origins of psychology Flashcards
Wundt, introspection and the emergence of Psychology as a science.
define science
discovering the physical and natural world systematically and objectively using empirical methods such as observation and experimentation
define psychology
the scientific study of behaviour and mental processes and how they are affected by internal and external factors
features of science
universal paradigm
theory construction
hypothesis testing
falsification
replicability
objectivity
the empirical method
what is the empirical method?
the use of objective, quantitative observation in a systematically controlled, replicable situation, in order to test or refine a theory
what was Wundt referred to as and why?
the father of experimental psychology
he was the first to use controlled empirical scientific research techniques to study the mind and established psychology as an independent field
what did Wundt do (accomplishments)?
- set up first psychological lab in Germany in 1870s
- called himself a psychologist
- wrote first book and academic journal on psychology
- trained students that would go on to be psychology professors across the world
what was Wundt’s research?
structuralism - an attempt to uncover the hidden structure of the mind by describing it in terms of its simplest definable components
his work focused on the structure of sensation and perception
used introspection as the experimental method of his research
what is introspection?
the process of observing and examining your own conscious thoughts and emotions
3 conditions of introspection
the mentality condition: aims to generate beliefs about mental states and events
the first person condition: aims to generate beliefs about the individuals own mind
the temporal proximity condition: generates beliefs and describes the individual’s current mental life
explain the process of introspection from Wundt’s research
1) participants are trained to report conscious experiences as objectively as possible
2) participants asked to focus on a sensory object e.g. ticking metronome
3) participants would systematically report their experience of the object by breaking their thoughts into separation element e.g. focus inward and report sensations, feelings and images
evaluation of Wundt’s experiment using introspection
+ highly scientific - controlled experimental conditions and environment, large sample size, and methods
+ systematic approach helped to developed theories of mental processes based on data collected
+ easy to replicate and was a significant inspiration for further psychologists
- not direct observation of mental processes as inferences were made which may be incorrect
- methods are subjective and not truly scientific - PPs cannot accurately report mental state as self-report is biased and can be influenced by demand characteristics or social desirability bias
timeline of psychology
1870 - Wundt
1890 - psychodynamic approach
1910 - behaviourist approach
1950 - humanistic approach
1960 - behaviourist approach
1960 - cognitive approach
1980 - biological approach
arguments for psychology is a science
Allport (1947) said psychology has the same aims as science - to predict, understand and control
behaviourist, cognitive and biological approaches use scientific procedures to investigate theories - controlled and unbiased
arguments for psychology is not a science
some approaches use unreliable and not objective methods to study behaviour e.g. interviews can be biased and interpreted differently
hard to get a representative sample of the population - findings can’t be reliably generalised
psychological experiments are open to extraneous variables e.g. demand characteristics
