science
constituted an accelerator of pscholo!Es histor %ecause it offered a powerful metaphor
a%out the mind that the underlin! inade6uac of %ehaviorism %ecame under dali!ht"
The important point is that the co!nitive pscholo! was computationalist as the
ori!in" The co!nitive processin! was assimilated to the sm%ols transformin!" #o!nitive
science %ecame more concerned with how the %rain wor's and how it is possi%le to
simulate its process rather than wonderin! how it is made of (7erard #ase and 3idan
8oran, 1989)" The computational metaphor ma %e expressed in the followin! wa< the
mind is governed by programs or sets of rules analogous to those which govern
computers. (i%id) The methodolo!ical implication of the computational metaphor was
even found in the definition of the discipline as .lric /eisser expressed it in his %oo'
co!nitive pscholo! (1960)< that the study of cognition was much like trying to find out
the program of an operating computer. #omputers offered a mana!ea%le wa to
represent complexit, that was ver appreciated % co!nitive pscholo!ists who
espoused a sstemic approach" 9inall, the metaphor allowed to esta%lish a computer
criterion which stated the followin! principle, if a theor is consistent, it should %e
computa%le"
The rather indirect influence of computational theory
Aowever, accordin! to Baars, the impact of the rapid advances in computational theor
on the course of scientific pscholo! was pervasive %ut in the same time indirect"
&ndeed, most pscholo!ists interested in the ideas emer!in! from the conferences 'new
little a%out the mathematical ar!uments ori!inatin! from information theor"
There was a resistance amon! the pscholo!istsE communit %ecause most of
them were exclusivel committed to an empirical proof procedure" 8ery few
psychologists became directly involved with computational theory, and those who did
were often not considered to be doing psychology.& (Baars, 1986)
/onetheless, the ideas of co!nitive revolution spread and the affected even
those who refuted the computational metaphor % reintroducin! concepts which were
considered as unscientific % %ehaviorists who advocated a non theoretical approach"
The co!nitive revolution li%erated the theoretical ima!ination" The use of theor to
explain uno%serva%le aspects of mind was appropriated anew % experimental
pscholo!" That is the most important conse6uence of the co!nitive revolution"
2onclusion
The pro!ress in computer science provided the material for renewin! experimental
pscholo!" &t led pscholo!ists to stud how human %ein!s process information, i"e"
transform representations" @imitations existed on information theor %ecause stochastic
processes are not a%le to modeli:e lin!uistics and it helped co!nitive pscholo! to show
the inade6uac of %ehaviorism a%out lan!ua!e"
The computation metaphor was an important conceptual tool for pscholo!ists"
The emer!ence of machines with %ehavior re!ulated % corrective feed%ac', and the
teleolo!ical conception of %ehavior led to renewed interest for concepts such as mind or
consciousness in pscholo!" ;ome scientists, li'e /or%ert (iener, had the am%ition to
create a unified science %ased on the information theor" Aowever, the did not mana!e
to do it, and c%ernetics staed a relativel mar!inal crossdisciplinar enterprise, even
thou!h it permitted to diffuse important concepts of computational sciences in other
disciplines" &nformation theor, c%ernetics and artificial intelli!ence influenced the future
co!nitive pscholo! in two was" 9irst, the provided formal tools to stud intelli!ence"
;econd, the shed a new li!ht on concepts li'e information and memor for example"
The renewal of the methods and the concepts a%out intelli!ence had a li%eratin! effect
on the theoretical ima!ination in experimental pscholo! which was excluded % the
%ehaviorist ri!idit" Aowever, the influence was more indirect" 9ew pscholo!ists 'new
a%out the mathematical foundations of information theor, automata theor or
c%ernetics"
The 6uiet co!nitive revolution continued until 196+ until it %ecame the dominant
approach to experimental pscholo!" &deas li'e information, c%ernetics or computation
%ecame !ranted % contemporar pscholo!ists even if the did not ma'e them explicit
(Baars, 1986)" .lric /eisserEs %oo', 7ognitive $sychology, pu%lished in 1960, %ecame
the reference text%oo' of the discipline" Ais %oo' endorsed the computational metaphor"
Aowever, he later tried to reconcile his approach with the ecolo!ical pscholo! of 2" 2"
7i%son that claims that it is a necessit to 'now the environment in which a human %ein!
lives in order to ma'e predictions a%out his %ehavior" 3rtificial intelli!ence was critici:ed
to %e out of touch with the real world % remainin! within la%orator"
#o!nitivism, as %ehaviorism, did not promote field experience" &t led an openin! to the
ecolo!ical pscholo! which %ecame later environmental pscholo!, an approach
focused on the interpla %etween humans and their surroundin!s"
8eferences
- Baars, B" 2" (1986)" The co!nitive revolution in pscholo!" /ew Nor', /"N"< 7uilford
5ress"
$ #ase 7" and 8oran 3" The Computational Metaphor and Cognitive Psychology Irish Journal of
Psychology , Vol. 101, No. , !1"#"$, pp. 1%&-1'1
$ #homs', /" (19+6)" CThree models for the description of lan!ua!eC " +6E Transactions
on +nformation Theory (B)< 11)=1B-" doi <1*"11*9OT&T"19+6"1*+681)"
$ #homs', /" (19+0) ;ntactic ;tructures, 8outon
$ 9ranJois, #" ;stemics and #%ernetics in a historical perspective = ;stems
4esearch and Behavioral ;cience,Gol"16,/r"), 1999
- 7ardner A", The 3ind9s ,ew #cience- :istory of the 7ognitive 6evolution, /ew Nor'<
Basic Boo's, 198+"
$ 7erovitch ;, 9rom /ewspea' To #%erspea'< 3 Aistor 1f ;oviet #%ernetics , B**B
$ Aeims, ;" 2" (199))" #onstructin! a social science for postwar 3merica< the c%ernetics
!roup, 19-6$19+) (1st ed")" #am%rid!e, 8ass" u"a"< 8&T 5ress"
$ 8c#arth 2" et al"D Fartmouth 3& 5ro?ect 5roposal, 3u!" )1, 19++
$ 8iller, 7"3" (19+6) the ma!ical num%er seven, plus or minus two" 5schol" 4ev" 6), 81=
90
$ 8iller, 7"3 The co!nitive revolution< a historical perspective, Trends in 7ognitive
#cience, 0 ()), B**)"
$ ;hannon, #" ," 3athematical Theory of 7ommunication , Bell ;stem Technical
2ournal, Gol" B0, pp" )09=-B), 6B)=6+6, 19-8" K1L KBL
$ ;hannon, #" ," and (eaver (" The 3athematical Theory of 7ommunication. The
.niversit of &llinois 5ress, .r%ana, &llinois, 19-9" &;B/ *$B+B$0B+-8$-
$ ;'inner, B"9" (19+0) Ger%al Behavior, 3ppleton$#entur$#rofts
$ Gon /eumann, 2 " (19-+), ;irst Draft of a 6eport on the ED87 , retrieved 3u!ust B-,
B*11