AP Exam Review:
Psychological Approaches
Psychological Science is Born
Wundt (1832-1920)
Wundt (1832-1920)
Titchner (1867-1927)
Wilhelm Wundt and psychology’s first
graduate students studied the “atoms
of the mind” by conducting
experiments at Leipzig, Germany, in
1879. This work is considered the birth
of psychology as we know it today.
Wundt’s student, Edward Titchner,
introduced structuralism at Cornell
University. He wanted to discover the
structural elements of the mind, so he
trained people in introspection
(looking inward) and reporting
elements of their experiences.
Generally speaking, the structuralists
focused on inner sensations, images
and feelings.
Psychological Science is Born
American philosopher William James looked at the
evolved functions of our thoughts and feelings.
James (1842-1910)
Mary Whiton Calkins and
William James
Mary Calkins
Margaret Floy Washburn
James believed that thinking, like smelling and
seeing, developed because it was adaptive. He
studied how mental and behavioral processes
function and enable us to adapt, survive, and
flourish. This approach to psychology is called
functionalism.
James was better known for teaching at Harvard and
for writing Principles of Psychology (1890), the first
psychology textbook, a task that took him 12 years to
complete.
Mary Calkins, James’s student, became the APA’s
first female president.
Margaret Floy Washburn was the first female
psychology Ph.D., the second female APA president,
and a distinguished writer (The Animal Mind)
Psychological Science Develops
Those involved in the birth of
psychology, dubbed “Magellans of
the mind,” developed from more
established fields. Many, like
Wundt, were physiologists.
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)
Sigmund Freud, an Austrian
physician, and his followers
emphasized the importance of the
unconscious mind and its effects on
human behavior. This approach is
known as psychoanalysis.
Psychology originated in many
disciplines and countries. It was,
until the 1920s, defined as the
science of mental life.
Psychological Science Develops
Behaviorists
Watson and later Skinner dismissed introspection and redefined psychology as
“the scientific study of observable behavior” from the 1920s through the 1960s.
The behaviorists emphasized the study of overt behavior as the subject matter
of scientific psychology.
Both Watson and Skinner
were influenced by
classical conditioning
which was discovered by
Ivan Pavlov.
Like the behaviorists,
Pavlov had a distain for
“mentalistic concepts”
such as consciousness.
Ivan Pavlov
John Watson (1878-1958)
(1849 – 1936)
B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
Psychological Science Develops
Humanistic Psychology
The humanists thought behaviorism’s focus on learned behaviors
was too mechanistic and that psychoanalysis focused too much on
the meaning of childhood memories.
http://www.carlrogers.dk
http://facultyweb.cortland.edu
Abraham Maslow
Maslow and Rogers
emphasized current
environmental influences
on our growth potential
and our need for love and
acceptance.
Carl Rogers
(1902-1987)
Psychological Science Develops
The Cognitive Revolution
In the 1960s, psychology went through a cognitive revolution
where the focus returned to earlier ideas like the importance of
how our mind processes and retains information.
The new definition of psychology from this revolution was “the
science of behavior (what we do) and mental processes (inner
thoughts and feelings).”
This revolution has continued to evolve (with technology) into
multiple fields including cognitive neuroscience (the study of
brain activity linked with mental activity).
Psychology’s Three Main Levels of Analysis
Today, psychology is analyzed using the biopsychosocial approach. Each of
psychology’s perspectives is helpful, but each by itself fails to reveal the whole
picture.
Psychology’s Current Perspectives
Perspective
Focus
Sample Questions
Neuroscience
How the body and brain
enables emotions?
How are messages transmitted in
the body? How is blood
chemistry linked with moods and
motives?
Evolutionary
How the natural selection of
traits the promotes the
perpetuation of one’s genes?
How does evolution influence
behavior tendencies?
Behavior genetics
How much our genes and
our environments influence
our individual differences?
To what extent are psychological
traits such as intelligence,
personality, sexual orientation,
and vulnerability to depression
attributable to our genes? To our
environment?
Psychology’s Current Perspectives
Perspective
Focus
Sample Questions
Psychodynamic
How behavior springs from
unconscious drives and
conflicts?
How can someone’s personality
traits and disorders be explained
in terms of sexual and aggressive
drives or as disguised effects of
unfulfilled wishes and childhood
traumas?
Behavioral
How we learn observable
responses?
How do we learn to fear
particular objects or situations?
What is the most effective way to
alter our behavior, say to lose
weight or quit smoking?
Psychology’s Current Perspectives
Perspective
Focus
Sample Questions
Cognitive
How we encode, process,
store and retrieve
information?
How do we use information in
remembering? Reasoning?
Problem solving?
Social-cultural
How behavior and thinking
vary across situations and
cultures?
How are we — as Africans,
Asians, Australians or North
Americans – alike as members of
human family? As products of
different environmental contexts,
how do we differ?
Psychology’s Subfields: Research
Psychologist
Biological
Developmental
Cognitive
Personality
Social
What she does
Explore the links between brain and mind.
Study changing abilities from womb to tomb.
Study how we perceive, think, and solve
problems.
Investigate our persistent traits.
Explore how we view and affect one another.
Psychology’s Subfields: Research
Other 11.5%
Experimental
14.1%
Biological
9.9%
Developmental
24.6%
Psychometrics
5.5%
Cognitive
8.0%
Social 21.6%
Data: APA 1997
Personality
4.8%
Psychology’s Subfields: Applied
Psychologist
Clinical
What she does
Studies, assesses, and treats people with
psychological disorders
Counseling
Helps people cope with academic, vocational,
and marital challenges.
Educational
Studies and helps individuals in school and
educational settings
Industrial/
Organizational
Studies and advises on behavior in the
workplace.
Psychology’s Subfields: Applied
Industrial
6%
Educational
9%
Other
3%
Counseling
15%
Data: APA 1997
Clinical
67%
Clinical Psychology vs. Psychiatry
A clinical psychologist (Ph.D.) studies, assesses,
and treats troubled people with psychotherapy.
Psychiatrists on the other hand are medical
professionals (M.D.) who use treatments like drugs
and psychotherapy to treat psychologically
diseased patients.