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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