Unit 1 Flashcards
What is psychology?
The scientific study of the mind, brain, and behaviour.
What are psychology’s goals?
To describe, explain, predict, and change behaviour.
What are Social Culture Influences?
Social or behavioural level: involves relating to other and personal relationships
Psychological?
Mental or Neurological level: Involves thoughts, feelings, and emotions
Biological?
Molecular or Neurochemical Level: Involves molecules and brain structure
What does multiply determined mean?
This means that many factors go into determining human behaviours.
What is naive realism?
The mistaken belief that we see the world exactly as it is. Our perceptions aren’t always wrong but seeing is not always believing
What is the scientific method?
It is a set of systematic and objective rules and procedures scientists use to gather and interpret information
Is science neutral?
Scientists have biases but the best ones are aware of their biases and try to find ways to compensate for them.
Confirmation Bias
The tendency to seek out evidence that supports our beliefs and deny, dismiss, or distort evidence that contradicts our beliefs.
This is the most important bias that scientists need to counter in their work
Belief Perseverance
The tendency to stick to our beliefs even when evidence contradicts them
People rarely ever want to admit that they are wrong
Do scientists ever claim to “prove” their theories and try to avoid committing to definitive conclusions?
No
What is a metaphysical claim?
Those about the existence of god, the souls, or the afterlife.
Can we test metaphysical claims?
No, but this does not mean it is wrong or that these claims are unimportant
What is pseudoscience?
it is a set of claims that seem like they are scientific but they are not
How do we spot pseudoscientific claims? #1
Meaningless psychobabble
- the use of fancy terms that do not make sense
How do we spot pseudoscientific claims? #2
Overreliance on anecdotes
- Q ray company has many testimonials that claim it helps with pain but there is no scientific evidence to state that it helps
How do we spot pseudoscientific claims? #3
Use of exaggerated claims
- Q-ray bracelets use informercials to state they rip pain out of the body
How do we spot pseudoscientific claims? #4
Overuse of Ad Hoc Immunizing Hypotheses
- Most pseudoscientific claims are incapable of being refuted
How do we spot pseudoscientific claims? #5
Lack of connectivity to other research
How do we spot pseudoscientific claims?#6
Lack of connectivity, lack of review by others, and lack of self-correction
Talk of proof instead of evidence
Emotional Reasoning Fallacy
Using our emotions as guides for evaluating the validity of a claim
- Instead of using evidence we use our emotions
Bandwagon Fallacy
The error of assuming a claim just because many people do too
Not Me Fallacy
Occurs when we believe we are immune from errors and thinking
Why do we fall for pseudoscience?
- Our brains want to make order out of disorder
- We often find comfort in our own beliefs
- Many pseudoscientific claims offer us control over the world
What are the dangers of pseudoscience?
Opportunity cost - pseudoscientific claims can lead people to forgo opportunities to seek effective treatments
What are the dangers of pseudoscience?
Direct Harm - Pseudoscientific treatments sometimes do dreadful hard to those who receive them by causing psychological or physical damage
What are the dangers of pseudoscience?
An inability to think as citizens - we need scientific thinking skills to reach educated decisions
What is critical thinking used for?
Critical thinking skills are used to evaluate claims open-mindedly and careful
Critical thinking is the hallmark of scientific skepticism
How can we think critically about claims?
Ruling out rival hypotheses
How can we think critically about claims? #2
Correlation does not equal causation
A does not always equal B
How can we think critically about claims? #3
Falsifiability
- Can the claims be disproven
How can we think critically about claims? #4
Replicability - can the results be duplicated in other studies
How can we think critically about claims? #5
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence
How can we think critically about pseudoscientific claims? #6
Occam Razor (Principle of Parsimony) - does a simpler explanation fit the data equally well
Structuralism
E.B Titchener
Uses introspection to identify basic structures or elements of experience
Structuralists dream of creating a map of the elements of the consciousness
Functionalism
- William James
- Aims to understand the adaptive purposes of psychological characteristics
- To understand the functions or adaptive purposes of our thoughts, feelings, and behaviours n
Who is the father of modern psychology?
William James
Does functionalism in its original form exist today?
No
Behaviourism
- John B. Watson and B.F Skinner
- Focuses on general principles of human and animal behaviour
- Observable human behaviour is the most important thing according to Watson
- The mind was viewed as a black box.
- We know what goes in and comes out but not how it is all developed
Cognitivism
- Jean Piaget and Ulric Neisser)
- We are opening the black box and trying to understand it
- We are looking at the mental processes in thinking
Psychoanalysis
- Sigmund Freud
- Focuses on internal processes, especially thoughts, impulses and memories that we are largely unaware of
The goal of psychoanalysis is to decode our dreams
What makes psychology distinctive and fascinating?
- Multiply determined - many factors that go into human behaviour
- Psychological influences are rarely independent of each other
Individual differences
- People differ in thinking, emotion, personality and behaviour
Reciprocal Determinism
People influence each other
Cultural differences
- Their culture quite often shapes people’s behaviour
Emic Approach
Investigators study the behaviour of a culture from the perspective of someone who grew up in that culture
Etic Approach
Study the culture from an outsider’s perspective as opposed to someone who grew up within the culture
When is our common sense right?
Our snap or five-second judgements are usually right
What is a scientific theory not?
It attempts to explain only one event rather than a variety of diverse observations
