approaches flashcards - full topic (copy)

what subject did psychology originate from

philosophy

when did psychology become its own subject

17th century - 1800s

who do we know as the first psychologist

Wilhelm Wundt

where was the first psychology lab created

Leipzig University - Germany

what did Wundt propose in regards to why psychology should be studied

all aspects of human behaviour should be tested experimentally and believed to do this empirically (understanding the senses)

what is structuralism

to investigate the nature of human consciousness through our sensations (how we feel) and perception (how we see thingS) down to their individual elements

what is introspection

it is a process in which a person gains knowlgade about is/her own mental and emotional state (systematic analysis of our conscious experience)

who did Wundt orignally test introspection on

his colleagues then himself

how did Wundt test introspection

presented parcipants with carefully controlled stimuli (most cases = moving images or auditory tones eg. ticking metronome)

they were asked to provide a description of inner processes they experienced (eg. thoughts or feelings towards the stimuli) an these results were recorded

evaluating Wundt

strength: method was reliable and valid and paved the way for scientific approaches - empirical method instead of using just facts, standardised procedure and controlled environment = more reliable research and better replications (more consistent results)

limitation: considered unscientific today - relied on participants self-report (bias and subjective) and participants may have hidden or withheld information making results inaccurate

1900s psychology

behaviourist questioned the usefulness of introspection - subjective methods

focus on behaviour that could be seen and carefully controlled

1950s psychology

introduced studying the mind - cognitive psychology (input = what we see or experience in the environment and process = how the brain responds output = our behaviour)

more legitimate and highly scientific studies

1980s psychology

utilised advances in technology to investigate physiological processes as they happen

understand relationship between genes and behaviour

evaluating modern psychology

strength: scientific research - controlled and unbiased (objective) measures taken to keep it accurate

limitation: not all approaches use objective methods (eg. humanistic approach fails to account for demand characteristics)

4 types of behaviourist approaches

classical conditioning, operant conditions, reinforcement and Skinner’s research

when was the behaviourist approach introduced

start of the 20th century

what is classical conditioning

when a stimulus is consistently associated with another stimulus and trains to produce a consistent response

who tested classical conditioning

Ivan Pavlov

Ivan Pavlov (1927)

experimentally testing dogs in a lab to see the effect of classical conditioning

method: paired an unconscious stimuli (food) with a neutral stimuli (bell) to produce a conditioned response (salivating) to the now conditioned stimuli (bell)

what is positive reinforcement

when something pleasant is added to a situation

what is negative reinforcement

when something unpleasant is removed to a situation

what is positive punishment

when something unpleasant is added from a situation

what is negative punishment

when something pleasant is removed from a situation

who came up with operant conditioning

B.F Skinner

what is Skinner’s box

a box containing a rat which tested reinforcement and punishment to condition the rat

reinforcement in Skinners box situations

positive: pulling the lever = food

negative: pulling the lever = deactivating the electric shocks

evaluating the behaviourist approach

strength: practical applications and can improve lives - led to developments for treating anxiety disorders eg. phobias (systematic desensitisation)

strength: it is scientific and establishes cause and effect relationships - well controlled and manipulation over extraneous variables, also allows for establishment of cause and effect relationship between consequences and future behaviour (falsifiability)

limitation: research is limited in uses (due to practical and ethical issues) - studies based off animals (pigeons and rats) not humans = more developed and have free will so doesn’t entirely determine reinforcement associations

limitation: it is reductionist and oversimplified - too basic to say all behaviour is caused by simple reflex responses to stimuli shaped by conditioning (no consideration of biological or cognitive accounts and contributions), Seligman = different responses to same stimuli and conditions

fallibility

the hypothesis that reinforcement increases likelihood of repitition

what is reductionist

reducing behaviour down to a basic level/set of principles

Seligman (1970)

not all species will be conditioned to respond the same way to a stimuli - eg. electric shock + snakes = fear in snakes but electric shock + flower doesn’t mean fear of flowers (biological preparedness)

