Psychology - Quiz 1 Flashcards
Definition of psychology
- The Latin definition is ‘the study of the soul’
- The modern definition is ‘the study of the human mind and its mental states’
Psychoanalytic perspective
- A set of theories and methods founded by Sigmund Freud
- Our present is shaped by our past
- Everyone has unconcious thoughts, feelings, desires, and memories
- Psychoanalysis therapy is used to release repressed emotions and experiences (Miss Elizabeth)
- Quite controversial
- Iceberg theory of the unconcious - superego and ego are partly concious, id is completely subconcious
Freud
- Very famous but controversial psychologist
- Supported the belief that all mental illnesses have physiological causes
- Created the theory of id, ego, and superego
- Developed the ‘stages of development’ theory (oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital)
- Very sexist and focused on sex
Ego
- Freud’s term for the rational part of the mind, which operates on the reality principle
- Mediator between the id and reality
Id
- Freud’s term for the instinctual part of the mind, which operates on the pleasure principle
- Freud conceived the id as the unconscious source of all innate needs, emotional impulses and desires, including the sexual drive
Superego
- Freud’s term for the moral centre of the mind
- Reflects the internalization of cultural rules
Unconcious mind
- Information processing in our mind that we are not aware of
- According to Freud, it holds our unnacceptable thoughts, feelings, and memories
- According to Jung, it includes patterns of memories, instincts, and experiences common to all
Defense mechanisms
- In psychoanalytic theory, a defense mechanism is the way the brain protects a person from anxiety and stress
- The ego’s way of distorting reality to deal with anxiety
Miss Elizabeth
- A young woman’s sister died and her first thought was that she would like to marry her sister’s husband
- She put the thought entirely out of her mind and it manifested as pain in her legs
- She wasn’t able to walk until she confronted her feelings and ‘got over’ her brother-in-law
- Conflict between id and superego
Carl Jung
- Student of Freud’s but disagreed with him on many things, such as the influence of sexuality on humans
- Founded analytical psychology, which is the idea that balancing the concious and unconcious mind would allow someone to reach their full potential
- Contributed to the understanding of personality
Psychoanalytical
Alfred Adler
- Founder of Adlerian psychology, sometimes called Individual Psychology
- Prioritzed mental health
- Focused on impact of birth order on kids
- Striving for perfection, self actualization
- Psychoanalysist
Behaviourist Perspective
- B.F. Skinner’s theory
- He used the Skinner box to study operant conditioning in rats
- Behaviourism focuses on the idea that all behaviours are learned through interaction with the environment
- This learning theory states that behaviours are learned from the environment, and says that innate or inherited factors have very little influence on behaviour
- Nature vs Nurture, everything is learned (nurture)
Edward Thorndike
YEAR!
- Worked on comparative psychology and educational psychology
- Created the law of effect in 1905
- Paved the way towards behaviourism
- Classical conditioning (cat in a box)
Cat in a Box
- Thorndike placed hungry cats within a box that required a simple action to open, in order to access food outside of the box
- At first the cats wandered around the cage until they incidentally stepped or pushed on a lever, opened the door, and gained access to the food
- When placed within the cage again, these cats were able to reduce their time wandering and meowing before they found the trigger and let themselves out
- These cats were able to find their way out faster each time
The Law of Effect
- Thorndike
- Something that reinforces a behavior makes it more likely that that behavior will occur again, and something that punishes a behavior makes it less likely that behavior will occur again
John Watson
- Popularized the scientific theory of behaviorism, establishing it as a psychological school
- Little Albert experiment (1920) - everytime the baby touched the rat, they made a loud noise. Eventually, the baby was scared of the rat, even when no sound came after touching it
- Evidence of classical conditioning in humans - fear a distinctive stimulus that normally would not be feared
- Ethical? Absolutely not, conditioned a phobia in a child
Behaviourist
Classical Conditioning
- A type of learning where a once neutral stimulus comes to produce a particular response after pairings with a conditioned stimulus
- Pavlov’s dogs, Little Albert, Dwight + Jim
Ivan Pavlov
YEAR!
