Issues and debates

• Strength of holism
• Strength of holism

  • Explains aspects of social behaviour like 'conformity to social roles' in the Stanford Prison Study by looking at the interactions between prisoners and guards to understand behaviors such as deindividuation
• Example of socially sensitive research with ethical implications

  • Goddard (1917) found IQ to be fully genetic, leading to eugenic procedures in the 1920s where feeble-minded individuals were sterilized
• Different levels of explanation in psychology

  • Social-cultural context
  • Psychological level
  • Physiological level
  • Neurochemical level
• Holism is the approach taken to understand behaviors of wider social contexts
• The difference between the emic approach and etic approach
• Behaviourist approach - Many experiments have been done on animals like rats, pigeons, etc., where generalizable laws of learning have been developed
• Refers to when conclusions can be applied to everyone regardless of which place, culture, or time a person is in
• The difference between hard determinism and soft determinism
• Biological determinism - all behavior is innate and determined by genes
• Free will
• Hard determinism states that we have completely no control over what directs our lives whereas soft determinism states that our behavior is determined by external or internal forces but at the same time we do have some control
• Etic approach is when a researcher does an investigation in one culture but then tries to apply it to another, which is known as imposing etic. The etic approach is when the researcher conducts the study in the same culture they are studying
• The ability to make choices that are not determined by past events or forces
• Cultural relativism
• Environmental determinism - all behavior is determined by factors outside the individual, e.g., parental influence, the media, or previous experiences. Schools which adopt this approach include behaviorism and social learning theory
• Determinism
• The idea that norms, values, and behaviors are culturally specific and may not be universal. They should be evaluated in the context of the culture in which they occur
• Universality
• Types of determinism

  • Biological
  • Environmental
  • Psychic
• Psychic determinism - behavior is the result of childhood experiences and innate drives (id, ego, and superego), as in Freud’s model of psychological development
• This is the belief that behavior is determined by external or internal forces acting upon an individual that is out of their control
• Psychodynamic approach - Freud’s use of case studies emphasizes the importance of individual experience
• Psychic


  Behaviour is the result of childhood experiences and innate drives (id, ego, and superego), as in Freud’s model of psychological development
• One problem associated with beta bias in psychological research is when differences between genders are minimised, leading to invalid theories
• Difference between nativists and empiricists


  Nativists believe all human characteristics are a result of heredity, while empiricists believe they result from the environment and experience
• Approaches taking the side of nurture in the nature-nurture debate

  • Behaviourist
  • Humanistic
  • Social Learning Theory
  • Psychodynamic (stance is a compromise between nature and nurture)
• A consequence of having gender bias in psychological research is that it can impact females’ lives by presenting scientific justification for denying women opportunities in the workplace and in society
• Idiographic definition


  focus on the individual and emphasise the unique personal experience of human nature

  
  

  Doesn't seek to formulate laws or generalise results to others
• Nomothetic definition


  concerned with establishing general laws based on the study of large groups of people
• What research methods do idiographic approaches prefer and why?


  case studies, unstructured interviews

  
  

  Provide an in-depth insight into individual behaviour
• AO3 of the idiographic approach

  Weaknesses of using unscientific methods e.g. uncontrolled, hard to replicate, low generalisability

  
  

  Power of case studies e.g. KF generating further research by highlighting flaws within a whole theory
• What research methods do nomothetic approaches prefer and why?


  research methods: experiments, correlational research

  
  

  approach is scientific

  
  

  Statistical and quantitative methods to analyse data
• AO3 of nomothetic approach

  Benefits of using scientific methods e.g. quantitative methods, controlled, reliable methods

  
  

  Application of approach - biological approach using drug treatments for mental health issues e.g. OCD/depression

  
  

  Many approaches in psychology adopt both an idiographic and nomothetic approach e.g. psychodynamic and cognitive
• Idiographic examples


  Case study KF in memory - STM of auditory information better than visual, STM consists of multiple components. KF = undermined model of MSM
• Nomothetic examples


  Biological approach e.g. OCD, depression as they pinpoint a biological factor e.g. neurotransmitters that are responsible for these disorders.

  
  

  Behaviourist approach e.g. Pavlov and Skinner, experiments on animals in order to establish laws of learning (classical/operant) that is generalised to humans

  
  

  Cognitive approach e.g. MSM applied to everyone
• Nature definition


  view that behaviour is the product of innate biological or genetic factors

  
  

  Locke = new born infants born as a tabula rasa (blank slate)
• Nurture definition


  behaviour is the product of environmental influences anything outside the body e.g. people, events, physical world
• Heredity definition


  process in which traits are passed down from one generation to the next
• Interactionist approach to nature vs nurture

  where nature and nurture overlap and work together to shape human behaviour.