Chapter 1 Flashcards
The Science/History of Psychology
Psychology
Study of behavior and mental processes
4 goals of psych
Description, explanation, prediction, control
Wilhelm Wundt
Father of psych; consciousness could be broken down into basic elements (thoughts, experiences, and emotions); objective introspection
Edward Titchener
Developed structuralism that focuses on breaking down mental processes into their most basic elements/structures
William James
Developed functionalism that focuses on how the mind allows people to adapt, live, work, and play (to function)
Max Wertheimer
Created Gestalt psychology that focuses on perception and sensation, particularly the perception of patterns and whole figures
Sigmund Freud
Believed we repress threatening urges/desires from childhood and when they try to surface they create nervous disorders; created psychoanalysis- theory of personality that past changes present
Ivan Pavlov
Studied classical conditioning through dog salivation
John B. Watson
Created behaviorism that focuses on observable behavior that can be directly seen and measured
B.F. Skinner
Developed behavioral perspective, continued classical conditioning, and founding operant conditioning
Abraham Maslow
Founded humanistic perspective that focuses on aspects of personality that make people uniquely human (subjective feelings and freedom of choice) and human growth potential
Critical thinking
Making reasoned judgements about claims
Scientific approach
Measured system of gathering data so that bias and error is reduced/nonexistent
Steps of the scientific approach
Make observation, perceive question, form hypothesis, test hypotheses, draw conclusion, record results
Hypothesis
Tentative explanation of a phenomenon based on an observation
Observer effect
Tendency for ppl/animals to act different from their normal when they know they’re being observed
Participant observation
Observer becomes a participant in the group being observed in order to hide
Observer bias
tendency of observers to see what they expect to see
Case study
study of one single individual or group situation in great detail
Representative sample
randomly selected sample of participants from a larger population of participants
Population
entire group of ppl/animals in which researcher is interested in
Correlation
Measure of relationship between two variables
Correlation coefficient
Number representing strength and direction of relationship existing between two variables
Experiment
Deliberate manipulation of a variable to see if corresponding changes in behavior result, allowing determination of cause and effect relationship (if exists)
Operationalization
Specific description of a variable of interest that allows it to be measured
Independent variable
Variable manipulated
Dependent variable
Variable that represents measurable response/behavior of participants in experiment
Experimental group
Participants who are exposed to the independent variable
Control group
Participants who aren’t exposed to independent variable
Random assignment
Assigning participants to the experimental or control group randomly
Placebo effect
Phenomenon when expectations of participants influence their behavior
Experimenter bias
Tendency for experimenter’s expectations for a study to unintentionally influence the results
Single blind study
study in which participants dont know if they’re in experimental or control group
Double blind study
Study in which neither experimenter or participants know if participants are in experimental or control group
