Psychology’s Roots
UNIT ONE
Psychology
 What is it?

The definition has changed over time. Today it is:
 The scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

Behavior- outward or avert actions and reactions

Mental Processes- internal covert activity of our minds
Ancient Greeks
 Socrates

and Plato
Dualism - the mind is separate from the body and continues after the
body dies

some ideas innate (nature)
 Aristotle

monism – mind and body are connected
 knowledge results from memories of past experiences
(nurture)
Nature vs. Nurture- Nurture works on what nature endows.
Structuralism
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.
 Introspection- process of
objectively examining and
measuring one’s own thoughts and
mental activities
Structuralism (cont)
 Edward Titchener:

Structuralism - early school of psychology that used
introspection to explore the structural elements of the
human mind.


Introspection to study inner sensations and mental images
Died out in the 1900’s because introspection is unreliable!!!
Explain your feelings????
Functionalism
William James- Father of “modern psychology”

Focused on the adaptive value of conscious thoughts and
emotions (how they enable us to survive and reproduce added the importance of the environment )
Interested in how and why something happens-
predecessor to behaviorism
Functionalists broadened field of psychology to
include the study of children, animals, religious
experiences, and stream of consciousness
Gestalt Psychology
 Max Wertheimer- psychological events could not be
broken down into different events
 “the whole is greater than the sum of its part”
 Focus on how people perceive the world
Psychoanalysis
 Sigmund Freud, an Austrian physician,
and his followers emphasized the
importance of the unconscious mind
and its effects on human behavior.
 Emphasizes unconscious motives and
conflicts
 Psychoanalysis- helps a person
gain insight into their early life
experiences to change behavior


Behavior is driven by unconscious drives
and conflicts and childhood experiences
We protect ourselves from our real feeling
by using defense mechanisms.
Behaviorism
 Ivan Pavlov- Classical Conditioning
 John Watson and later B.F. Skinner emphasized the
study of overt- observable- behavior as the subject matter
of scientific psychology
Biopsychosocial Approach
We define psychology today as the scientific study of
behavior (what we do) and mental processes (inner
thoughts and feelings).
The best of psychology takes a combined approach to
looking at any given phenomenonThe biopsychosocial approach
Evaluates nature and nurture!!!!
Biopsychosocial Approach (cont.)
Psychodynamic Perspective
 Psychodynamic Perspective- Focus on the
unconscious mind and its influence over conscious
behavior and on early childhood experiences with
more emphasis on the development of a sense of
self and the discovery of other motivations behind
a person’s behavior
Freudian ideas are enduring because they lack anyway to
test them
 In order to get better, we must bring forward the true
feelings we have in our unconscious.

Behavioral Perspective
 Behavioral Perspective- Focus on observable
behavior and ignore “consciousness” issue
B.F. Skinner- developed a theory of how voluntary
behavior is learned called operant conditioning
 We behave in ways because we have been conditioned by
rewards and punishments to act a certain way.
 To change behaviors, we have to recondition the client.

Humanistic Perspective Humanistic Perspective- Focus on the aspects
of human nature that makes us human. People
have free will, the freedom to choose their own
destiny.

Abraham Maslow and Carl Rodgers both emphasized the
human potential, the ability of each person to become the
best person he or she could be (self actualization)
Cognitive Perspective
 Cognitive Perspective- focus on how people
think, remember, store, and use information
Focus on memory, intelligence, perception, thought
processes, problem solving, language and learning
 Cognitive Neuroscience- study of the physical changes in
the brain and nervous system during thinking


How do we react to getting dumped?

Try again or never again???
Socio-cultural Perspective
 Socio-cultural Perspective- focuses on the
relationship between social behavior and culture.
How our groups social roles along with cultural
norms and values affect our behavior

Cross-cultural research- contrasts and comparisons of a
behavior or issue are studied in at least two or more
cultures
Biopsychological Perspective
 Biopsychological Perspective- human and
animal behavior are linked to biological events
occurring in the body.
Hormones, heredity, brain chemicals, tumors, and
diseases
 To change behavior the biological problem must be
addressed, usually through medication or surgery

