Introduction to Psychology / Chapter 1 Flashcards
What is psychology?
The scientific study of behaviour and mental processes.
What does “behaviour and mental processes” encompass?
Not only what people do, but also their thoughts, emotions, perceptions, reasoning processes, memories, and biological acitivities that maintain bodily functioning.
What ancient operation was performed when people thought psychological problems were caused by evil spirits?
Trephining
- chipping a hole in a patient’s skull
What 18th century physician argued that a trained observer could discern basic personality characteristics from the shape and number of bumps on a person’s skull, and what was this called?
- Franz Joseph Gall
- phrenology
What do you call the perspective that Sigmund Freud developed?
Psychodynamic
What discipline and where can psychology’s be roots traced back to?
- Ancient Greeks
- Philosophers
Which philosopher believed children were born into the world with minds like “blank slates” (tabula rasa)?
John Locke, of 17th century Britain
What is considered the formal beginning of psychology?
- When Wilhelm Wundt established the first experimental lab devoted to psychological phenomena
- 1879, Leipzig, Germany
- at the same time William James was setting up a lab in Cambridge
Out of John Locke, Rene Descartes, and Plato, who believed some knowledge was inborn in humans?
Rene Descartes and Plato.
***What was Wundt’s aim, and was was his perspective called?
- To study the building blocks of the mind
- “structuralism”
*Wundt and his followers used a procedure known as _______ as part of their study in structuralism.
introspection
What is introspection?
A procedure where people are presented with a trgger/stimulus, then asked to describe in detail in their own words what they were experiencing.
True or false: Wundt and other structuralists used introspection.
True
True or false: Wundt and other structuralists used functionalism.
False
Which perspective replaced structuralism?
Functionalism
What does functionalism concentrate on?
What the mind DOES and how behaviour functions.
American psychologist William James led what?
- William James led functionalists
- examining how behaviour allows people to satisfy their needs
- how our “Stream of consciousness” permits us to adapt to our environment
- first to apply psychology practically
Which early psychologist was heavily influenced by Darwinism?
William James
Which early psychologist was one of the first to focus on child development and women’s issues?
Leta Setter Hollingworth
What are 5 major perspectives of psychology?
Neuroscience Psychodynamic Behavioural Cognitive Humanistic
*How does a neuroscience perspective view behaviour?
From perspective of biological functioning
*Describe the psychodynamic perspective’s belief.
Believes behaviour is motivated by inner, unconscious forces over which a person has little control.
*What does a behavioural perspective of psychology focus on?
Observable behaviours
*Which perspective of psychology examines how people think about and understand the world?
Cognitive