- 1890s
- Research with dogs showed that they would drool when he put food in their mouths, began to ring a bell when he fed the dogs, eventually conditioned them to drool at the sound of the bell
- Father of classical conditioning
Behaviourist
Operant Conditioning
- A method of learning that uses rewards and punishment to modify behavior
- Skinner box (rats with pellets), Sheldon and Penny (chocolates)
B.F. Skinner
- Considered to have developed true behaviourism because he was concered with only observable behaviours, not the processes behind them
- Used rats and pigeons to study operant conditioning (how rewards and punishment can influence behaviour)
- Cupoard theory of attachment
Behaviourist
Big Bang (TV show) Experiment
- Every time Penny does something that Sheldon doesn’t like, he tells her, ‘bad Penny’
- Whenever she listens to him and does what he wants, he gives her a chocolate
- Eventually, her behaviour is modified
- This is an example of operant conditioning
- Rewards (chocolate) and punishment (Sheldon gets mad) modify behavior
The Office Experiment
- Every time Jim’s computer chimes, he gives Dwight an altoid
- Then, he lets the computer chime without giving Dwight an altoid, and Dwight puts his hand out out of habit
- Dwight says that his mouth tastes bad
- This is an example of classical conditioning
- A once neutral stimulus (computer chime) comes to produce a particular response after pairings with a conditioned stimulus (mint)
Frasier Crane
- Fictional psychiatrist in Cheers
- Experiment - every time the Seahawks lose, he’ll tie a balloon to his Bulldog’s car
- Then, every time Bulldog sees a red balloon, he’ll feel a sense of loss
- Example of classical conditioning
Cognitive Perspective
- This approach focuses on how internal thoughts and feelings influence one’s behavior
- Cognitive psychologists believe in and consider mental states, such as beliefs, motivations, and desires
Abraham Maslow
- Humanist
- His perspective - hierarchy of needs to achieve full potential - pyramid model
- According to Maslow, we have 5 categories of needs: physiological, safety, love, esteem, and self-actualization
- In this theory, higher needs emerge when people feel they have sufficiently satisfied the previous needs
- Studied self-actualization
Humanism Perspective
- Abraham Maslow’s perspective
- Hierarchy of needs to achieve full potential - pyramid model
- According to Maslow, we have 5 categories of needs: physiological, safety, love, esteem, and self-actualization
- In this theory, higher needs emerge when people feel they have sufficiently satisfied the previous needs
Albert Bandura
- Part of the ‘cognitive revolution’ moving away from purley behaviourist thought
- Came up with the social-cognitive theory, a perspective on personality that takes motivation, behaviour, and environment into account
- Believed that humans learn by watching and copying others
- Bobo doll experiment
Social cognitive
Bobo Doll
- In this experiment, young children watched adults act aggressively towards a Bobo doll
- When they were introduced to the doll, they used toys that they had previously acted normal towards to attack the doll like the adults had done
- The control group of children (who hadn’t seen the adults be aggressive) were less likely to be aggressive towards the doll
Harry Harlow
- Studied monkeys in order to understand humans
- Wanted to find out what was stronger: the need for affection or the satisfaction of physical needs
- Surrogate mother experiment - separated baby monkeys from their mothers and gave them two new ‘mothers’, one who was wrapped in fuzzy cloth and the other who provided food
- The monkeys overwhelmingly prefered the cloth mother
Social cognitive
Mary Ainsworth
- Studied infant-mother attatchment
- Created the Strange Situation experiment where infants are introduced to a stranger after playing with their mothers
- Theorized the stages of attatchment
Developmental
Theories/types of Attachment
- Ainsworth’s theory
- Children form attachments with those who are familiar and responsive to their needs
- Secure attachment: children given a positive working model, caregiver who is emotionally available, sensitive, and supportive. Sad when caregiver leaves the room
- Avoidant attatchment: children have a working model of themselves as unnacceptable or unworthy, caregiver who is rejecting. Sad when caregiver leaves but when they come back they’re mad and refuse to play
