Introduction to Psychology

IoBM, fall’20
Assignments/Exams etc
Assessment Methods – Online Semester Objectives to Assess Week Weight age

1 Quizzes (best 3 out of 4) Knowledge and 4, 7, 30%

understanding 10, 13
2 Class Participation/discussions Intellectual and All 05%
analytical skills
3 Assignments/Mini Projects Intellectual, 5, 8, 12 30%
analytical,
professional and
practical skills
4 Class Presentation Knowledge and 14 10%
understanding
5 Final Assessment Professional 15 25%
skills
 Why Psychology?

What is Psychology?

Is Psychology Scientific?
 Myths?
 Mind-reading?
 Hypnosis?
 Telepathy?
 Power?
 Only “crazy” people need Psychologists.
 All Psychologists treat patients “on the couch”
 Every Psychologist uses hypnosis or electric
shocks.
 Strangers would never understand my problems.
 Psychology only looks at the mind.
 Anyone can do psychology.
 Originated from the greek word “Psyche – human soul/vital breath”,
root word “ology” means “scientific study of”
 The study of the mind and behavior:
 Emotions
 Physiological and biological components,
 Thoughts
 Memory
 Perceptions
 Personalities etc
 “Psychology is the systematic study of thoughts, feelings and behavior”.
 A “science” that looks at all processes related to the human mind and
behavior.
What are the major specialties in the field of
psychology?
 Behavioral neuroscience is the subfield of psychology that
mainly examines how the brain and the nervous system—but
other biological processes as well—determine behavior. Thus,
neuroscientists consider how our bodies influence our behavior.
 Experimental psychology is the branch of psychology that
studies the processes of sensing, perceiving, learning, and
thinking about the world. (The term experimental psychologist
is somewhat misleading: Psychologists in every specialty area
use experimental techniques.)
 Cognitive psychology , which focuses on higher mental
processes, including thinking, memory, reasoning, problem
solving, judging, decision making, and language.
 Developmental psychology studies how people grow and
change from the moment of conception through death.
Personality psychology focuses on the consistency in people’s
behavior over time and the traits that differentiate one person
from another.
 Clinical psychology deals with the study, diagnosis, and
treatment of psychological disorders.
 Clinical neuropsychology unites the areas of biopsychology
and clinical psychology, focusing on the relationship between
biological factors and psychological disorders.
 Counseling psychology focuses primarily on educational,
social, and career adjustment problems.
 Educational psychology is concerned with teaching and
learning processes, such as the relationship between
motivation and school performance.
 Environmental psychology considers the relationship
between people and their physical environment.
 Evolutionary psychology considers how behavior is
influenced by our genetic inheritance from our ancestors.
 Forensic psychology focuses on legal issues, such as
determining the accuracy of witness memories.
 Health psychology explores the relationship between
psychological factors and physical ailments or disease.
 Industrial/organizational psychology is concerned with the
psychology of the workplace.
 Personality psychology focuses on the consistency in
people’s behavior over time and the traits that differentiate
one person from another.
 School psychology is devoted to counseling children in
elementary and secondary schools who have academic or
emotional problems.
 Social psychology is the study of how people’s thoughts,
feelings, and actions are affected by others.
 Sport psychology applies psychology to athletic activity and
exercise.
Feminist Psychology

 Dominant influence of western, white males in the early history of

Psychology meant that Psychology developed with the biases inherent in
those individuals (which often had negative consequences for members of
the society that weren’t white or male).

 Until the 1960s, Psychology was largely “womanless”

 Even experimental subjects were mostly male.
 Implication that there is no difference in the genders, and that women
are not interesting enough to study.
 Feminist Psychology: attempts to reevaluate and discover contributions of
women to the history of psychology, studying psychological gender
differences, and questioning male bias present across the study of
psychology.
Multicultural Psychology
 Culture has important impacts on individuals and social psychology, but the effects of culture
on psychology are under-studied.

