Approaches Flashcards
Wilhelm Wundt
In 1873 he published the ‘Principle of Physiological Psychology’. Established psychology as a unique branch of science. Opened the first psychology lab in Leipzig, Germany in 1879. Developed the theory of introspection- process of gaining knowledge of one’s mental/ emotional state by observing our mental processes like memory and perception.
Introspection
Process of gaining knowledge of one’s mental/ emotional state by observing our mental processes like memory and perception.
Griffiths (1994)- fruit machine
Introspection on fruit machine gamblers- asked them to think aloud while playing.
Csikzentmilyi and Hunter (2003)- happiness
Used introspection to study happiness in their work in the area of positive psychology.
Empiricism
Knowledge comes from observation and experience alone.
Introspection Evaluation
- Not reliable- cannot be measured because they are unobservable.
- Other researchers were not reliably reproducing the same thing.
- Other psychologists were conducing reliable scientific studies.
- Not particularly accurate.
Psychology Timeline
1900s- Freud/ Psychodynamic
1920s-30s- Behaviourism
1950s- Humanism
1960s- Cognitive
1960s- Social
1980s- Biological
2000s- Cognitive neuroscience
Behaviourism
Behaviour is learnt through classical and operant conditioning.
Classical Conditioning
Learning through association.
Operant Conditioning
Learning through reinforcement.
Classical conditioning process
An unconditioned stimulus can gradually become associated with a neutral stimulus to create a conditioned stimulus and response.
Pavlov (1902)- dogs
- Classical conditioning involves association of an unconditioned stimulus with a response with a neutral one to create a new conditioned stimulus and response- triggered a dog to salivate when a bell was rung.
- Unconditioned stimulus (food) = Unconditioned response (salivation)
- Neutral stimulus (bell)
- Unconditioned stimulus (food) + Neutral stimulus (bell) = Unconditioned response (salivation)
- Overtime: Conditioned stimulus (bell) = Conditioned response (salivation)
Operant Conditioning Process
Works through positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement and punishment. Positive reinforcement works for reinforcing behaviour through rewards. Negative reinforcement reinforces behaviour by removing unpleasant feelings. Punishment weakens negative behaviour.
B F Skinner (1948)- rats
- Operant conditioning suggests behaviour is reinforced by positive or negative reinforcement- studied rats in cages.
- Positive Reinforcement- hungry rat in cage with a lever. Rat would knock the lever and be given a food pellet. They quickly learnt that they would be given food by knocking the lever.
- Negative Reinforcement- subjected the rats to eclectic shocks. If the rat knocked the lever it would stop the current, learning to go to the lever to stop the unpleasant current.
- Punishment- designed to weaken or eliminate a response.
Watson and Rayner (1920)- Little Albert
Applied Classical Conditioning to cause a phobia of white rats in ‘Little Albert’. Paired a white rat with a loud clanging sound. Little Albert was conditioned to fear anything white and fluffy including the investigator’s beard.
Behaviourism Evaluation
+ Practical applications/ usefulness- helped with treatments like systematic desensitisation.
+ Scientific method- Skinner manipulated the IV and was able to measure the rats behaviour- establish a cause and effect relationship.
- Both theories are based on animals- human behaviour is different.
- Reductionist- doesn’t take into account nature.
Social Learning Theory
Behaviour is learnt through imitation.
Bandura (1961)- SLT
A group of children were split into 2 separate groups. Half were exposed to an adult role model interacting aggressively with a life size Bobo doll, while the other half were exposed to an adult interacting calmly with the Bobo doll. The children who were exposed to a more aggressive adult were seen to be more verbally and physically aggressive afterwards with the same Bobo doll.
Modelling
People imitate behaviour displayed by role models.
Identification
People are more likely to imitate behaviour displayed by role models they relate to.
Imitation
Behaviour is copied and replicated depending on the characteristics of the model, the ability to replicate the behaviour and the consequences.
Vicarious Reinforcement
Seeing punishment or reward can affect the likelihood of imitation.
Mediational Processes
People must perform internal mediational processes to imitate.
Attention
Behaviour must capture ones attention to be imitated.
Retention
Behaviour must be memorable to be imitated.
Reproduction
Behaviour must be able to be replicated/ the person must have the ability to reproduce it to be imitated.
