GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY 11103-01 NOTES
September 29, 2010
MID-TERM EXAM REVIEW
Hypnosis is a trancelike state in which a person responds readily to suggestions.
When you itch, you have the desire to scratch, and sometimes when people feel a
slight itch on their face or somewhere around their face; they have the need to take
care of it because starts to really really bother them to the point that it gets
annoying (Professor Fish demonstrates scratching as he is speaking). This is the
power of suggestion, and if you can suggest something enough to somebody, then he
or she may actually incorporate it into his or her system and find that he or she
needs to scratch something. This is the introduction to hypnosis. I did not use any
tricks, no subliminal messages, but I was very open about it. So, Imagine what kind
of therapy could be done if you are trying to help someone to quit smoking. We are
most suggestible when we have just woken up.
Consciousness will be on the exam.
Chapter 1 The Science of Psychology
Professor Fish advised he is providing an outline for this chapter on his website that
is very informative.
The chapter is an introduction that psychology is a science. Even though psychology
is very young that psychology as a science is possible. We can use experimentation
and data analysis to eventually prove things in psychology. Right now, we can ‘show’
and that it is likely, but cannot prove - Probability and Statistics.
There are some important people in Chapter 1:
Sigmund Freud - Father of Psychoanalysis.
Wilheim Wundt - Founder of psychology as a science in 1879, in Leipzig Germany.
Edward Titchener - Structuralism
William James - Functionalism
B.F. Skinner - Behaviorism
Question #1
If you need help from a bystander, you more likely to receive it if there is only one or
two people nearby. T or F
Answer: True
P: What does the Bystander Effect say?
GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY 11103-01 NOTES
September 29, 2010
P: Kitty Genovese, 1964, was walking the streets of New York, when she was
brutally murdered in front of her apartment. A number of people had open windows
in their houses and apartments nearby. There were approximately 20-50 people out
in the streets that saw and heard this happen, the police confirmed this. Not one
person called the police. This is the Bystander Effect.
S: The reason I said false is that one would think that with more people around that
there would be at least one good person in the group.
P: It is not the good people theory, it is the diffusion of responsibility - “I’m sure that
someone else is better qualified than I am to take of it,” or “I really just do not want
to get involved,” and “It is not my problem.” There are many different
rationalizations that people use to relieve themselves of the responsibility, and
sometimes fear is a variable as well.
The things in psychology do not necessarily make sense, and that is what Chapter 1
states. Psychology is not common sense.
Question #2
Schizophrenics suffer from split personalities. T or F
Answer: False
S: True
P: The word Schizo and Phrenia comes from the Latin split-brain. However, that is a
trick question because schizophrenia was once thought to be a split-brain problem.
Roses are red, Violets are blue, I’m schizophrenic, and so am I.
That is the way it was once thought. Now, schizophrenia is characterized by
psychosis. Psychosis consists of hallucinations and delusions, and the hallucinations
cannot be caused by any other external stimuli like drugs. So, the name
schizophrenia means something other than it really is because the condition was
originally thought to be a split-brain problem when in fact it is not.
Split personality or multiple personality is a different animal all together. It is now
referred to Dissociative Identity Disorder. You cannot split a personality - they are
whole, but you can have multiple personalities.
S: Will we need to know the parts of the brain?
P: You will need to know the four lobes and their function more than anything else:
1. Frontal lobe - Part of the cerebral cortex that is responsible for voluntary
movement; it is also important for attention, goal-directed behavior, and
appropriate emotional experiences.
2. Parietal lobe - Part of the cerebral cortex that receives sensory information
from throughout the body.
GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY 11103-01 NOTES
September 29, 2010
3. Temporal lobe - Part of the cerebral hemisphere that helps regulate hearing,
balance and equilibrium, and certain emotions and motivations.
4. Occipital lobe - Part of the cerebral hemisphere that receives and interprets
visual information.
Chapter 3 Sensation and Perception
What is important to know with each sense is how energy (ie. Sound waves, Light
waves etc.) get changed into useful information by the brain. For example, what is a
hair cell? Where is a hair cell located?
S: The ear.
P: What happens to the hair cell? What is it the hair cell does? Well, the reason it is
called a hair cell is because it is affected very easily by sound waves.
S: Doesn’t it bend when you listen to loud music?
P: Yes, and for deaf people it lays flat. Hair cells are important for hearing, but as you
get older, they naturally bend.
What is also important is Transduction. Know everything there is to know about
transduction!! This is the change between natural energy we find in the universe
and information that our brain can compute. The change from energy to useful data
the brain can use is transduction, and is usually referred to in the ear.
Also, understand the difference between sensation and perception. We do not know
about sensation. We cannot experience sensation. We use it as a slang term, “Yeah I
sense there is something wrong,” or “I can sense that this is flat and smooth.” No, I
perceive that this is flat and smooth, but I do not know what I am sensing. I just
know that as soon as it is received, I start processing it. That is why witness
observations in crimes are unreliable. Eyewitness testimony is the most unreliable
testimony there is.
Jung’s Theory
S: Can we talk about Jung’s two personalities?