 Risk that psychological theories and data derived from white, western settings could be
assumed to apply to individuals and social groups from other cultures (unlikely to be true)

 A lot of the research is descriptive, but does not determine cause and effect
 Eg study of characteristics of individuals seeking treatment for binge eating disorder in Hispanic
America, African American, and Caucasian individuals. – causes of differences not measured.
 diverse topics as human aggression, liking and loving, persuasion, and conformity.

 Cross-cultural psychology investigates the similarities and differences in psychological functioning

in and across various cultures and ethnic groups. For example, cross-cultural psychologists examine
how cultures differ in their use of punishment during child rearing.
 Much of the world of early African American psychologists was dedicated to
intelligence and other testing.
 Some research stated that African Americans were genetically set up to be intellectually inferior,
due to large gaps in scores compared to Caucasian children. What do you think? Could there be
any other factors contributing to the gap?
 Contemporary Psychology

 Major subdivisions within Psychology today:

 Biopsychology and Neuroscience
 Sensation and Perception
 Cognitive Psychology
 Developmental Psychology
 Personality Psychology
 Social Psychology
 Industrial/Organizational Psychology
 Health Psychology
 Sports and Exercise Psychology
 Clinical Psychology
 Forensic Psychology
Activity
 Discussion

 Suppose you are a teacher who has a 7-year-old child in your

class who is having unusual difficulty learning to read. Imagine
that you could consult as many psychologists with different
specialties as you wanted. What are the different types of
psychologists that you might approach to address the
problem?
Where do psychologists work?
Do we really need to study Psychology?
 “common sense” - is a casual way of figuring things out or making
assumptions about behaviour or thoughts or feelings, or anything
related.

 For example:
 Milgrim study https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=Edi948AF5R4
 Kitty Genovese https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdpdUbW8vbw
 The Milgram experiment 1974 on obedience to authority figures was
a series of notable social psychology experiments conducted by Yale
University psychologist Stanley Milgram, which measured the
willingness of study participants to obey an authority figure who
instructed them to perform acts that conflicted with their personal
conscience.
Hindsight Bias
 The tendency to believe, after learning the
outcome, that you knew it all along.
 Psychology is a science

 It employs the scientific method for gathering knowledge and information (research); otherwise, the
research will not be considered authentic, reliable, or scientifically valuable.

 Scientific method is a systematic and organized series of steps that scientists adopt for exploring
any phenomenon in order to obtain accurate and consistent results. These steps involve
 observation,
 description,
 control, and
 replication
Goals of Psychology

Main goal of psychology is understanding human behavior and mental processes

• Describe & Explain: To develop an understanding of the nature of, and of the
relationship between behavior and mental processes (what and why)
• Prediction & Application: To apply this understanding to real life situations and, on
the basis of this understanding, predict for the future
• Control: To employ the scientific approach for developing this understanding (by
determining cause and effect), so we can gain some control.
Why study Psychology?

 Psychology, as a science, attempts to help you hone critical thinking skills

 Critical thinking: the active application of a set of skills to information to understand and
evaluate that information.
 Evaluating reliability and usefulness of something
 Involves maintaining an attitude of skepticism, recognizing internal biases, logical thinking,
asking the right questions, making observations.
 Important to have this skill in a world full of competing and often misleading “facts” (Conoway –
“alternative facts”)
Why study Psychology?
 Gain insight into the mind
 Understanding of people
 Understanding yourself
 BASIC and APPLIED RESEARCH

 Basic Research: research conducted for the purpose of the expansion of scientific knowledge and the
development of theories rather than for practical application (typically three goals: description,
explanation, prediction)
 An investigation looking at whether stress levels influence how often students engage in academic cheating.
 A study looking at how caffeine consumption impacts the brain.
 A study assessing whether men or women are more likely to be diagnosed with depression

 Applied Research: research for the purpose of solving practical problems (typically the fourth goal: to
control behavior)
 Investigating which treatment approach is the most effective for reducing anxiety.
 Researching which strategies work best to motivate workers.
 Studying different keyboard designs to determine which is the most efficient and ergonomic.
 Difference between Psychologists & Psychiatrists

