1. Sociocultural
Behavioral
Psychoanalytic
APPROACHES
TO PSYCHOLOGY
Humanistic
Biological
Cognitive

2. What is Psychology?
The scientific study of behavior and mental processes (humans and animals)
Covers what we…..
Think
Feel Do
What is behavior? It includes just about everything. It includes attitudes, thoughts, physical changes, and emotional changes.
Largest association of Psychologists worldwide

3. Why Study Psychology? Application to everyday life
Gain insight into behavior (yours and others)
Application to everyday life = Potty training through shaping (reward and punishment)
Application to everyday life = Hypnosis and other techniques related to psychology can help you overcome an addiction like smoking.
Application to everyday life = Help you improve your memory
Application to everyday life = Get better grades
Gain insight into behavior = learn why someone you know is shy and withdrawn

4. Why Study Psychology? Dispel myths about human behavior
Test your Intuitions = Each answer is False

5. Goals of Psychology Describe behavior Explain behavior
Predict behavior
Influence behavior
Nature vs. Nurture
Stability vs. Change
Rationality vs. Irrationality
During the process of trying to explain human behavior, psychologists create hypothesis and test them. A hypothesis is an educated guess. They use the knowledge gained to create theories that will help them predict and influence human behavior.
Just like scientists, Psychologists use the scientific method of research
Can you think of an example that illustrates each of the goals of psychology?

6. History of Psychology
Phrenology – Examining bumps on the skull to determine intellect and character traits (19th century)
Phrenology encouraged psychologists to study the role of the brain, rather than the heart, in human behavior.
Past attempts at understanding human behavior (weird or not) have led to what we know today and shaped the current Approaches to Psychology

7. Ancient Psychology
Aristotle
Trephination

8. Wilhelm Wundt “Father of psychology”
Started 1st lab to study humans (1879)
Established Psychology as formal field of study
Introspection – self observation, report thoughts and feelings
Wundt would ask individuals to perform activities and then ask them to report their own sensations.
Wundt took a scientific approach to human behavior, probably because of his background in the field of science. He wanted to break down the basic elements of human experience and try to understand each part.

9. William James
“Father of MODERN Psychology” or “Father of Psychology in the U.S.”
Principles in Psychology = 1st Psychology Textbook
Principles of Psychology was the 1st Psychology textbook
James taught the first psychology class at Harvard in 1875

10. Psychoanalytic Behavioral Humanistic Cognitive Biological
Sociocultural
Phrenology encouraged psychologists to study the role of the brain, rather than the heart, in human behavior.

11. Perspectives

12. PSYCHOANALYTIC/PSYCHODYNAMIC
Key ideas
childhood experiences
unconscious forces
Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939)
Unconscious motivations are responsible for human behavior
Techniques:
Free association
Psychoanalysis
Dream analysis

13. BEHAVIORAL John Watson (1878 – 1958) B.F. Skinner (1904 – 1990)
Key ideas
Observable Behavior
Conditioning/Learning
Prior experience
John Watson (1878 – 1958)
Behavior the result of conditioning – “We are what we learn to be”
B.F. Skinner (1904 – 1990)
Reinforcement

14. HUMANISTIC Key Theorists Key ideas Self-directed Uniqueness
Potential to develop
Key Theorists
Carl Rogers
Abraham Maslow

15. EVOLUTIONARY Key Ideas: Survival of the fittest Inheritable traits
Success
Main theorist: Charles Darwin

16. COGNITIVE Key ideas How we ….. Process, Store, Retrieve information
Thought patterns
Problem solving
Behavior results from memories, expectations

17. BIOLOGICAL A.k.a. Behavioral neuroscience Key ideas
How the brain, nervous system, hormones, genetics influence behavior

18. SOCIOCULTURAL Key ideas Cultural influence on behavior Gender
Socioeconomic status

19. Eclecticism
By combining information from all of the approaches, psychologists stand a better chance of describing, explaining, predicting, and controlling behavior.

20. Psychology as a Profession
Psychologist
Observe, analyze, evaluate behavior
Doctorate degree
Psychiatrist
Medical degree + training in psychiatric medicine
Phrenology encouraged psychologists to study the role of the brain, rather than the heart, in human behavior.

