Approaches - Origins of Psychology

Question 1

Who is Wilhelm Wundt?

Answer 1

• He is seen as the first person to make psychology scientific
• He set up the first ever psychological lab in Liepzig, Germany 1879
• He published one of the first books on psychology
• He wanted to seprate psychology from philosophy so he focused on studying the mind in a scientific way and used the method of introspection

Question 2

Explain what Introspection is and how Wundt used the method

Answer 2

• Introspection - a psychologicl method which involves analysing your own thoughts and feelings internally
• He encouraged his participants to focus on their thoughts, images and sensations in response to different stimuli and they had to self report what they were experiencing

Question 3

Why is introspection seen as a scientific method?

Answer 3

• Introspections were recorded under strictl controlled conditions
• The same standardised instructions were issued to all participants and allowed procedures to be replicated
• The aim of introspection was to analyse the mind by breaking it down to it’s simplist elements and then peicing them back together to understand more complex experiences which is called structuralism

Question 4

What do 1900s behaviourists believe?

The emergence of psychology as a science

Answer 4

Watson and Skinner believe that true scientific psychology should just study things that can be observed and measured instead of private mental processes.

Question 5

What are the methods used in scientific research?

The emergence of psychology as a science

Answer 5

• Objective - recorded without bias and not influenced by any other factor
• Replicable - should be able to be replicated exactly
• Controlled - should be under controlled condtions
• Predictable - results should be used to predict future behaviour

Question 6

What do 1950s cognitive psychologists believe?

The emergence of psychology as a science

Answer 6

• They see the study of mental processes as highly scientific and compare the mind to a computer
• Cognitive psychology emerged during the digital revolution
• Cognitive psychologists make inferences on how mental processes work by conducting lab experiments on participants

Question 7

What is the 1980s biological approach?

The emergence of psychology as a science

Answer 7

• These researchers take advantage of technology to investigate physiological processes as they happen
• Scanning techniques are used to investigate activity in the brain
• Genetic testing has allowed us to understand the relationship between genes and behaviour