Psychiatrists: They are physicians who specialize in the

treatment of psychological disorders. Not all psychiatrists have
extensive training in psychotherapy, but as MDs they can
prescribe medications
Psychologists: They typically have PhDs or PsyDs. They are
experts in research, assessment, and therapy, all of which is
verified through supervised internship.
 DEBATES IN PSYCHOLOGY
 Individual Differences Vs Universal Principles
 Conscious Vs Unconscious
 Nature Vs Nurture
 Free Will Vs Determinism
 Observable Behavior Vs Internal Mental Processes
 Nature vs Nurture
 Are human capabilities in born or acquired through experience
 The Nature view holds that human beings enter the world with an
inborn store of knowledge and understanding of reality, which could be
accessed through careful reasoning and introspection.

 The Nurture view holds that knowledge is acquired through

experiences and interactions with the world
 John Locke- 17th century Philosopher believed that at birth the
human mind is a Tabula Rasa.
 History & Trends in Psychology

 Proof of “trephining” from at least 6500 BC

 Trephination is a surgical procedure in which a circular part of the skull is carved away leaving a
hole in the skull. ... It is theorized that early cultures used trephination to release spirits from a
person or as a cure for convulsions and headaches.

 Such evidence suggests that man sought explanations of human behavior, and tried to control it according
to the explanation he believed in.

 Ancient explanations centered on the supernatural: gods, evil spirits, demons etc
 History of Psychology

 The roots of psychology can be traced to the great philosophers of ancient Greece (300 BC onwards).
 The most famous of them, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, posed fundamental questions about mental
life:
 What is consciousness?
 Are people inherently rational or irrational?
 Is there any such thing as free choice?
 Before the 19th century, issues related to the mind were explored in a philosophical context.
 History of Psychology – Structuralism
 Late 19th century
 Wilhelm Wundt – Established the first Psychological Laboratory at Leipzig in
1879 -

 STRUCTURALISM – Analysis of mental structures.

 Wundt’s approach, which focuses on uncovering the fundamental mental
components of consciousness, thinking, and other kinds of mental states
and activities.

 Eg. The taste of something (PERCEPTION), could

be analyzed into elements such as sweet, bitter,
hot, cold (SENSATIONS).
Belief that Mind and behavior could be scientifically analyzed through
INTROSPECTION. i.e.
Observing and recording the nature of one’s own
perceptions, thoughts, and feelings.

 Examples: Peoples’ perceptions of how heavy an object is or how

bright a flash is, or high or low the temperature of something is, etc.

 WHAT PROBLEM DO YOU THINK THIS LED TO???

DIFFERENT PEOPLE PRODUCE DIFFERENT INTROSPECTIONS ABOUT SIMPLE
SENSORY EXPERIENCES.

 Therefore, pure self observation was not sufficient.

 It had to be supplemented by experimentation.
 But these experiments yield few and inconclusive inferences based
on the many differences in individual perception as stated above.
 Hence introspection is no longer a central part of the current
cognitive perspective.
 This led to the development of other modern perspectives.
Perspectives which would not rely on internal processes like
introspection and perception.
History of Psychology – Functionalism

 FUNCIONALISM – Study of how the mind works to enable an organism to

adapt and function in its environment.
 William James (Harvard university) – Analyzing the elements of
consciousness was less important than understanding its fluid, personal
nature.

 Heavily influenced by Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection.

 Emphasized “function” of the human mind and behaviour, why certain
behaviour occurred.
 For example, a functionalist might examine the function of the emotion of
fear in preparing us to deal with emergency situations.
 Psychoanalysis
 Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)- Austrian neurologist
 Worked with women (mostly) who had physical and
emotional disturbances with no apparent physical cause.
 problems arise from the unconscious mind and conflicts –
need to gain access to the unconscious to resolve your
problems.
 early childhood experiences shape personality &
behavior.
 Role of the unconscious – expressed in terms of dreams
and slips of the tongue
 Free Association
 Dream Analysis
 Gestalt Psychology
 Focused on studying the whole experience of a person rather than breaking it
into individual components
 The concept of Gestalt applies to everything, objects, ideas, thinking processes
and human relationships (but their initial focus was on sensation and perception).
 Three German psychologists Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang
Kohler were regarded as the founders of gestalt school as each one of them had
done significant work in his respective field

 Gestalt – German word meaning “form” or “configuration”.