21. Clinical Psychologist
diagnoses and treats people with emotional disturbances
Counseling Psychologist
help people deal with problems of everyday life
Developmental Psychologist
Study changes that occur throughout life

22. Educational Psychologist
helps students learn
Industrial/Organizational Psychologist
employed by businesses to boost production, improve working conditions, make the workplace a more satisfying environment

23. Research v. Applied Psychology
Research Psychologists – study origins, causes, results of behavior
Applied Psychologists – make direct use of the findings of research psychologist; deal directly with clients

24. Methods of Research Naturalistic Observation Case Study
Observe subjects in a natural setting without interfering
Natural behavior
Phrenology encouraged psychologists to study the role of the brain, rather than the heart, in human behavior.
Case Study
Intensive investigation of one or more participants
long-term observations, diaries, tests, interviews

25. Cross-sectional Study
Survey
Interviews, questionnaires, or both
asking many individuals a fixed set of questions
Longitudinal Study
Data is collected over a number of years
Development
time-consuming
Cross-sectional Study
Different age groups – same time – compare

26. Longitudinal vs.
Cross-Sectional

27. Psychological Experiments
Phrenology encouraged psychologists to study the role of the brain, rather than the heart, in human behavior.

28. Experimental Terms
Independent variable: the part of the experiment you, the researcher, are manipulating; the treatment
Dependent variable: the part of the experiment that you, the researcher, measure (dependent on independent variable)
Control group: does not receive the treatment or receives a placebo
Experimental group: receives the real treatment or the drug
Operational definition: because we cannot measure memory, motivation, etc., we have to come up with a way to measure these things

29. Let’s design an experiment!
Question: What motivates college students to exercise?
Hypothesis: Extrinsic motivators (rewards) will be the most motivating to students.
Experimental setup: Four groups of college students are observed exercising until exhaustion (until they want to stop). Their time on an exercise bike is measured, as well as the rotations of their tires per minute. One group is offered no reward, one is offered music to listen to, one is offered money (.15 per rotation), one is offered music and money.

30. Experimental terms Who is the control group?
Who is/are the experimental group(s)?
What is the independent variable?
What is the dependent variable?
What are we trying to measure, and how do we measure it (what is our operational definition)?

31. What motivates colleges students to exercise?25 30 35 40 45
Minutes Riding
Control Music Money M+M

32. What motivates colleges students to exercise?65 70 75 80 90 85
Revolutions per Minute
Control Music Money M+M

33. Analyze and Predict Were the results what you expected?
Is there a better way to measure exercise?
Would these results hold up under a second test? Do they hold up to common sense?

34. Let’s design an experiment!
Question: Do fetuses prefer mom’s voice to other voices?
Hypothesis: Fetuses will respond to their mother’s voice where they won’t to others.
Experimental setup: Both mom and dad of an unborn baby (gestational age: weeks—old enough to have ears!) read Bambi to the baby, fifteen minutes apart. Researchers observed the fetus’s heart rate while both mom and dad read.

35. Experimental setup Independent variable? Dependent variable?
Control group/experimental group?
Operational definition?

36. Results
Fetus’s heart rate sped up by about 3 beats per minute while Mom read.
Fetus’s heart rate actually slowed slightly, then picked up again after Dad read.
Researchers theorized that because Dad’s voice is less familiar, baby didn’t get excited or respond, or possibly responded slower.
Does this mean what researchers thought it meant?

37. Double-Blind Experiment
Neither participants nor experiment knows which received medication
keeps researcher unbiased
Placebo effect
change in illness/physical state from knowledge and perception of treatment
believing it will have an effect
fake medication

38. Ethics Why do we need them? Standards: Animal Standards: Review Boards
Stanley Milgram example
Phil Zimbardo example
Standards:
Right to decline at any time
Must be open and honest
Confidentiality
Limit risks
Animal Standards:
No illogical suffering
Review Boards

39. Stanley Milgram: Obedience
Milgram was fascinated by what made the Nazis obey their superiors, even to the point of killing others.
“Teachers” were forced to administer electric shocks to “learners” for wrong answers.
The learners were actually part of the experiment; actors.
Taught us that 60% of us would keep shocking a person to lethal levels if a man in a white lab coat told us to! (White coat=authority)

41. Phil Zimbardo: Stanford Prison
Zimbardo engaged college students to act as “guards” or “prisoners” in a fake prison so that he could study roles—how do we act when given power? How do we fulfill stereotypes of roles?
The study was cancelled after just six days. Guards became violent, prisoners fought back against the guards, and both psychological and physical abuse resulted.