who introduced social learning theory

Albert Bandura

what is social learning theory

acknowledges the important role that mental processes play in interpreting the environment and planning new actions through a direct response of consequences

what is modelling (social learning approach)

when an individual carries out a behaviour and we observe them doing this and we learn the same behaviour (copy it as we look up to them)

what are the 2 types of models for social learning theory

live models - people we encounter on a daily basis (eg. parent or teacher)

symbolic models - characters or people we aspire to copy the behaviour of (eg. celebrities or media characters)

what is imitation (social learning theory)

when we observe a behaviour being modelled and we reproduce the behaviour ourselves through 3 steps

what are the 3 steps of imitation in social learning theory

1. we identify in some way with the model

2. we perceive that we have the ability to perform the model’s behaviour

3. we expect that the behaviour will have positive consequences

why is identification important in social learning theory

identification with a model suggests that we are more likely to experience the same outcome as the model (which we believe is positive)

what is vicarious reinforcement

when we frequently observe the positive outcome of a behaviour and so imitate this behaviour to receive the same positive outcome

what are the meditational processes

Attention - the extent to which we notice behaviours

retention - how well the behaviour is remembered

motor reproduction - the ability of the observer to perform the behaviour

motivation - the will to perform the behaviour (often determined by the outcome of the behaviour)

what is meditational processes

internal mental processes that occur after observing the model’s behaviour (the decision whether to imitate the behaviour based on things like vicarious reinforcement and self-efficacy)

what is self-efficacy

whether the observer is capable of successfully reproducing a models behaviour

Albert Bandura (1960s)

testing social learning in a lab

method: a sample of 72 children between 3-6 (half of each gender). Children were all put in a room with an adult and other toys (including a boba doll). One group saw an adult acting aggressively towards the boba doll (throwing it, kicking it, punching it and hitting it with a hammer) and the other group saw an adult playing quietly with a construction set. Children were taken to another room (with a boba doll and other toys) and their behaviour was observed

results: children in the aggression group imitated the adult’s behaviour towards the boba doll (boys = more aggressive then girls)

conclusion: children learn social behaviour through the process of observational learning and watching and imitating their models

evaluating social learning theory

strength: it explains cultural differences in behaviour - children learn from observing models around them = explanation for how cultural norms form and vicarious reinforcement encourages the repeat of these behaviours in future

strength: it is scientific - lab study = control over extraneous variables = more reliable

C/A: artificial setting = demand characteristics = less validity

strength: less reductionist than other approaches - no simplification of complex behaviours (aggression), instead the link between the interaction between the environment and cognitive factors to prove the existence of meditational processes taking place

C/A: critiqued for not having enough biological factors (link between brain functions and behaviour)

strength: reciprocal determinism - we play a part in influencing environment and it plays a part in influencing us = reciprocal 2 way process (eg. blue sky with clouds - one says its sunny, another says it might rain)

what is the cognitive approach

the study of internal mental processes

the role of schema

the use of theoretical ad computer models to explain and make interferences about mental processes

the emergence of cognitive neuroscience

what type of method does the cognitive approach use

inferences to make assumptions instead of asking people things about what’s happening in their brain (as they could not tell you)

what is the black box in the cognitive approach

the state between what is input (stimulus) and what is output (response)

which mental processes do psychologists make inferences about (please let Ashleigh tell Maddie props)

perception - use information to solve problems

language

attention - selecting information from environment

thinking

memory - store and retrieve information when its needed

perception

what is a schema

ways in which we store and organise thoughts and information in our minds which are about ourselves and our world around us.