Evolutionary Perspective
 Evolutionary Perspective- focuses on the
biological bases for universal mental characteristics
that all humans share, based upon Darwin and
Natural Selection
 Example: why attractiveness influences mate
selection
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.
Four Big Ideas in Psychology
1. Critical Thinking is Smart Thinking
2. Behavior is a Biopsychosocial Event
3. We Operate with a Two-Track Mind (Dual
Processing)
4. Psychology Explores Human Strengths as Well
as Challenges
Why do Psychology?
1.
2.
How can we differentiate between uniformed
opinions and examined conclusions?
The science of psychology helps make these
examined conclusions, which leads to our
understanding of how people feel, think, and act as
they do!
What About Intuition & Common Sense?
 Many people believe that intuition and common sense are
enough to bring forth answers regarding human nature.
 Intuition and common sense may aid queries, but they are
not free of error.
 Example: Personal interviewers may rely too much on their
“gut feelings” when meeting with job applicants.
Hindsight Bias
Hindsight Bias is the “I-knew-it-all-along” phenomenon.
After learning the outcome of an event, many people believe
they could have predicted that very outcome.
Example: We only knew the dot.com stocks (housing
market) would plummet after they actually did plummet.
Overconfidence
 Sometimes we think we know
more than we actually know.
 How long do you think it would
take to unscramble these
anagrams?
Anagram
WREAT
WATER
ETYRN
ENTRY
Try it!
 People said it would take about
10 seconds, yet on average they
took about 3 minutes (Goranson,
1978)
OLHCOS
GLNEIANR
SDECELHU
TTHWEAM
EMLSLS
Critical Thinking
Critical thinking does not accept
arguments and conclusions blindly.
It examines assumptions, discerns hidden
values, evaluates evidence and assesses
conclusions
1.
2.
3.
4.
There are very few “truths” that do
not need to be subjected to testing.
All evidence is not equal in quality.
Just because someone is
considered to be an authority or to
have a lot of expertise does not
make everything that person claims
automatically true.
Critical thinking requires an open
mind.
The Amazing Randi
Critical Thinking Guidelines
Ask questions
Define your terms
Examine the evidence
Analyze assumptions and biases
Avoid emotional reasoning
Don’t oversimplify
Consider other interpretations
Tolerate uncertainty
How Do Psychologists Ask & Answer
Questions?
Psychologists, like all scientists, use the scientific
method to construct theories that organize,
summarize and simplify observations.
Theory
A theory is an explanation that integrates principles
and organizes and predicts behavior or events.
For example, low self-esteem contributes to
depression.
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is a testable prediction, often prompted
by a theory, to enable us to accept, reject or revise the
theory.
People with low self-esteem are apt to feel more
depressed.
Research Observations
 Research would require us to administer tests of self-
esteem and depression. Individuals who score low
on a self-esteem test and high on a depression test
would confirm our hypothesis.
Descriptive Methods
Methods that yield descriptions of behavior, but not
necessarily causal explanations
Include:
 Case studies
 Observational studies
 Psychological tests
 Surveys
They are difficult to replicate therefore
cannot be used as evidence to prove a
psychological theory
Case Study
A detailed description of a particular
individual being studied or treated, which may
be used to formulate broader research
hypotheses
• May not apply or generalize
others
• Vulnerable to bias from
participant or observer
Observational Studies
Researchers carefully and systematically
observe and record behavior without
interfering with behavior
Naturalistic observation
Purpose
is to observe how people or animals behave in their natural
environments.
Laboratory observation
Purpose
is to observe how people or animals behave in a
more controlled setting.
Observation Bias- see what they expect to see
Surveys
 Questionnaires and interviews that ask
people about experiences, attitudes, or
opinions
Requires a representative sample
Group
of subjects, selected from the population for study, which
matches the population on important characteristics such as age and
sex
 Popular polls and surveys rely on
volunteers
Survey
 Wording Effect
Wording
can change the results of a
survey.
Q: Should cigarette ads and
pornography be allowed on television?
(not allowed vs. forbid)
Courtesy Bias
What
they think people want to hear
Random Sampling
If
The fastest way to know about the
marble color ratio is to blindly
transfer a few into a smaller jar and
count them.
each member of a population has an
equal chance of inclusion into a sample,
it is called a random sample
(unbiased). If the survey sample is
biased, its results are not valid.
Correlational Study
A descriptive study that looks for a consistent
