Approaches

• empirical methods: Information that is gained through direct observation, investigation, or experimental methods rather than from unfounded beliefs or reasoned arguments.
• according to empiricism 

  1. All behaviour is caused by something
  2. If behaviour is determined then we can predict how humans would behave in different conditions
• objective: Making an unbiased, balanced observation based on facts which can be verified.
• systematic procedures: Procedures that are objective and well-ordered, allowing for close examination of some phenomenon or aspect of behaviour.
• standardised: Keeping everything the same for all participants so that the investigation is fair.
• controlled procedures: helps minimise extraneous variables
• replicable:  it must be shown to be repeatable across a number of different contexts and circumstances.
• In the 17th to 19th century Psychology was a branch of philosophy but the philosopher Descartes believed the mind and body are separate from each other
• In 1879: William Wundt opens the first experimental Psychology laboratory in Germany and pschology is recognised as a science
• 1900s: Freud emphasises the influence of the unconscious mind on behaviour, and the psychodynamic approach is born.  
• 1913: Watson & Skinner proposed that truly scientific psychology should only study phenomena that can be observed objectively & measured. This bean the behaviourist approach
• 1950s: Rogers and Maslow develop the humanistic approach.
• 1950s: the introduction of the digital computer allowed for cognitive psychology which was much more scientific than Wundt's ways
• 1960s: Social Learning Theory is proposed by Bandura.
• 1980s: Advances in technology - PET scans, fMRI allows the biological approach which contiuned to dominate psychology
• eve of the 21st century: Cognitive neuroscience starts to emerge as a distinct form of Psychology bringing together the cognitive and the biological approaches.
• introspection: means “looking into” and refers to the process of observing and examining your own conscious thoughts or emotions.
• falsifiability:  the principle that a proposition or theory could only be considered scientific if in principle it was possible to establish it as false.
• Khun suggested that a shared set of assumptions and methods - a paradigm - distinguishes scientic and non scientific disciplines
• why did Khun suggest that social sciences should be considered a pre-science


  Because there is a lack of a universally accepted paradigm
• Why did Khun say psychology cannot be considered as a science 


  Because it is marked by too much internal disagreement and has too many conflicting approaches
• Paradigm shift: the sudden change in an accepted theory
• behaviourist approach: the study of behaviour and how it is learned and controlled by the environment
• classical conditioning: Learning by association - occurs when an unconditioned stimulus and a neutral stimulus are paired together so the neutral stimulus produces the same behaviour as the unconditioned one
• operant conditioning: A form of learning in which behaviour is shaped and maintained by their consequences
• positive reinforcement: if you receive something nice beahviour is more likely to be repeated
• negative reinforcement: if you remove something horrible you are more likely to repeat a behaviour
• positive punishment: if you receive something horrible you are less likely to repeat a behaviour
• negative punishment: if you remove something nice you are less likely to repeat a behaviour
• behaviourists believe all behaviour is learnt
• the behaviourist approach is only interested in studying behaviour that can be observed and measured
• behaviourists believe in two types of learning: Classical conditioning and OPerant conditioning
• social learning theory SLT: the theory that people learn behaviour through bserving, imitation and modelling
• What is Skinner's box used to demonstrate?

  The mechanisms of positive and negative reinforcement
• How did Skinner demonstrate positive reinforcement in his experiments?

  By showing that a rat would press a lever to receive a snack, which repeated the behavior
• What is an example of negative reinforcement in Skinner's box experiments?

  The rat pressed the lever to avoid an electric shock
• What is classical conditioning?

  • A type of learning through associations
  • Involves unconditioned stimulus (UCS) and neutral stimulus (NS)
  • UCS produces unconditioned response (UCR)
  • NS paired with UCS to produce UCR
  • NS becomes conditioned stimulus (CS) producing conditioned response (CR)
• What does UCS stand for in classical conditioning?

  Unconditioned stimulus
• What does NS stand for in classical conditioning?

  Neutral stimulus
• What does UCR stand for in classical conditioning?

  Unconditioned response