origins of psychology

Question 1

what is psychology?

Answer 1

the word ‘psychology’ comes from the Greek word ‘psyche’ meaning ‘mind’ and the Greek word ‘logos’ meaning study of

Question 2

what are the 2 main ideas of origins of psychology?

Answer 2

• Wundt and introspection

- the emergence of psychology as a science

Question 3

Wundt established the first

Answer 3

psychology lab; the aim was to describe the nature of human consciousness

Question 4

Wundt pioneered the method of

Answer 4

introspection

Question 5

explain how Wundt pioneered the first method of introspection

Answer 5

this was the first systematic attempt to study the mind- conscious awareness was broken down into basic categories: thoughts, images and sensations (isolating the structure of consciousness in this way is called structuralism

Question 6

all introspections were recorded under controlled conditions and the same standardised instructions were given to all participants so

Answer 6

procedures could be repeated (replicated) identically every single time

Question 7

regarding the emergence of psychology as a science, who rejected introspection?

Answer 7

Watson and early behaviourists- they argued that introspection was subjective in that it varied from person to person. A ‘scientific’ psychology should only study phenomena that can be observed and measured

Question 8

what approach led to the emergence of the scientific approach?

Answer 8

the behaviourist approach- Watson and Skinner brought the language and rigour of the natural sciences into psychology. The focus on learning, and the use of carefully controlled lab studies would dominate psychology for decades

Question 9

explain how the legacy of experimental method can still be observed today

Answer 9

many psychologists rely on the experimental method:

• the cognitive approach investigates ‘private’ mental processes via lab tests
• the biological approach studies activity in the brain using scanning techniques such as EEG and fMRI in controlled conditions

Question 10

what are the evaluation points for origins of psychology?

Answer 10

• one strength is that some of Wundt’s methods are scientific
• one limitation is that some aspects of the research are not scientific
• one strength is that research into modern psychology can claim to be scientific
• one limitation with psychology is that not all approaches use objective methods

Question 11

explain how one strength is that some of Wundt’s methods are scientific

Answer 11

• for instance Wundt recorded all introspections within a controlled lab experiment; he also standardised his procedures so that all participants received the same information and were tested in the same way
• for this reason Wundt’s research can be considered a forerunner to the later scientific approaches in psychology that were to come

Question 12

explain how one limitation is that some aspects of the research are not scientific

Answer 12

• Wundt often relied on partcipants self-reporting their own ‘private’ mental processes’- such ‘data’ is subjective and participants may not have wanted to reveal some of the thoughts they were having
• participants would also not have exactly had the same thoughts every time, so establishing general principals would not have been possible. General laws are useful so prediction of future behaviour become possible and this is one of the aims of science

Question 13

explain how one strength is that research into modern psychology can claim to be scientific

Answer 13

• psychology has the same aims as the natural sciences: to describe, understand, predict and control behaviour
• the learning approaches, the cognitive approach and biological approach all rely on the use of scientific methods e.g. lab studies to investigate theories in a controlled and unbiased way
• throughout the 20th century and beyond, psychology has established itself as a scientific discipline

Question 14

explain how one limitation with psychology is that not all approaches use objective methods

Answer 14

• the humanistic approach is anti-scientific and does not attempt to formulate general laws of behaviour- it is only concerned with documenting subjective experience
• psychodynamic approach also makes use of case studies based on interview techniques which are open to bias, an no attempt is made to gather a representative sample of the population
• for this reason, many claim that a scientific approach to the study of human thought and experience is not possible, nor is it desirable, as there are important differences between the subject matter of psychology and the natural sciences