AP Psychology
UNIT ONE:
HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY
LEQ 1
 What is psychology and what philosophical changes
have occurred in the field throughout time?
What is Psychology
 Psychology is the study of the behavior and mental
processes of the human mind through scientific
inquiry.
 Psychology studies the behavior, and attempts to
understand the mental process behind it.
 Two important components to this definition are


Scientific inquiry
Behavior
What They Mean
 Scientific Inquiry: The method consistently used
to both ask and answer questions.


Each question is based less on a set of findings or thoughts
Each inquiry (method) can be repeated to verify it’s validity
and results.
 Behavior – is any action that other people can
observe or measure.


Can include walking, sleeping, and eating
Includes automatic body functions like heart rate, blood
pressure, and brain activity
The Goal of Psychology
 Psychologists seek to observe, describe, explain,
predict, and control the events they study
 Evaluate competing ideas with careful observation
and rigorous analysis.
 This allows them to get a better understanding of
behavior, and lets psychologists explain, predict, and
control behavior
 Example: Pro sports teams give many players
psychological evaluations before offering a big
contract.
Question
 What types of questions do psychologists seek to
answer?

Eliminate or prove theories about
the brain
 Sleep
 Stress
 Sensation
 Intelligence
 Lying

Question 1
 Is it a myth that most people use 10% of their brains
on average?
Answer 1
 Yes it is a myth. We use all the components of our
brain every day. We will see how this works in the
second unit of this course
Question 2
 During your most vivid dreams is your body
paralyzed?
Answer 2
 The answer is yes. Dreams occur during REM (rapid
eye movement)- a stage of sleep. Voluntary muscles
cannot move during this time
Question 3
 Can psychological stress cause physical illness?
Answer 3
 Yes. The link between mind and body can make you
sick when stress is chronic
Question 4
 Does the color red exist only as a sensation in the
brain and not in the real world?
Answer 4
 Yes. All sensations of color are created within the
brain. Light waves have different frequencies, but no
color. The brain “assigns” a color to a certain
frequency.
Question 5
 Is Bipolar disorder (manic-depressive disorder)
caused by a conflict in the unconscious mind?
Answer 5
 No. There is no evidence at this time that the
unconscious mind plays any role in bipolar disorder.
Because the disorder responds well to narcotics, it is
a chemical imbalance.
Question 6
 Is a new-born child’s mind a blank slate?
Answer 6
 No. Tabula Rosa has been proven to be false. The
brain has built in abilities and protective reflexes.
The brain also has what is called genetic potential.
Question 7
 Does everything that happens to us leave a
permanent memory?
Answer 7
 No. There is no evidence that memory records all the
details of our lives. What does get stored is what we
experience that has value to us in some form. This
memory will become distorted as it decays over time.
Question 8
 Are we born with all the brain cells we will ever
have?
Answer 8
 Nope. Many parts of the brain develop as we move
through life. Your brain does not fully develop until
your late 20’s- early 30’s.
Question 9
 Is intelligence a purely genetic trait that is fixed at
the same level throughout someone’s life?
Answer 9
 No. Intelligence is the result of heredity and the
environment.
Question 10
 Polygraph devices are extremely accurate in
detecting that a person is being dishonest?
Answer 10
 False. There is little evidence to support the
effectiveness of a lie detector. The sensors can be set
off by a number of psychological or physical actions.
Question to Ponder
DO YOU HAVE A SOUL? IF SO, HOW DO YOU
DEFINE IT?
ON A SHEET OF PAPER, GIVE ME THREE
POINTS THAT ANSWER THIS QUESTION
PLEASE NOTE: THIS ANSWER CANNOT USE
ANY RELIGIOUS IDEOLOGY. WHILE
RELIGION IS IMPORTANT, USING IT WILL
DEFEAT THE PURPOSE OF THE QUESTION.
Foundations of Psychology
THE ORIGINS OF PSYCHOLOGY
(AKA VERY DEAD PEOPLE)
Pre-Scientific Psychology
 The beginnings of Psychological Thought
throughout the world can be traced to ancient
writings.
India – Buddha pondered how sensations and
perceptions combine to form ideas
 China – Confucius stressed the powers of ideas and of an
educated mind (educated leadership)
 Israel – Hebrew Scriptures anticipated today’s
psychology by linking mind and emotion to the body.


People were said to think with their hearts and feel with their
bowels.
Pre-Scientific Psychology
 Socrates (469-399 B.C)
 Viewed the mind as separable from the body
 They
believed that the mind and body did not function
in unison.




