Lecture 1 Flashcards
What is psychology?
scientific investigation of mental processes, behaviour and interaction between them
mental processes: thinking, remembering, feeling
examine patterns of behaviour
What does biology and culture do?
provide possibilities and constraints within which people think, feel and act
What is positive psychology?
understand the factors that help people flourish
What do psychological anthropologists study?
psychological phenomena in other cultures, people in natural settings
What do cross cultural psychologists study?
patterns of behaviour across different cultures
What do cultural psychologists study?
patterns of behaviour within cultures
What do biopscyhologists/behavioural neuroscientists study?
genetic and biological processes in the brain and nervous system
What is localisation of function?
discrete brain regions have significant influence in discrete aspects of mental functioning
uses positron emitting tomography (PET)
what part of brain in charge of different mental functions
What is Broca’s aphasia?
difficulty producing speech
smaller area near frontal lobe
What is Wernicke’s aphasia?
Difficulty comprehending language
area near back of brain
What is the sociocultural perspective?
how unconscious cultural and social influences shape our thoughts, feelings and interactions
cultural and social factors: ethnicity, religion, socioeconomics
What is structuralism?
early psychological science that aimed to uncover the basic elements of consciousness
Who is Wilhelm Wundt? What did he do?
- involved with structuralism
- established first psychological lab
- used introspection to undercover basic elements of consciousness
eg. how memory works and stored in brain
What is functionalism?
the idea that consciousness is functional (serves a purpose)
eg. why do we have functioning memory
What did William James do?
Functionalism
What is a paradigm?
Broad system of theoretical assumptions employed bya scientific community
Psychology lacks unified paradigm- has number of schools of thought
5 perspectives in psychology
- psychodynamic
- behaviourist
- humanistic
- cognitive
- evolutionary
Areas in psychology
- psychological anthropologists
- cross cultural psychologists
- cultural psychhologist
- biopsychologist/behavioural neuroscience
- sociocultural
iceberg
What is the psychodynamic view? Who was involved?
FREUD
conscious and unconscious forces interact to control our thoughts and behaviours
some mental events are unconscious
conflicting mental processes- anxiety
behaviour is the inerplay between thoughts, feelings, wishes
How does the psychodynamic view understand unconscious?
- interpret through client’s consicous, verbalised thought and behaviour
- collect data through case studies- therapist tries to understand thoughts, feelings and actiosn of client
social relationships, psychpathology, mental process, personality, uncon
What are Freud’s contributions to the psychodynamic view?
- social relationships shaped by enduring aspects of personality
- psychopathology- influenced by mental representations of self and others
- mental processes occur in parallel and simultaneously- causes conflicting feelings
- personality development regulates sexual + aggressive behaviour
- much of mental life is unconscious
Freud’s criticisms
- non-empirircal approach
- violation of falsifiability criterion
- used unreliable measures
mechanistic/gears
What is the behaviourist perspective? Who is involved?
- Pavlov, Watson, Skinner
- environmental stimuli (associated through conditioning) control behaviour through learning- don’t need to refer to internal states like thoughts/feelings
classical conditioning
learning that occurs unconsciously
operant conditioning
learning that uses rewards and punishment to modify behaviour
how is behaviourist perspective investigated?
use experimental method to understand relationship between stimuli and behaviour- quantitative, empirical data- can be analysed statistically and replicated
human
What is the humanistic perspective? Who is involved?
- people are innately good + unique- will strive to realise goals and ambitions
- self-actualisation
- Rogers, Maslow
- person-centred- therapist shows empathy towards client
computer
What is the cognitive perspective? Who is involved?
- Wundt, Descartes
- focuses on hwo people process, store and retrieve info
- uses experimental methods to infer mental processes at work
runners
What is the evolutionary perspective? Who is involved?
- Darwin
- human behaviours evolved because they helped our ancestors survive and reproduce
- some behaviours are biologically determined- impulse to eat, sexual impulses
What is natural selection?
- interaction between psychological functions, social behaviour, physical functions
- concern for kin + degree of biological relatedness
What is reproductive success?
capacity to survive and produce offspring
What is inclusive fitness?
reproductive sucess and influence on reproductive success of genetically related individuals
ability of individual to transfer genes to offspring
How is the evolutionary perspective investigated?
- gather info through deductive methods- more recently use experimentation
- often start with known behaviour in species- attempt to explain using evolutionary principles- can interpret to humans
What is the modern school of thought?
Biopsychosocial model
* draws from across all perspectives
* biological processes, psychological factors, social forces are interrelated and influence mental states + behaviour
