The World of Psychology: An Overview

What is psychology, andhow did it grow?

What Is Psychology?

• The science that seeks to understand behavior and mental processes, and to apply that understanding in the service of human welfare.

Academic Psychology

• Biological• Perception• Consciousness• Learning• Memory• Cognition

• Motivation/Emotion• Developmental• Personality• Social• Disorders

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Testosterone and Aggression

Early Late Result

Grp None no T no T Low

Grp Early T No T Low

Grp Late Tno T Low

Group Both T T High

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Figure 1.1: What Do You See?

• An elderly father-in-law or a husband?

• Perception involves more than just passively receiving information.

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In-class only

Two Examples

• Spotlight Effect

• Illusion of Transparency

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Typical Work Settings

• Mental Health Facilities

• Universities and Colleges

• Business

• Schools

• Other (Miltary, Prisons, Public Policy)

Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920)

• Used laboratory science methods to study consciousness.

• Changed psychology from a philosophy to a science of mental processes.

Historical Roots of Psychology

Structuralism

• Founder: Edward Titchener, trained by Wundt

• Goals: To study conscious experience and how elements of consciousness are structure in humans.

• Methods: Experiments; introspection.• Application: “Pure scientific research”

– Spurred development of psychological laboratories.

• Describe the intensity and clarity of the sensations and images that make up your experience of this object.

Introspection

Gestalt Psychology

• Founder: Max Wertheimer• Goals: To describe organization of mental

processes.– “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

• Methods: Observation of sensory/perceptual phenomena.

• Applications: Understanding visual illusions; laid groundwork for humanistic and cognitive psychology.

Psychoanalysis

• Founder: Sigmund Freud

• Goals: To explain personality and behavior and develop techniques for treating mental illness.

• Methods: Study of individual cases.

• Applications: Development of psychotherapy; emphasis on childhood, role of unconscious processes.

Functionalism

• Founder: William James• Goals: To study how the mind works in

allowing an organism to adapt to the environment.

• Methods: Naturalistic observations of animal and human behavior.

• Applications: Child psychology; educational and industrial psychology; study of individual differences.

Behaviorism

• Founders: John B. Watson; B. F. Skinner

• Goals: To study observable behavior and explain behavior via learning principles.

• Methods: Observation of the relationship between environmental stimuli and behavioral responses.

• Application: Behavior modification; improved teaching methods.

Watson’s Famous Quote

“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select—doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and, yes, even beggarman and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, abilities, vocation, and race of his ancestors”.

Current Approaches

• Biological Approach: Emphasizes activity of the nervous system, especially the brain; the action of hormones and other chemicals; and genetics.

• Evolutionary Approach: In what ways do behavior and mental processes aid reproduction and survival.

• Behavioral Approach: Emphasizes learning and how environmental circumstances dictate behavior.

Approaches (cont’d)

• Cognitive Approach: Emphasizes how people receive, store, retrieve, and otherwise process information

• Humanistic: Focuses on the attributions and choices made by the individual

• Psychodynamic: Conflicts between underlying biology and societal goals.

• Cultural/Personality: Effects of individual traits and cultural upbringing on behavior.

Impact of SocioculturalDiversity on Psychology

• Are all people essentially the same?• Sometimes “Yes”: Most basic processes of

perception and learning are shared• Sometimes “No”: Sociocultural variables shape

what people make of those experiences and what they learn from them.

• Culture is an organizing and stabilizing influence.

• Separate identity• Meeting personal

goals; being unique• Self-assurance,

express individuality• Personal credit for

success; Blame external factors for failure

• Self frame of reference

• Connectedness• Belonging, Meet

obligations• Self-restrain, self-

effacing,• Social unit credit for

success; Blame internal factors for failure

• Group frame of reference

Individualist Collectivist

Cultural Values in Advertising--Korean or U.S. Advertisements?

• “She’s got a style all her own”– ANSWER: ?

• “You, only better”– ANSWER: ?

• “A more exhilarating way to provide for your family”– ANSWER: ?

• “We have a way of bringing people closer together”– ANSWER: ?

• “Celebrating a half-century of partnership”– ANSWER: ?

• “How to protect the most personal part of the environment: Your skin”– ANSWER: ?

• “Our family agrees with this selection of home furnishings”– ANSWER: ?

• “A leader among leaders”– ANSWER: ?

Source: Brehm, Kassin, Fein, Social Psychology, 4/e (1999)