P: What Jung is talking about is the conscious and the unconscious. The conscious
according to Jung is where our inhibitions are stored. The unconscious is who we
truly want to be. Although we cannot monitor the unconscious, it still guides us to
do what we need to do for ourselves to be successful and how we want to live. When
we talk about Jung’s unconscious, we need to separate it from what we have learned
about Freud’s unconscious.
With Freud, we want to make the unconscious conscious to deal with unresolved
issues or fixations. We want Jung’s unconscious to guide us. So, the #2 personality is
the favorite personality. The collective unconscious is the source of wisdom that
everyone shares. In fact, this package is orange because everyone was born on the
GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY 11103-01 NOTES
September 29, 2010
same level of consciousness, where on that realm of consciousness everyone knew
the color was orange. The word orange is taught, but the color orange is not taught.
In other words, you can recognize the color orange when you are born. That is the
collective unconscious knowledge that everyone shares.
Jung also said that the unconscious in our mind knows far more than we do as
conscious people. Your unconscious is 10x smarter than you are right now. Unlike
Freud’s Id and Superego, which are stupid. Jung’s unconscious is highly intelligent
which is why it is our guide. So, how does the unconscious tell you what is best for
you? Through your dreams and symbols are manifestations of our unconscious crosses, circles, etc.
Make sure that you more about the ‘SELF’ and ‘OPPOSITE’. Know these!!
Opposites with Jung tend to be about being either on one side of the pole or the
other. You cannot be 100% an introvert and be 100% an extrovert all the same time.
There might be varying degrees of that, but overall you will be somewhere in the
middle most of the time. On page 235 gives you more examples of opposites.
Sensation  Intuition and Thinking  Feeling. Obviously, that is the biggest
differences between men and women. More women make decisions based on
feelings and more men base their decision making on logic or thinking.
Archetypes - Hidden means in ones dreams, can sometimes take the form of a wise
old man or woman. We are born with these, but do not know much about them.
1. Anima
2. Aminus
Back to review of Freud
Back in the time of his existence - the Victorian Era, the 19th century, society
believed that women were inferior. The role of the woman was to marry, have
children, and take care of the home.
Freud’s theories were based on ‘His’ society, white affluent men. Sexuality, which
was taboo - not talked about by women and never in public, was suppressed
(voluntary) or repressed (involuntary). If one is suppressing sexual issues then one
is bound to have a greater problem later. Therefore, Freud probably treated many
women because they were not allowed to talk about sex, and he came up with these
theories because the man is predominant in society, and Freud focused most of his
theory about sexual gratification.
What you need to know regarding the five stages of the psychosexual development,
oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital is that it is not about sexual intercourse. It is
GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY 11103-01 NOTES
September 29, 2010
not about the act of sex that he is addressing in the earlier stages. Especially in the
phallic stage. The male child may not really understand what sexual intercourse is,
but that his love for his mother is what is driving him. But, he sees his dad as a
threat and so he has this problem or conflict. He eventually realizes, especially if the
father spends quality time with him, that his dad is not a threat.
What happens then is the Identification with the Aggressor. The aggressor is dad,
but the child recognizes the dad is no longer a threat to him and so he gives up his
infatuation for his mother. He then enters the latency stage.
In the genital stage is where appropriate sexual knowledge comes in for a
relationship with another person. So, he gets his theory from the relationship with
the opposite sex party. And, from his theory come very valuable concepts that come
into role model play. A girl needs her father to teach her how men should treat girls.
A girl needs her mother to teach her how to behave like a woman. A boy needs his
father to model how to treat women. A boy needs his mother to develop the
nurturing role, to temper that aggressiveness.
When we talk about extremes, we talk about prostitutes and serial killers. Tracing
backwards we can usually track prostitution back to a core relationship with the
father. The serial killer is a core relationship with the mother because the mother is
not teaching him how to treat a woman.
It is suggested to review Dr. Paul Bloom’s lecture on Freud as a study guide.
One must have a healthy balance between the Id, Ego, and the Superego or you will
have problems. Too much Id or self-gratification, and you will be in trouble all the
time. Too much Superego, and you feel guilty all the time. There is a problem with
everything you do. You need to have a balance of the three.
 Id - The Cat-in-the-Hat
 Ego - The children
 Superego - The fish
“I want it now!”
“We can have ice cream after we finish our
dinner”
“No, you can’t do it!”
Fixations
According to Freud, some people who are pack rats can track the problem to the
anal stage of their development when they could not release their feces.
The same can be said for those who smoke, bite their nails, pick their nose, or chew
the inside of their cheek may have had a problem in the oral stage.
GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY 11103-01 NOTES
September 29, 2010
There are 50 multiple-choice questions. 10 questions from Chapter 1, 10 questions
from Chapter 2, 15 questions on Freud, 5 questions on Jung, and the balance on
classes of drugs, sleep, and dreams.
If you are unclear in any area, please ask about it so that you may do well on this
exam.
Things to know
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Structure of a neuron
What neurotransmitters do
Parts of the neuron
Important people and what they are known for.
Lobes of the brain and their function
Id, Ego, Superego
Freud
Jung
Consciousness
Good Luck to All!!!