Schools of Thought

School of Thought

• set of ideas and views common to a group of people

  • share similar beliefs and ideologies, similar reaserch methods

Father of Psychology

• Windhelm Wundt at the University of Leipzig

Structuralism Contributors and Date

• 1879

• Germany and US

• Wilhelm Wundt and Edward Titchner

Structuralism

• sought to breakdown consciousness in its most basic form - measure atoms of the mind

• consciousness is static

Introspection

• students would offer detailed self-reports of reactions to various stimuli,

• mind could be measured

Criticism of Structuralism

• poor reliability

• subjective methods

• reductionist, attempted to explain a complex phenomenon in simple terms

Functionalism Founder and Date

• 1890

• USA

• William James

Functionalism Theories

• contents of the mind are constantly changing and consciousness is flowing

• foucsed is on how and why an organism does something

• influenced by Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, believed consciousness helped us adapt to our environment

Methods used by Functionalists

• supplemented introspection with data from objective descriptions of behaviour

• researched animal behaviour

Criticism of Functionalism

Consciousness is not directly observable

Psychoanalysis Founders and Date

• 1902

• Vienna

• Sigmund Freud

Theories of Psychoanalysis

• man is born with strong animal like urges such as sex and aggression

• these are rejected by society and are repressed in the first 5 years of our lives

• FORMS THE UNCONSCIOUS

• Unconscious is a collection of urges, thoughts, memories and feelings which completely determine the way one acts

• no such thing as a random thought feeling motive or behavior

• early childhood experiences determine character, making events in early life responsible for what happens to a person in adult life.

Conscious vs Unconscious Mind

Conscious Mind	Unconscious Mind
contains thoughts and feelings we are aware of	thoughts urges or feelings that are unpleasant/socially unacceptable
not hidden or suppressed	buried - bring about pain or conflict
influenced by unconscious thoughts feelings or memories	be brought into awareness using certain techniques

Methods used in Psychoanalysis

• Free Association or Talk Therapy

  • Dream Analysis and Inkblot tests to reveal unconscious beliefs (what you see in the test is a symbol of whats in ur unconscious)

Criticism of Psychoanalysis

• doesnt focus on obersvable behaviour

• cannot be scientifically proven nor disproven

  • based his conclusions about all human nature on his own recollection of childhood/patients and applying it to human race in general

Behaviourism Founders and Date

• 1913

• Usa

• John. B Watson, Ivan Pavlov and B.F Skinner

Behaviorism Theories

Classical and Operant Conditioning (discussed later)

• studied overt behavior

• what cannot be seen cannot be studied

• we are all born as a ‘tabula' rasa’ everything we know is molded by environmental factors

• rejects free will, we are a product of what we learn from experience

Methods of Behaviorism

• experiments to understand the relationship between stimulus and response

  • Operant and Classical Conditioning, Little Albert Experiment

Criticism of Behaviorism

• generalizing animal findings to human behavior

• underestimates complexity of human emotions

• unable to fully explain human behavior as it neglected mental processes

Humanism Founder and Dates

• 1960s

• USA

• contributors- Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow

Theories of Humanism

• Hierarchy of Needs, Unconditional Positive Regard

• see humans as growing, generous healthy beings in control of their destiny

• Rogers; belief in basic goodness of humans, believed in the power of free will and determination

• Maslow; how people can fulfil themselves and become self actualized, humans are more than animals, theory hierarchy of needs

list hierarchy of needs to achieve self actualization

Where has humanism had its greatest impact

• field of therapy

Criticism of Humanism

• overly idealistic

• ignores the complexities of human nature, such as the impact of social, cultural, or economic factors.

• humanism doesn't pay enough attention to the darker sides of human behavior (like selfishness, violence, or greed), assuming that everyone will naturally strive to be their best.

• Another criticism is that humanism can be too focused on individualism, which might neglect the importance of community or collective well-being.