Motivation
The will to perform the behaviour.
Social Learning Theory Evaluation
+ Practical Applications- useful in understanding criminal behaviour.
+ Research support from Bandura’s study.
- Problem with causality- role models may have nothing to do with someone’s behaviour- they may just be the way they are.
- A problem with complexity- too reductionist. Disregards any other influence on behaviour like genes, locus of control, etc.
Bandura and Walters (1963)- rewards
Children who saw models being rewarded for aggressive acts were more likely to show a high level of aggression in their own play.
Akers (1998)- criminals
The probability of someone engaging in crime increases when they’re exposed to models that commit crime and identify with these people.
Ulrich (2003)- violence and rewards
Found that the strongest cause of violent behaviour in adolescence was association with delinquent peer groups where violence was modelled and rewarded.
Siegal and McCormick (2006)- personality
Criminals may not be influenced but just have a deviant attitude.
Cognitive Approach
All behaviour is preceded by a thought.
Computer Analogy
The brain encodes information into a suitable format for processing and storage. It is inputted through the senses, encoded into the memory, and stored.
Piaget- Schema Theory
- A schema is a set of knowledge and mental representations of the world that we help to understand and respond to situations. Allow shortcuts when interpreting huge amounts of data daily.
- Suggested that when presented with something unfamiliar, we try to use one of our existing schemas, try to fit it into that schema through assimilation and during accommodation change our schemas to fit the new characteristics of the unfamiliar stimulus.
Bartlett- War of the Ghost Study.
Theorised that memory is reconstructive and people store and retrieve information accounting to expectations formed by cultural schemas. Showed participants a Native American Folklore story and found that when they tried to remember it, they distorted the story in three ways.
Assimilation- Bartlett
Story became more consistent with the participants’ own cultural expectations.
Leveling- Bartlett
The story became shorter with each retelling as information deemed unimportant was omitted.
Sharpening- Bartlett
Participants changed the order of the story to make sense using terms more familiar to their culture. They also added details to match their own cultural expectations.
fMRI
Generates images of the brain by measuring blood flow to areas.
PET Scan
Uses a radioactive substance called a tracer to look for disease and create an image.
Cognitive Evaluation
+ Practical applications- can be used for cognitive therapies.
+ Scientific- methods of research are extremely scientific and use modern technology.
- Computer models reductionist- simplify complex mental processes too much.
- Studies like Bartlett’s have little generalisability.
Biological Approach
Focuses on biological explanations of human behaviour, e.g. genes, neurochemistry and evolution- nature only.
Gottesman and Shields (1972)- twins with schizophrenia
Found a 5% concordance rate for schizophrenia in MZ twins, and 12% in DZ.
Genotype
Genetic code
Phenotype
Physical appearance
Darwin
Suggested that organisms adapt over time to their environment through natural selection. For example, the peppered moths were lighter in colour before the industrial revolution, darkening to blend in with the pollution.
Bowlby
Attachment to a primary caregiver has evolved because it gives the infant a survival advantage.
Buss- mate choices
Mate choices have evolved because they lead to reproductive success. Some women desire males with resources because they will be able to provide for them and offspring, while some prefer young, attractive men, indicating fertility.
Biological Evaluation
+ Scientific- lab experiments ensure it is scientific, and biology can be evidenced.
+ Practical applications- fMRI/ PET scans can help find faults in the brain by finding areas affected, treatments.
- Reductionist- ignores nurture/ the environment
- Issues with evolutionary theory, e.g. homosexuality is not reproductively beneficial.
- Deterministic- against free will.
Psychodynamic
Idea that our past experience impedes our future.
Id
Our primal urges.
Ego
Mediator between Id and Superego.
Superego
Moral principles.
Defence Mechanisms
Triggered when we are confronted with a situation we are unable to deal with.
Repression
Unconscious blocking of unacceptable thoughts and imulses. Repressed thoughts continue to influence behaviour without the person being aware of their reasons for engaging in the behaviour.
Denial
Refusing to accept reality to avoid dealing with painful feelings.
Displacement
Redirecting thoughts and feelings from a situation to something else- gives hostile feelings a route for expression.
