Areas and Perspectives

Question 1

What are the key assumptions of the social area?

Answer 1

1 - Human behaviour is influenced by the individual situation as well as individual characteristics
2 - We can understand human behaviour in terms of influence by individual groups

Question 2

What are the key assumptions of the cognitive area?

Answer 2

1 - Mental processes help us to understand human behaviour
2 - The mind is like an information processing computer
3 - People make decision as to how they behave

Question 3

What are the key assumptions of the developmental area?

Answer 3

1 - People change and develop with age

2 - Human development is and interaction of the influences of nature and nurture

Question 4

What are the key assumptions of the individual differences area?

Answer 4

1 - Individuals differ in their behaviour and personal qualities so not everyone can be considered the ‘average’ person
2 - Every individual is genetically unique and this uniqueness is displayed through their behaviour. So everyone behaves differently
3 - All human characteristics can be measured from in person and quantified. The measures gained from one person are different to those gained from another
4 - All psychological characteristics are inherited and as everyone inherits different characteristics, everyone is different and unique

Question 5

What are the key assumptions of the biological area?

Answer 5

1 - All behaviour can be explained and understood in terms of functioning of biological systems
2 - There is a direct relationship between biology of the human brain and human behaviour
3 - Behaviour can be reduced to the functioning of biological systems

Question 6

What are the key assumptions of the behaviourist area?

Answer 6

1 - Humans and non-humans are only quantitatively different and so, generalisation about behaviour can be made across species
2 - we do now need to be concerned with internal processes, only external, observable factors
3 - we learn through one of three ways: classical conditioning, operant conditioning or social learning

Question 7

What are the key assumptions of the psychodynamic area?

Answer 7

1 - Human behaviour is a dynamic process and early experience leads us to believe in a predictable way
2 - Childhood is a critical period of development
3 - If conflicts in childhood aren’t resolved they can cause issues in adulthood