relationship between two phenomena
Correlation
A statistical measure of how strongly two variables are related to
one another.
Correlation coefficients can range from 0.0 – 1.0
Indicates strength
of relationship
(0.00 to 1.00)
Correlation
coefficient
r = + 0.37
Indicates direction
of relationship
(positive or negative)
Direction of correlations
Positive correlations
An association between
increases in one variable and
increases in another, or
decreases in one variable and
decreases in the other.
Negative correlations
An association between
increases in one variable and
decreases in another.
Correlation does not mean causation!
Explaining correlations
Start with three variables (X, Y, Z)
X might cause Y
Y might cause X
X might be correlated with Y, which alone causes Z
Correlations show patterns, not causes.
Illusory Correlation- The perception of a relationship
where no relationship actually exists. Examples…
Years of marriage and hair loss?
Experimentation
Like other sciences, experimentation is the backbone of
psychological research. Experiments isolate causes and
their effects.
Many factors influence our behavior. Experiments (1)
manipulate factors that interest us, while other factors are
kept under (2) control to test our hypothesis.
Effects generated by manipulated factors isolate cause and
effect relationships.
Control Group
In an experiment, a comparison condition in which
subjects are not exposed to the same treatment as in
the experimental condition.
In some experiments, the control group is given a
placebo, an inactive substance or fake treatment.
Independent Variable
An independent variable is a factor manipulated by the
experimenter. The effect of the independent variable is the
focus of the study.
For example, when examining the effects of breast feeding
upon intelligence, breast feeding is the independent variable.
Dependent Variable
A dependent variable is a factor that may change in response
to an independent variable. In psychology, it is usually a
behavior or a mental process.
For example, in our study on the effect of breast feeding
upon intelligence, intelligence is the dependent variable.
Depends on the Independent
Independent variables
Variables the experimenter
manipulates
Dependent variables
Variables the experimenter
predicts will be affected by
manipulations of the
independent variable(s)
Double-Blind Procedure
In evaluating drug therapies, patients and experimenter’s
assistants should remain unaware of which patients had
the real treatment and which patients had the placebo
treatment.
Unintended changes in subjects’
behavior due to cues
inadvertently given by the
experimenter.
Strategies for preventing
experimenter effects include
single- and double-blind studies.
Random Assignment
For experiments to have experimental and control groups
composed of similar subjects, random assignment should be
used.
Each individual participating in the study has the same
probability as any other of being assigned to a given group.
 Assigning participants to experimental (breast-fed) and
control (formula-fed) conditions by random assignment
minimizes pre-existing differences between the two
groups.
A summary of steps during experimentation.
Your Turn
An experimenter wants to study the effects of music
on studying. He has some students study while
listening to music and others study in silence, and
then compares their test scores. What is the
independent variable in this experiment?
1.
2.
3.
4.
The students
The presence of music while studying
The kind of music
The test scores
All the Research Models
Statistical Reasoning
 Mode- more frequently occurring
score in a distribution
 Mean- the average of the score
 Median- the middle score in the
distribution; the 50th percentile
 Range- difference between the
highest and lowest distribution
 Always note which measure of
central tendency is being reported.
It’s easy to skew
Standard Deviation
 The computed measure of
how much scores vary
around the mean or average
score
 Normal (Bell) Curve
Inferential Statistics
 Statistical procedures that allow researchers to
draw inferences about how statistically meaningful
a study’s results are.
 Statistical Significance

Statistical tests that show how likely it is that a
study’s results occurred merely by chance
Choosing the best explanation
Interpretation of results may depend on how the research was conducted.
Cross-sectional studies
 Subjects of different ages are
compared at a single time.
Longitudinal studies
 Subjects are periodically
assessed over a period of
time.
Frequently Asked Questions About Psychology
Q. Can laboratory experiments illuminate everyday life?
Ans: Artificial laboratory conditions are created to study
behavior in simplistic terms. The goal is to find underlying
principles that govern behavior.
Frequently Asked Questions About Psychology
Q. Is psychology free of value judgments?
Ans: No. Psychology emerges from people who subscribe to
a set of values and judgments.