AP Psych Barron's Chapter 1 Approaches and History Notes

Chapter 1 Approaches and History


History of Psychology

- One way to think about history of psychology is to organize various theorists and their theories into “waves”

o Each “wave” is domination of thought until new one comes along.

Wave One: Introspection

- Archaeologists find evidence of trephination (Stone Age humans carfing holes through the skull to release evil spirits)

o Greek philosophers Plato and Democritus theorized about relationship b/w thought and behavior.

- HV beginning of scientific psychology in 1879.

o Wilhelm Wundt set up first psychological laboratory.

o Trained subjects in introspection (where the subjects asked to record accurately their cognitive reactions to simple stimuli)

§ Through this, hoped to examine basic cognitive structures

o AR eventually described his theory of structuralism, the idea that the mind operates by combining subjective emotions and objective sensations.

- William James would eventually publish The Principles of Psychology, the first psychology textbook.

o James examined how Wundt’s structures function in our lives

o His theory is functionalism

- Introspective theories important in establishing the science of psychology, but do not significantly influence current psychological thinking.


Wave Two – Gestalt Psychology

- During approx. same time as Wundt and William James

- Gestalt psychologists including Max Wertheimer against dividing human thought and behavior into discrete structures.

- Gestalt psychology tried to examine a person’s total experience because the way one experiences the world is often more than the sum of the parts of the experience.

o Examined not only a client’s difficulty but the context in which it occurred.

- HV like introspective psychology, has done little to influence current psychology.


Wave Three: Psychoanalysis

- Sigmund Freud a very famous psychologist.

o Revolutionized psychology with his psychoanalytic theory.

§ Believe he discovered the unconscious mind

§ Believed that this hidden part builds over the years through repression.

· The pushing down into the unconscious events and feelings that cause so much anxiety/tension that our conscious mind cannot handle it.

o Believed that to understand human thought/behavior truly, must examine unconscious mind through dream analysis, word association, etc.

- HV Freud criticized for being unscientific and creating random theories.

- Many of Frued’s terms used now part of day to day speech (i.e. defense mechanism)


Wave Four: Behaviorism

- John Watson studied pioneering conditioning experiments of Ivan Pavlov.

- Then declared that for psychology to be a science, it must be limited to an observable phenomena, not w/ concepts like unconscious mind.

o Watson wanted to est. behaviorism as dominant paradigm (example) of psychology.

o Behaviorists maintain that psychologists should look only at stimuli (environmental events) and responses (physical reactions) and not concern themselves to describe consciousness.

- Another behaviorist B. F. Skinner expanded ideas of behaviorism to include reinforcement, environmental stimuli that either encourage or discourage certain responses.

- Behaviorism was the dominant thought in psychology in 1920s through 1960s.

Wave Five: Multiple Perspectives

- Currently no way of thinking all psychologists share.

- Many describe themselves as eclectic (drawing from multiple perspectives)

- For now, many look at different psychological perspectives

Psychological Perspectives (7 broad categories)

- Partially in reaction to reductionism of behaviorism, humanists try to describe the mysterious aspects of consciousness.

- Included theorists Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers stressed individual choice and free will

o Contrasts with deterministic behaviorists (those who theorized that all behaviors are caused by past conditioning)

- Humanists believe that we choose most of our behaviors which are guided by physiological, emotional or spiritual needs.

o A humanist may describe introvert as one who wants to fulfill social need via having few close friends.

- Humanist theories not easily tested by scientific method.

- Some view humanism as more of a historical perspective than a current one.


Psychoanalytic Perspective.

- A controversial part of modern psychology.

o Believe that the unconscious mind controls much of mind and actions.

- Psychoanalysts look for impulses or memories pushed into the unconscious through repression.

o A psychoanalyst would explain that an introvert avoids social situations b/c of a repressed memory trauma in childhood involving a social situation.

§ I.E anxiety experienced (but not consciously remembered) at a school or party.


Biopsychology (or Neuroscience) Perspective

- Explain human thought and behavior strictly in terms of biological processes.

- Human cognition and reactions might be caused by effects of genes, hormones, and neurotransmitters in the brain or a combo of all three.

o Might explain a person being an extrovert due to genes and its effects on the abundance of certain neurotransmitters in the brain.


Evolutionary (or Darwinian) Perspective

- Evolutionary psychologists aka sociobiologists examine human thoughts/actions in terms of natural selection

o Some psychological traits might be advantageous for survival, TF would be passed down.

o Might explain one being extrovert as a survival advantage – could make more friends and improve chances of passing offspring.


Behavioral Perspective

- Explain human thought and behavior in terms of conditioning

o Look strictly at observable behaviors and what reactions organisms get in response to specific behaviors.

o Might explain extroverted in terms of reward and punishment.

- Thinking one might be punished for being an introvert.


Cognitive Perspective

- Cognitive psychologists examine psychology in terms of how humans interpret, process and remember environmental events.

o Where the rules that one uses to view the world are important to understanding why we behave a certain way.

o Might explain one to be extrovert of how he/she interprets social situations.

§ Such as, starting a conversation means wanting to know them better.

§ Where an extrovert sees the world that being outgoing just makes sense.


Social-Cultural (or Socialcultural) Perspective

- Social-cultural psychologists look at how our thoughts/behaviors vary from other people living in other cultures.

- Emphasize the influence culture has over a way a person acts.

- Cultural norms important to a sociocultural psychologist in explaining a person’s extroversion.

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