Approaches

• Wundt: ‘father of psychology’

  • approach known as structuralism.
  • used introspection to investigate the human mind and structuralism.
  • Introspection relies primarily on non observable responses and produces data which is subject
• Introspection: AO3

  • Strength- causes of behaviour can be established through the use of methods that are systematic and replicable
  • Limitation- scientific psychologist create fake situations that create artificial behaviours
• Humanistic: Emphasise that humans have full conscious control over their own destiny

  • It acknowledges that we are constrained by environmental and biological factors but we do have the ability to make choices and influence our own development.
  • Self-actualisation is when you are the best version of yourself
• Cognitive approach: behaviour is studied indirectly by making inferences to our mental processes

  • Investigates those areas of human behaviour neglected by behaviourist.
  • Input——>process——>output
  • schema: a ‘package’ of beliefs and expectations on the topic that comes from prior experiences
• Cognitive approach AO3:

  • strength- the emergence of cognitive neuroscience has enabled the two fields of biology and cognitive psychology to come together- more things can be discovered about the mind
  • Limitation- Experimental studies of mental processes are carried out using artificial stimuli
• Social learning theory: Bandura

  • Bobo doll study: behaviour is learned through observation, retaining and replicating behaviour
  • Meditational processes: focus on how cognitive factors are involved in learning

  1. Attention
  2. Retention
  3. Reproduction
  4. Motivation
• Social learning theory AO3:

  • strength: social learning principles can account for how children learn from other individuals around them as well as through media
  • Limitation: social learning theory relies in lab studies this may mean participants may respond to demand characteristics
• Psychodynamic approach: unconscious mind is an inaccessible Part of the mind. Controls our behaviour without us being directly aware.

  • personality is made up of three parts: Id, Ego and superego

  Defence mechanism:

  • Repression- putting information into unconscious
  • Denial- refusing to accept that an event has happened
  • Projection
  • Displacement - unacceptable drive displaced from primary target
  • Regression
  • Sublimation
• Behaviourist approach: Skinner

  • Interested in studying observable and measurable behaviour
  • Rejects introspection for being too vague, prefers lab experiments.Assumes all behaviour is learned for environment
  • Classical conditioning (learning through association)
  • Operant conditioning ( learning through consequences)

  operant conditioning involves:

  • positive reinforcement
  • negative reinforcement
  • punishment
• Humanistic AO3:

  Not reductionist: They reject any attempt to break up behaviour and experience into smaller components. Humanistic psychologist advocate holism the idea that subjective experience can only be understood by considering the whole person. This approach has more validity

  Limited application: Humanistic psychology has relatively little real-world application. As it is lacking a sound evidence base and also due to the fact that the been described not as a comprehensive therory
• Personality is broken down in 3 parts:

  • Id- Needs need to be met
  • Ego- goal is to satisfy the demands of Id in safe socially acceptable ways
  • Super-ego- Driven by morals, makes us feel guilty
• Psychosexual stages:

  Oral: focus of pleasure in the mouth. Oral fixation- smoking, biting nails

  Anal: Focus of pleasure in the anus.

  Phallic: Focus of pleasure in genetical area

  Latent: Earlier conflicts are repressed

  Genital: sexual desires become conscious alongside the onset of puberty.
• Psychodynamic approach

  • Remained the dominant force in psychology for the first half of the 20th century
  • Used to explain a wide range of phenomena including personality development, abnormal behaviour, moral development and gender
  • Significant in drawing attention to the connection between experiences in childhood, such as our relationship with our parents, and later development
• Popper argued that the psychodynamic approach does not meet the scientific criterion of falsification, in the sense that it is not open to empirical testing
• Many of Freud's concepts such as the id are said to occur at an unconscious level, making them difficult, if not impossible, to test
• According to Popper this affords psychodynamic theory the status of pseudoscience
• Limitation


  Untestable concepts