mental frameworks of beliefs and expectations that are refined through experience

why are schemas useful

provide a mental shortcut when processing information

when presented with an unfamiliar situation or thing, schemas make predictions as to what to expect

help to fill in memory gaps

enables us to quickly process information

saves us from being overwhlemed by an environmental stimuli

why are schemas not useful

reliance on schemas can lead to perpetual error and false memories

inaccurate stereotypes of people

pre-misconceptions

Allport and Postman 1947

investigates the influence of schemas on stereotypes

method: people were shown 2 pictures of a white man holding a razor and a black man on the train and then later asked to recall the image

results: due to forgetting and reliance on schemas, people assumed the presence of the razor was due to the black man being aggressive to the white man

conclusion: schemas can be unreliable, tamper with memory and result in false information as we resort to expectations and stereotypes

what is the theoretical model in the cognitive approach

a model that represents how information processing works mostly through pictures/diagrams with boxes to represent structures and arrows to represent sequences/stages

what is cognitive neuroscience

looking at the brain and investigating which brain structure is involved with each mental process

what is dominant paradigm

dominant set of ideas that we use in psychology due to their objectiveness

what does cognitive neuroscience use for proving the link between brain structures and mental processes

neuro-imaging techniques: positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI scans)

what is the purpose of using neuroscience-imaging techniques for the cognitive approach

provide an active image of the living brain, revealing which parents are being used when an individual engages in certain mental processes

Tulving et al (cognitive approach)

used PET scans on individuals when recalling different types of LTM and showed these areas being used:

episodic memory = frontal lobe

semantic memory = temporal lobe

procedural memory = cerebral cortex

McGuire et al (cognitive approach)

see the effect neuro-imaging techniques (fMRI) have on mental processes

method: 16 right handed male London taxi drivers (who had all been doing their job for at least 1.5 years) and used MRI scans to see their brains. These results were compared to 50 males who didn’t drive taxis

results: increased grey matter in the brains of the taxi drivers in the posterior hippocampus

evaluating the cognitive approach

strength: practical applications in real life - led to the development of CBT (cognitive behaviour therapy) and this has been proved successful in treating depression (Beck found of 14 studies, 80% of adults with depression benefitted from therapy and it had a lower relapse rate than drug therapy), it also applies to practical and theoretical context (AI and the development of thinking machines) which may revolutionise how we interact in future

strength: uses scientific methods = very reliable (standardised lab experiments, lots of control) and capable of making cause and effect statements between mental processes and behaviour

C/A: lab experiments = artificial stimuli, lacks ecological validity

limitation: considered machine reductionist - not all human behaviour is caused by internal mental processes (eg. sense and memory) so we need to consider other factors alongside the cognitive approach (eg. inherited biological traits) = oversimplified human behaviour as there is more to it then internal mental processes

what does the biological approach investigate

how biological structures and processes within the body impact behaviour

in what 2 ways do biological psychologists believe human behaviour can be altered

environmentally or genetically

what affect do genes have on behaviour

genes affect behaviour and influence individual psychological difference between people

what do biological psychologists believe about the mind and brain vs cognitive psychologists

biological = mind lives in the brain

cognitive = mental processes of the mind are separate from the physical brain

what is the largest area of the brain

cerebrum - divided into 2 hemispheres (sides) and each hemisphere has 4 lobes

what does the frontal lobe/motor cortex do

movement

higher level cognition

expressive language

what does the parietal lobe/somatosensory cortex do

processing

other tactile sensory information (eg. pressure touch pain)

what does the occipital lobe/visual cortex do

interpreting visual stimuli and information (processing shapes and colours)

what does the temporal lobe/auditory cortex do

interpretation of sounds

language we hear

long term memory

case of Phineas Gage

a railroad constructor had an accident when a metal rod when through his brain’s frontal lobe

damage resulted in a loss of social inhibitions = became angry and impulsive

what is heredity

when the genetic code for a particular characteristic may be passed from a parent to a child (as they carry 50% of the parents genes)

what 2 things do heredity manifestation though the child depend on

1. how the gene interacts with other genes the child inherited

2. influence of environmental factors

what is heritability

the extent to which a behaviour (or characteristic) can be attributed to genetics

the more influenced a characteristic is by genetics, the greater its heritability

how can we determine the heritability of psychological traits

comparing the incidence of the trait among the family members who share a varying amount of genetic material

