Chapter 1: What Is Psychology

What is Psychology?

• Definition:

  • Is the discipline concerned with behavior and mental processes and how an organism’s external and internal environment.

• Two Parts:

  • Mental Processes:

    • The mind is made up of all the mental activity that lets us experience the world; that is, we use our senses—sight, smell, taste, hearing, and touch—to take in information from outside ourselves.

  • Behavior:

    • Refers to all the actions that results from sensing and interpreting information.

• Psychology is a discipline that is composed of many levels of explanations!

Behavioral Science

• Empiricism:

  • The view that science should ONLY rely on observation, experimentation, and measurement!

  • Empirical evidence is required!

• Psychology is a REAL science and is just as real as Physics, Biology and Chemistry.

• Psychology follows the scientific method!

History of Psychology

• In the past:

  • Scholars did not rely heavily on empirical evidence.

  • Hippocrates — founder of modern medicine observed patients with brain injuries.

  • OOPS! Phrenology — argues that different brain areas accounted for specific character and personality traits — and personality traits — and could be read by the bumps on your skull!

  

The History of Psychology

• Founding Father of Psychology:

  • Willhelm Wandt (1879) - established the very first psychological laboratory in Germany.

  • The purpose of the laboratory was to identify the basic parts, or structures, of the conscious mind.

    • Reaction time experiments.

    • Introspection methods

  • Psychology branched off into different several different schools.

  • There were different opinions regarding what psychology was and how it should be studied

Schools of Psychology

• Structuralism:

  • An early school of psychology that explored the structures of the mind through introspection.

  • Edward Titchener

• Aim was to discover the basic elements of conscious experience.

  • Self-reflective introspection (looking inward)

  • Three basic mental elements:

    • Images, feelings, and sensations

• Problems:

  • Highly trained introspectionists couldn’t duplicate each other’s findings.

  • Science requires the replication of findings!

Schools of Psychology

• Functionalism:

  • An early school of psychology concerned with the adaptive purpose, or function, of mind and behavior.

• William James - Father of American Psychology

  • Rejected the structuralists’ approach and methods.

  • Influenced by Charles Darwin, who proposed the theory of natural selection.

• Functionalism:

  • Focuses on how mental and behavioral processes function — how they enable the organism to adapt, survive, and flourish.

  • Unlike Structuralists, Functionalism approach asked “why” questions such as:

    • “Why do we sometimes forget things?”

• Psychoanalytic Theory:

  • Based on the idea that our thoughts and actions are influenced by unconscious mental forces.

  • Psychoanalysis: therapeutic technique used to bring the contents of the patient’s unconscious to their conscious awareness.

• Sigmund Freud Argued:

  • That the primary influences on behavior are unconscious drives such as:

    • Sexuality and Aggression

• Goal:

  • Is to decode the symbolic meaning of our dreams, “slips of the tongue” and psychological symptoms.

Perspectives in Psychology

• Biological Perspective:

  • A psychological approach that emphasizes bodily events and changes associated with actions, feelings , and thoughts.

  • Are interested in the functioning of different areas of the brain.

  • Include research on topics such as dementia, substance abuse, sleep, psych disorders, etc.

• Learning Perspective:

  • Includes behaviorism and social-cognitive learning theories and emphasizes how the environment and experience affect actions.

• Behaviorists:

  • Focus on the general principles of learning underlying human and animal behavior.

  • John Watson:

    • Founding father of this school.

    • That we can understand behavior by EXCLUSIVELY looking outside the organism. He believed that behavior is the product of.

    • Rewards and Punishments.

• Behaviorists:

• B.F. Skinner argued:

  • We do things that we do because of the environmental conditions and what we have experienced.

• Cognitive Perspective:

  • Studies the mental processes involved in different aspects of thinking (intelligence, language, attention, learning, memory, problem solving, and decision making).

  • George Miller and Ulric Neisser

• Cognitive Scientists:

  • Believe that oru way of thinking influences our behaviors!

• Sociocultural Perspective:

  • A psychological approach that emphasizes social and cultural influences on behavior.

• Margaret Floy Washburn:

  • First woman to earn a doctoral degree in American psychology.

• Mary Whiton Calkins:

  • She earned her PhD at Harvard under William James, Calkins was refused the degree by the Harvard.

• Anna Freud:

  • Founder of child psychoanalysis and contributed to ego and adolescent psychology.

Diversity in Psychology

• Diversity improves psychological research!

  • The field was slow to change but change is happening.

• Mamie and kenneth Clark:

  • Were the first African-Americans to obtain their doctoral degrees in psychology from Columbia University.

  • Clark Doll research study.

  • Findings used in the Brown v. Board of Education - U.S. Supreme Court ruled that school segregation was unconstitutional.

What Psychologists Do

• Types:

  • Basic Research:

    • Research designed to increase knowledge about social behavior.

    • Increases knowledge for knowledge’s sake.

    • Does not attempt to solve a specific problem.

  • Applied Research:

    • Increases the understanding of social problems.

    • Finds solutions to social problems by using current scientific knowledge.

  • Basic and applied research can inform each other.

Types of Psychologists

• Experimental Psychologists:

  • Primarily work in research settings and study memory, language, and thinking of humans.

  • Focus areas can vary such as cognitive, neuroscience, social psychology, developmental psychology, and psychology/law.

  • I’m an experimental psychologist because I studied how the brain cognitively processes different types of stimuli (negative or positive).

• School Psychologists:

  • Work with parents, teachers, and students to enhance students’ performance and resolve emotional difficulties.

• Industrial-Organizational Psychologists:

  • The scientific study of human behavior in organizations and the work place.

  • Focuses on deriving principles of individual, group and organizational behavior and applying this knowledge to the solution of problems at work.

Subfields of Psychology

• Evolutionary psychology

  • Explore how traits are selected to aid adaptation in an environment.

• Biological psychology

  • Study how biological systems give rise to mental activity and behavior

• Cognitive psychology/Cognitive neuroscience

  • Investigate attention, perception, memory, problem solving, and language, often based on brain processes.

• Developmental psychology

  • Research how people change from infancy through old age.

• Healthy psychology

  • Examine how psychological factors affect health and well-being.

• Personality psychology

  • Analyze enduring characteristics that people display over time and across circumstances.

• Social psychology

  • Explore how people are affected by others.

• Cultural psychology

  • Study how people are influenced by the societal rules that dictate behavior in their cultures.

• Clinical psychology

  • Consider the factors that cause psychological disorders and the best methods to treat them.

• Educational psychology

  • Investigate effectiveness of techniques in teaching and learning.

• Industrial/organizational psychology

  • Examine issues pertaining to industry and the workplace.

Types of Psychologists

• Clinical Psychologists:

  • Focus on the assessment, diagnosis, causes, and treatment of mental health disorder, like depression, bipolar disorder, etc.

  • It is the most populous field in psychology.

    • Private practice, drug treatment centers, rehabilitation centers, schools, healthcare facilities, universities, and social service centers.

• Counseling Psychologists:

  • Work people who are experiencing temporary life problems, such as marital conflict.

  • This is not the same as clinical psychology