Over 2000 years ago in ancient Greece, Plato recorded his
teachers greatest advice “know thyself”
Socrates suggested that we can learn about ourselves by
carefully examining our thoughts and feelings.
This method is known as Introspection, which means to look
within.
Plato and Socrates made these conclusions without the
benefit of scientific support
Ancient Greece
 Aristotle was another philosopher that believed the
mind is not separable from the body.
 He used observation of human behavior to discover
that knowledge is not preexisting (instinct
notwithstanding)
 Knowledge is, instead, developed from experience
and parental training
Prescientific Psychology
32
 Believed in soul (mind)-



http://ocw.mit.edu

body separation, but
wondered how the
immaterial mind (soul) and
physical body
communicated.
Is the soul our
consciousness?
Believed brain fluid was part
of the “soul”
First discovery of “nerve
pathways”
Believed in dualism-humans
have a physical and mental
nature.
 Rene Descartes (1596-1650)
Prescientific Psychology
33



Bacon is one of the
founders of modern
science, particularly
the experimental
method.
Use of experiments,
experience, and
common sense
Developed the idea
of Novum Organuum
 Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
Novum Organuum
 States that “the human understanding, from its
peculiar nature, easily supposes a greater degree of
order and equality in things than it really finds”!
 What do you think this means?
 Do we seek to impose order where it doesn’t exist?
 How does this apply to humans?
Phrenology
 This is the school of thought
that says the size and shape of
the skull directly related to a
person’s psyche



By feeling the bumps on a
person’s skull, psychologists
could a person’s psychological
capabilities. (the more bumps,
the better, and uglier).
This science also forced all
psychologists that the mind
was in the skull, not the heart
or liver.
One thing phrenology did get
right is called brain area
specializations.
Prescientific Psychology
36



Empiricism – the
view that knowledge
comes from experience
and science flourished
through observation
and experimentation
Locke held that the
mind was a tabula
rasa, or blank sheet, at
birth, and experiences
wrote on it.
An Essay of Human
Understanding
 John Locke (1632-1704)
Prescientific Psychology
What is the relation of mind (soul) to the body?
Mind and body are
connected
Mind and body are
distinct
The Hebrews
Socrates
Aristotle
Plato
Augustine
Descartes
37
Scientific Psychology
HISTORICAL APPROACHES TO PSYCHOLOGY:
EARLY SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT
THESE FOLKS ARE DEAD TOO….
Psychology is Born
 Psychology was born in December of 1879 at the
University of Leipzig in Germany
 Wilhelm Wundt developed an experimental apparatus
that tested how quickly a person responded to hearing a
ball hit a platform

The different tests required the participants to press a telegraph
button when they heard the ball hit the platform
 The difference was 1/10 of a second each time
 Wundt wanted to see what the faster mental process was
(hearing the ball strike or pressing the button)
 The test itself was fundamentally flawed. The significance
is that he used a scientific approach (not anecdotal
evidence) to back his claims.
Psychology’s New Path
 Psychology soon began to develop into several
schools of thought that describe how our minds work
and why:





Structuralists
Functionists
Gestalt Psychology
Humanistic
Behaviorists
Structuralism – founded by Wilhelm
Wundt
 Structuralists were concerned with discovering
basic elements of conscious experience.
 Used introspection – a method of selfobservation where people report their thoughts
and feelings based on stimuli (smell=memory)
 Set up the first psychological laboratory
 Conscious experience was broken down into two
categories:
Objective sensations – five senses
 Subjective feelings – emotional responses to mental
images

Functionalism
 Functionalism- focus on emotions, memories, will





power, habits, and streams of consciousness.
Why do certain parts of our brain function the way they
do?
William James speculated that thinking, feeling,
learning, and remembering serve one major function to
our ancestors, to help them survive and adapt.
Later on, these senses and functions contribute to our
complexity of thought.
Published 1st psychology text book: the Principles of
Psychology
Study how animals and people adapt to their
environments
Gestalt Psychology
 The focus on attempting to explain our tendency to
integrate pieces of information or feelings into a
whole.
 For ideas, events, or actions to make sense to us, we
have to place it in the context of a larger event.
(justification)
 How often do we take pieces of an idea, facts,
emotions, or feelings and organize them into an idea
that places them into a useful singular whole?
Humanistic Psychology
 Developed by Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow
 Focus on current environmental conditions as
influential in growth
 Developed the cognitive revolution-study in the
importance of internal processes, but expanded to
explore the ways we perceive, process, and retain
information scientifically
 Cognitive neuroscience- study of interaction of
thought processes and brain functions
Behavioralism
 Behavioral Psychology- The scientific study of