 Primary Interests - Perception of form, motion, size, colour.

 “The whole is different from the sum of its parts,” meaning
that our perception, or understanding, of objects is greater
and more meaningful than the individual elements that make
up our perceptions.
Gestalt Psychology
Gestalt Psychology
The shift to Behaviourism

 The model emerged as a reaction to the earlier approaches that

emphasized the significance of hidden, underlying, predetermined
forces. The behaviorists suggest that observable behavior alone should
be the main area of interest to psychology.
 Behaviorism
Focuses on studying the behavior that is observable and overt.

Behaviorism is largely responsible for establishing psychology as a scientific discipline through its
objective methods and experimentation.
Psychologists started analyzing, predicting and controlling human behavior (which was visible) while
consciousness was not.
Some important figures: Pavlov, Watson, Skinner.
Contributions in such diverse areas as treating mental disorders, curbing aggression, and dealing with
drug addiction

Sample Issues:
How we learn to fear particular objects or situations?
What is the most effective way to alter certain behaviors?
What are the underlying causes of Anxiety disorders, Phobic disorders, Obsessive-Compulsive
disorders…
Humanistic theory

 Important figures: Maslow and Carl Rogers

 They didn’t like the pessimism and determinism as proposed by Freud
(Psychoanalysis)
 They also didn’t like the reductionist, simplifying, and deterministic nature of
behaviourism.
 Humanism is a perspective within psychology that emphasizes the potential for
good that is innate to all humans.
 It emphasizes the uniqueness of each human being and the idea that human beings
have free will to determine their destiny.
 The research has been largely qualitative but also includes quantitative research,
with research on things like happiness, meditation, self-concept, and self esteem.
Cognitive Psychology

 By the 1950s, perspectives and research in linguistics, neuroscience, and computer

science were emerging
 These areas revived interest in the mind as a focus of scientific inquiry.
 Noam Chomsky, a linguist, thought behaviourism was short-sighted and that mental
functioning played an important role to understanding behaviour as well.
 Psychologists began to cooperate with scientists in other fields (eg neuroscience,
anthropology, computer science).
 This interdisciplinary approach often is referred to as cognitive psychology.
 Focuses on understanding mental processes such as perceiving, remembering,
reasoning, deciding and problem solving, and their relationship to behaviour.
 i.e. how we process, store, and retrieve information.
 Not based on introspection, rather based on the study of mental processes in an
objective manner by focusing on specific behaviours, like behaviourists do, but
interpreting them in terms of underlying mental processes like memory, schemas,
perception, etc.
 Sample Issues:
 How do we use information in remembering and reasoning?
 How do our senses govern the nature of perception?
 How much to infants know when they are born?
 Biological Approach/Neuroscience Approach

 The school of psychological thought that examines psychological issues based on how
heredity and biological structures affect mental processes and behavior and that
focuses on how physical mechanisms affect emotions, feelings, thoughts, desires and
sensory experiences. Also known as the neuroscience perspective.
 i.e. How the body and brain create emotions, memories, and sensory experiences.
 Sample Issues:
 How do evolution and heredity influence behavior?
 How are messages transmitted within the body?
 How is blood chemistry linked with moods and motives?
 Explaining pathology e.g. Depression, Childhood amnesia, Face recognition, etc
 Eclecticism

 Eclecticism is a combination of theories, facts or techniques.

 In clinical and counseling psychology, eclecticism means

using a variety of approaches to evaluate data, theories and
therapies as appropriate for an individual client, rather than
relying exclusively on the techniques of one school of
psychology.
 5 Major Perspectives
 Cognitive Psychology
 Examines how people understand and think about the world
 Behavioral Psychology
 Focuses on observable behavior
 Humanistic Psychology
 Contends that people can control their behavior and that they naturally try to reach their
full potential
 Psychodynamic
 Believes behavior is motivated by inner, unconscious forces over which a person has little
control
 Neuroscience
 Views behavior from the perspective of biological functioning
Overview of common approaches