how much genetic material do (non) identical twins share

identical/monozygotic twins = 100%

non-identical/dizygotic twins = 50% (same as all siblings)

statistiques about schizophrenia likelihood in regards to family relationships

chances of having schizophrenia = 1%

chances of having schizophrenia with a sibling that has it = 9%

chances of having schizophrenia with an identical twin that has it = 48%

what is a genotype

an inherited genetic makeup of an individual

copied into the nucleus of every cell

simple terms = the thing itself

what is a phenotype

the observable characteristics of an individual

results from an interaction between genes and environment

simple terms = the symptoms or outcome of the genotype

Genotype vs phenotype

if we know someones phenotype we can’t determine their genotype from this alone

identical twins have the same genotype

identical twins could develop the same phenotype (possibility)

what are neurotransmitters

chemicals produced by the brain that transmit electrical messages between nerve cells in the brain

evaluating the biological approach

strength: it has real world application - links depression to an imbalance of serotonin = developments drug treatments to correct neurotransmitter imbalances and treat conditions (eg. depression)

C/A: drug solutions don’t help all patients (Cipriani 2018)

strength: it is scientific - uses empirical methods and developments in brain scanners make results more reliable and less biased, also makes more predictions about localised brain damage and the impact of later behaviour

limitation: difficult to desperate the influence of nature and nurture - hard to tell whether it is genetic or environmental factors influencing behaviour is all situations

limitation: considered determinsitic - believes human behaviour is governed by internal and biological causes over which we have no control, but it disregards the role free will has on our actions

Cipriani et al 2018

compared 21 anti-depressants and found they were more effective then the placebo group, but the effect was modest = challenges the biological approach as it suggests that brain chemistry alone might not account for all causes of depression

what is the structure of personality according to the psychodynamic approach

ID = unconscious

Ego = unconscious and conscious

superego = unconscious and conscious

when does the psychodynamic approach say behaviour is determined

by early childhood (psychic determination) and between birth and puberty

what does the psychodynamic approach say behaviour is motivated by

instinctive drive: sex and aggression

what is the role of the unconscious

the conscious level = aware of thoughts and perceptions

the pre-conscious level = retrieving thoughts and memories from our mind

unconscious level = ID (something born with)

what is the role of the unconscious

to store biological drives, thoughts and memories that are seen as unacceptable or unpleasant and repress them (lock away) so we aren’t aware of them (eg. sex drive and aggression which we are unconsciously motivated to satisfy - which may affect our behaviour

what is the ID part of our personality

our inherited biological drives

present from birth

operate on the pleasure principle (meaning its driven by basic, selfish desires that demand to be satisfied)

entirely irrational and therefore doesn’t accept gratifying some impulses - inappropriate

what is the ego part of our personality

operates on the reality principle

rational and uses logic/planning to mediate between the demands of the Id and superego to achieve an acceptable solution to obtaining pleasure

what is the superego part of our personality

internalised sense of right and wrong

operates on the morality principle

strives to uphold moral standards and punishes the ego with guilt of wrongdoingings

when does the ID develop

birth

when does the ego develop

2 years

when does the superego develop

5 years

summary of the main function/motivation of the Id

entirely selfish

demands all desires

summary of the main function/motivation of the ego

reduces conflict between id and superego

employs defence mechanisms

summary of the main function/motivation of the superego

internalised sense of right and wrong

represents moral standards of the same sex parent

punishes the ego for wrongdoing

what are defence mechanisms in the psychodynamic approach

unconscious strategies for helping the ego balance the conflicting demands of the id and superego and prevent anxiety when faced with unpleasant situations that may create guilt or embarrassment

distort reality so we protected from confronting or accepting unpleasant feelings

what is an example repression in the psychodynamic approach

eg = forgetting the trauma of a pets death

what is an example of denial in the psychodynamic approach

eg = continuing to turn up for work after your fired

what is an example of displacement in the psychodynamic approach

eg = slamming a door after an argument

what is an example of rationalisation in the psychodynamic approach

eg = blaming an act of violence on someone looking at you a certain way