- Resistant attatchment: children have a negative self-image and exaggerate their emotional responses to gain attention, caregiver who is inconsistent. Don’t care when the caregiver leaves and comes back
Lawrence Kohlberg
- Moral development
- Morality improves as we mature
- Points more to Freud than behaviourists
- As we get older, we do what’s right
- Stages of moral development:
- Pre-conventional (age 3-7) - moral reasoning based on reward and punishment
- Conventional (age 8-13) - moral reasoning based on external ethics
- Post-conventional (adulthood) - Moral reasoning based on personal ethics
Moral psychologist
Nature vs Nurture
- Nature refers to how genetics influence an individual’s personality
- Nurture refers to how their environment (including relationships and experiences) impacts their development
Genetics vs Environment
- Nature vs nurture
- The interactions between genes and environment shape human development
Repression
- Unknowingly placing an unpleasant memory or thought in the unconcious
- E.g. not remembering a traumatic incident in which you witnessed a crime
- Miss Elisabeth
Displacement
- Redirecting ennacceptable feelings from the original source to a safer, substitute target
- E.g. taking your anger toward your boss out on your spouse or children by yelling at them and not your boss
Sublimation
- Replacing socially unacceptable impulses with socially acceptable behaviour
- E.g. channelling aggressive drives into playing football or inappropriate sexual desires into art
Reaction formulation
- Acting in exactly the opposite way to one’s unacceptable impulses
- E.g. being overprotective of and lavishing attention on an unwanted child
Projection
- Attributing one’s own unacceptable thoughts to others and not yourself
- E.g. accusing your boyfriend of cheating on you because you have felt like cheating on him
Regression
- Reverting back to immature behaviour from an earlier stage of development
- E.g. Throwing temper tantrums as an adult when you don’t get your way
Rationalization
- Creating false excuses for one’s unacceptable feelings, thoughts, or behaviour
- E.g. Justifying cheating on an exam by saying that everyone else cheats
Stages of attachment
- Pre-attachment (birth to six weeks): baby shows no particular attachment to specific caregiver
- Indiscriminate (six weeks to seven months): infant begins to show preference for primary and secondary caregivers
- Discriminate (seven + months): infant shows strong attachment to one specific caregiver
- Multiple (10 + months): growing bonds with other caregivers
Four psychological perspectives
- Psychoanalytic - concious and subconcious, id, ego, superego, present is shaped by past
- Behaviourist - all behaviours are learned through interaction with the environment
- Humanist - hierarchy of needs to achieve full potential, pyramid model
- Cognitive - how internal thoughts and feelings influence one’s behavior
Denial
A person refuses to recognize or acknowledge something that is painful
Free association
A method used in psychoanalysis where a patient relaxes and says whatever comes to mind.
Neo-Freudians
Psychologists who modified Freud’s psychoanalytic theory to include social and cultural aspects
Skinner Box
YEAR!
- Created by B. F. Skinner in 1948
- Has a bar or pedal on one wall; when pressed sends a pellet into the cage for a rat to eat
- Soon the rat presses the bar many times to get many pellets
- If the rat stopped being rewarded with pellets, it will stop pressing the bar (called extinction)
- Classical conditioning
Who said…
Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.
John B. Watson
Behaviourist
Who said…
One’s only rival is one’s own potentialities. One’s only failure is failing to live up to one’s own possibilities.
Abraham Maslow
Humanist
Who said…
The fact is that people are good, Give people affection and security, and they will give affection and be secure in their feelings and their behavior.
Abraham Maslow
Humanist
Skinner’s cupboard theory of attachment
- The learning theory of attachment is a behaviourist explanation
- Suggests that attachments develop through classical and/or operant conditioning
- Sometimes referred to as a cupboard love theory, as the infant attaches to the caregiver who provides the food
Karen Horney
- Feminist neo-freudian
- Mostly agreed with Freud, but disagreed with two things:
- That personality is strongly affected by sexual conflicts in childhood
- That Freud’s views did not accurately represent females
- Founder of feminine psychology