What is Psychology?
Psychology is both a science and a profession…
How?
What is Psychology?
It is a science by
doing research
and creating
new knowledge
to try to answer
questions
Others transmit
the knowledge
to others in the
form of
education.
What can you do with it?
Industrial
Psychologist
Clinical Psychologist
Counseling
Psychologist
School Psychologist
Social Psychologist
Cognitive
Psychologist
Personality Psychologist
Developmental
Psychologist
4 Goals of Psychology
1. Describe Behavior
3. Predict Behavior
2. Understand Behavior
4. Control Behavior
4 Goals of Psychology
1. Describe Behavior
-What is the nature of
this behavior?
3. Predict Behavior
-Can we predict when it
will occur
2. Understand Behavior
-Why is this behavior
occuring?
4. Control Behavior
-What conditions will
affect the behavior?
What is Psychology?
Touches many
aspects of our
lives, shown by
your work the
past few days.
Memory, stress,
therapy, love,
persuasion,
hypnosis,
perception,
death,
conformity,
creativity,
learning,
personality,
aging,
intelligence, or
lack thereof,
emotion.
Psychology vs. Philosophy
Simply the
behavior
How we explore
things like
knowledge,
beauty, ethics
and our beliefs
about these
topics
Should we apply Philosophy to Psychology?
Psychology vs. Philosophy
What is the philosophy of psychology?
Are first person experiences
anywhere close to valid?
Are observational reports
reliable at all?
What is Psychology?
By definition, psychology is
the scientific study of
behavior and mental
processes.
Why is psychology hard to
define, and hard to study?
What is Psychology?
Psychologists study all kinds
of behavior.
Overt behaviors- those actions
and responses that are
observable
Covert behaviors- those
actions that are private and
internal
Examples???
What is Psychology?
Psychologists rely heavily on
empirical evidence. This
information that is gained from
observation and measurement
is the only data they truly care
about.
What is Psychology?
There are a number of strands
of psychology that are studied,
we have already looked at a
few.