Psychosexual Stages of Development
Our unconscious desires that develop as our body does. Our erogenous zones become more sensitive as we grow, and our libido, our sexual energy, is focused on a particular organ.
Oral stage
0-1 year- focus on the sensation of pleasure in the mouth. Babies receive pleasure from sucking or chewing things. Suggested people can be stuck in this stage if they are under or over fed.
Anal stage
1-3 years- child derives pleasure from the retention or expulsion of faeces. The child becomes aware that they must use a toilet. Too harsh or too lax potty training can result in fixation in this stage. Children can become anally retentive or anally expulsive if fixated in this stage.
Phallic stage
3-6 years- the child becomes aware of gender differences and becomes obsessed with genitals.
Latency stage
6 years-puberty- sexual desires remain dormant as social and intellectual development occurs.
Genital stage
Puberty-maturity- beginning of mature adult sexuality. Calmness disrupted by the Id, that makes demands in the form of heterosexual desires.
Oedipus complex
The Oedipus Complex occurs in the phallic stage , where a young boy has unconscious sexual desires for their parent of the opposite sex, therefore leading to resentment toward their same sex parent. Freud suggested that boys then fear their father and believe they will be castrated so internalise his moral values and standards.
Electra Complex
Freud suggested the Electra Complex for girls, suggesting that girls suffer with Penis Envy and turn to their father in the hopes of ‘regaining their penis’. He suggested the only way they can regain their penis is through having a career, a male baby, or a male lover.
Castration anxiety
A male fears that his mother is going to cut off his penis and emasculate him.
Psychodynamic Evaluation
+ Explanatory power- huge influence on psychology at its time. Helped explain personality, abnormal behaviour, moral development and gender, while emphasising the importance of our relationship with our parents.
+ Practical application- psychoanalysis therapy (dream therapy/ hypnosis)- useful for people with mild neuroses, but potentially harmful to people with more serious mental disorders.
- Case study- ungeneralisable and subjective
- Untestable- pseudoscience
Karl Popper- testability of psychodynamic
The psychodynamic approach is not testable- pseudoscientific.
Fisher and Greenberg (1996)- support psychodynamic
Found support for the existence of unconscious motivation in human behaviour as well as for defence mechanisms in their review of 2500 studies.
Humanistic
Focuses on human experience and free will.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
The goal is self-actualisation (full potential), but we must complete each level first, including physiological (breathing, food, water, sleep), safety (employment, health, home, etc), love/ belonging (friendship, family, sexual intimacy), and esteem (self-esteem, confidence, achievement, respect).
Focus on the Self
Our concept of self comes from the opinions of others (positive regard) and our own feelings of self worth.
Congruence/ Incongruence
Similarity between ideal and actual self is congruence, a large disparity between ideal and actual self is incongruence.
Conditions of Worth
Those who experience unconditional positive regard are more likely to self actualise than those who experience conditional positive regard.
Humanistic Counselling
An individual’s psychological problems were a direct result of their conditions of worth and the conditional positive regard they receive from other people. Humanistic therapists regard themselves as guides or facilitators to help people understand themselves and find ways to self-actualise. They usually provide unconditional positive regard for clients, expressing their understanding.
Humanistic Evaluation
+ Research support for conditions of worth- Harter et al (1996)- teens who feel that they have to fulfil certain conditions in order to gain parents’ approval often end up not liking themselves.
+ Practical applications through therapy- humanistic counselling can be used to help people self-actualise.
- Not scientific- no experimental evidence to show a causal relationship between variables.
- Unrealistic- overly idealised- most people will never self actualise and will exhibit self destructive behaviours- also ignores the situation.
- Cultural differences in hierarchy of needs- Nevis (1983)- in a study in China, it was found that belongingness and love were more fundamental than physiological needs and that self-actualisation was defined in terms of contributions to the community more than individual development.
Behaviourism Comparisons
Reductionist, Deterministic, Nurture
Biological Comparisons
Reductionist, Deterministic, Nature, Scientific
Cognitive Comparisons
Reductionist, Deterministic to an extent, Nature and Nurture, Scientific
Psychodynamic Comparisons
Reductionist, Deterministic, Nature and Nurture
Humanistic Comparisons
Free will, Nature and Nurture
SLT Comparisons
Reductionist, Deterministic to an extent, Nurture, Scientific