observable behavior in humans in their environment
Early Behaviorists include John B. Watson and B.F.
Skinner
Behaviorists – study how people / animals learn or
modify their behavior based on their responses to events
in the environment
Behaviorists dismissed the idea of introspection
Example: He put a hungry rat in a maze, and put food in
the same place to observe behavior.
B.F. Skinner showed that when a behavior is reinforced,
or rewarded, the behavior will happen often.
Modern Psychology
THE STUDY OF PSYCHOLOGY TODAY USING
MODERN THEORIES AND TECHNOLOGY TO
UNLOCK THE BRAIN.
Psychology’s Debate
 What are the relative contributions of biology and
experience?
 Nature-Nurture- Humans either develop their
traits through experience or they come equipped
with them.
 Was Plato right in assuming character and
intelligence are inherited?
 Was Socrates right in assuming we are a blank sheet?
Darwin
 1859- Origin of Species explained that diversity of
life as a result of natural evolution
 Natural Selection-nature selects the best traits
that best enable an organism to survive and
reproduce in a particular environment.
Levels of Analysis
 Three levels of analysis- three complementary
outlooks:



Biological Influences
Psychological Influences
Social-cultural Influences
 Biopsychosocial approach- considers the influence of
biological, psychological, and social-cultural
influences
Levels of Analysis
Sub-Fields of Psychology
 Types of Research
 Basic Research – science tat aims to increase the
scientific knowledge base

Ex: study changes that humans go through from womb to
tomb
 Applied Research – Scientific study that aims to
solve practical problems

Ex: study why employees work harder in the morning or
the afternoon, and why
Clinical Psychology
 A branch of psychology that studies, assesses, and
treats people with psychological disorders
 Administer and interpret tests, provide
psychotherapy, manage mental health programs, and
conduct basic and applied research
Contemporary Perspectives in Psychology
 Neuroscience - Study how the body and brain enable emotions,






memories and sensory experiences
Evolutionary - Study how natural selection of traits promotes the
perpetuation of one’s genes
Behavior Genetics - Study how much our genes and our
environment influence our individual differences
Psychodynamic - Study how behavior springs from unconscious
drives and conflicts
Behavioral - Study how people learn from observable responses and
behavior
Cognitive - Study how we encode, process, store, and retrieve
information
Sociocultural - Study the influence of culture, ethnicity, and
socioeconomic status on our behavior

Socioeconomic status – your status or self-perception in society
Psychiatry
 A branch of medicine dealing with psychological
disorders
 Practiced by physicians who sometimes provide
medical treatments as well as psychological therapy
 Can be open to counterfeiters who are looking to
make money, and it isn’t illegal.
Psychology as a Science
LEQ 2: HOW AND WHY DO PSYCHOLOGISTS
STUDY BEHAVIOR?
Need for Scientific Approach
 Are gut feelings always right?
 Have you been overconfident, yet proved to be
wrong?
 Are there limits of intuition and common sense? –
YES
Fallacies of the Brain
 Hindsight Bias
 The tendency to believe, after learning an outcome,
that one would have foreseen it
 Also know as the “I knew it all along phenomenon”
 Overconfidence
 our everyday thinking is limited by two things:
Hindsight bias – common sense after the fact
 Human tendency to be overconfident

Critical Thinking
 Critical Thinking
 does not blindly accept arguments and conclusions
 examines assumptions, evaluates evidence, and assesses
conclusions
 Leads to a scientific approach
The Scientific Method and Psychology
 this approach is used to give credibility to psychological studies
 Form a Theory – an explanation using an integrated set of principles
that organizes and predicts observations
 Hypothesis- A testable prediction
 A hypothesis is tested by making observations that:



describe behavior
detect correlations that help predict behavior
allow for experiments that explain behavior
 These are research strategies
 Operational Definition (Procedures) – A statement of procedures used
to define research variables


The procedures allow for replication of the study
Replication – repeating a research study to see whether the basic
findings are consistent

A repeated study is done with a different set of participants
Types of Psychologists
 Counseling Psychology- assist people coping with
emotional or personal challenges
 Clinical Psychologist- assess and treat mental,
emotional, and behavior disorders
 Psychiatrist- medical doctors who are licensed to
prescribe medication and treat physical causes of
psychological disorders
Any Questions