Edward chace tolman biography

Edward Chace Tolman (April 14, 1886 – November 19, 1959) was an Americanpsychologist. He was most famous for his studies of learning in rats using mazes, and he published many experimental articles, of which his paper with Ritchie and Kalish in 1946 was the most influential.

His major theoretical contributions came in his 1932 book, Purposive Behavior in Animals and Men, and in a series of papers in the Psychological Review including "The determinants of behavior at a choice point" (1938) and "Cognitive maps in rats and men" (1948), and "Principles of performance" (1955).

Tolman's goal was to understand human mental processes through experimental methods. Although he used rats in mazes as his technique, and was a behaviorist in his approach, he also incorporated significant ideas from Gestalt psychology.

His theories, while not necessarily accepted at the time, laid the foundation for later work in cognitive psychology and theories of decision maki