approaches in psychology

• Who was Wundt and what did he do

  He is known as the father of Psychology opening the first institute for experimental psychology in Germany in 1879. He separated psychology from philosophy and focused on studying the mind. He took a very reductionist approach where he simplified everything down to cause and effect.
• Outline introspection and problems with it

  Introspection is a psychological method to analyse someones thoughts and feelings internally, this was done as there were no brain scans or computers at the time and thus they used this technique of presenting a stimuli and asking how they felt after seeing it.

  Problems with it include how it does not explain how the mind works it simply relies on peoples subjective thoughts. Secondly it doesn't provide data that can be used with certain reliability.
• What are the 5 factors that need to be looked at when deciding whether psychology is a science


  Objectivity

  Control

  Predictability

  Hypothesis Testing

  Replication
• Evaluate the strengths and limitations to a scientific approach in psychology

  :) - Due to its reliance on objectivity and scientific methods knowledge acquired is more than just the passive acceptance of facts

  :) - Because scientific methods believe in determinism they are able to establish the causes of behaviour through the use of methods that are replicable

  :) - If scientific methods no longer fit the facts then they can easily be refined or abandoned meaning that scientific knowledge is self corrective

  :( - Be focusing on objectivity and control in experiments they tend to be too unrealistic and we lack an insight into natural behaviour

  :( - A lot of psychological behaviour is unobservable and thus cannot be measured with much accuracy meaning that the gap between actual data and theories put forward is quite large

  :( - Not all psychologists believe that human behaviour can be viewed scientifically as it is not subject to laws and regularities that science implies
• The first worldwide accepted approach was behaviourism, outline this


  Behaviourism, also known as learning theory, started in the early 1900's by Watson who believed that psychological research before this wasn't scientific enough.

  
  

  There are three assumptions behaviourism makes:

  1) All behaviour is learnt (exception of inborn reflexes)

  2) Animals and humans learn in the same way

  3) The minds is irrelevant
• Outline Pavlov's classical conditioning

  Pavlov was studying dogs salivation however during his studies he found that dogs would end up salivating before there was any food, the direction of his studies changed and outlined classical conditioning.

  He eventually ended up ringing a bell before giving the dogs food and then he would ring a bell and give no food, the dogs still salivated. The food is the UCS and salivation is the UCR. The bell had become the CS and salivation the CR.

  This process of learning can be applied to human development.

  Comfort for the baby is an UCS that produces happiness, the UCR. The babies mother will talk to it while she feeds it and changes its nappies etc. and thus the baby hears its mothers voice every time it is made happy. The sound of the mothers voice is matched with the UCS and therefore becomes a CS, eventually the sound of the mothers voice alone will make the baby happy. The CS now causes the CR.
• Outline the several principles of classical conditioning

  Generalisation - stimuli similar to CS produces the CR

  Discrimination - when stimuli similar to CS does not produce the CR

  Extinction - when the CR isn't produced after the CS

  Spontaneous recovery - when a previously extinct CR is produced in response to the CS

  High order conditioning - when a new CS produces the CR because the animal associates it with the original CS
• Outline Skinners operant conditioning

  Skinner studies how animals can learn from consequences of their own actions. Consequences involve either:

  Positive reinforcement where something desirable is obtained or negative reinforcement where something undesirable is removed.

  Skinner used a 'Skinner Box' which he placed one rat inside at a time. Each box had a variety of different stimuli including a speaker, lights an electric floor and a food dispenser connected to a lever. The time taken for the rats to learn that pressing the lever was recorded. He found that rats would initially run around the cage until accidentally pressing the lever then it was rewarded the food. The more it was put into the box, the quicker they got at learning about the lever. The rat had learnt that when it pressed the leaver there was a reward in return.
• Evaluate conditioning as a theory

  Classical

  :) - Research into classical conditioning has lead to the development of treatment of phobias, systematic desensitisation works by eliminating the learned anxious response (CR) that is associated with the feared object (CS). This process has been proven to work on many different phobias such as arachnophobia

  
  

  :( - It is difficult to say that conditioning works the same for every animal as some animals find it harder to form associations with certain stimuli. Thus Seligman proposed preparedness, this means that animals are prepared to associate aspects that will help their survival such as the smell of meat with food, but are less ready to associate random items such as a bell with a tree.

  
  

  Operant

  :) - Skinner used a strong experimental method which allowed him to control the conditions in which it was setup in. The 'Skinners Box' in particular is a good example of this in practice where the consequence was manipulated to see the effects on the rats behaviour. All of this allowed him to draw a strong cause and effect relationship.

  
  

  :( - Critics have pointed out that he has relied strongly on the fact he can extrapolate his findings from rats onto humans. We are very different to rats and specifically we have free will, it can be argued that we do not have our behaviour determined by positive and negative reinforcement
• Outline Bandura's SLT


  Bandura agreed that people can learn through conditioning but he stated other people such as role models also play a key role in our behaviour. He said people must focus their attention onto a role model, perceive what they do and then remember it in order to repeat it.

  In order to model we must first identify with the role model, meaning certain attractive characteristics and qualities are picked up on.

  The behaviour can be learnt through both reinforcement and vicarious reinforcement and once this is happened for effective learning meditational processes need to occur.

  1) Attention

  2) Retention

  3) Reproduction

  4) Motivation
• Outline Bandura's Study


  He had a large sample of toddlers half female half male and setup a lab experiment. The experiment consisted of two conditions, in the first condition half the toddlers observed an aggressive model playing in a room ie. hitting a bobo doll and the second condition had the other half observing a non-aggressive model playing. There was a third condition in which no observation was taken place, this was the control group. The children were then put in their groups into the same room and observed for 20 minutes.

  He found that children who had observed aggressive models tended to act with much more physical and verbal aggressive behaviour when compared to the non-aggressive group who showed nearly no aggressive behaviour.

  This study provided evidence for social learning theory.
• Evaluate SLT


  :) - There are many real world applications that research into SLT has bought for example Akers suggested that the probability of someone engaging in criminal activity increases when they are exposed to models that do this around them. This is an application that can benefit society as we now know to keep children away from parents with criminal records or general antisocial behaviour.

  
  

  :) - There has been research done which supports identification. Greater identification results in a learner learning more as it is easier for them to visualise them self in the place of the model. Fox found evidence for this using computer generated virtual humans engaging in exercise and had participants watch these CGI humans, some of which looked similar to participants and some didn't. The participants were then observed for the next 24 hours and found that the participants who's models looked similar tended to do exercise them self.

  
  

  :( - Social learning theory is too reductionist as it only states that it only looks at the nurture side of the nature nurture debate. We know now that we must take a wholistic approach and take parts from both side of the argument as there is strong evidence that proves genes play a significant part in our behaviour and thus SLT needs to take a more wholistic approach in explaining human behaviour.
• Outline the cognitive approach

  Cognitive psychology looks at how we interpret the world, whilst the behavioural approach studies observable behaviour the cognitive approach does quite the opposite by looking at the internal workings of the mind. Cognitive psychologists try to explain behaviour by looking at our perception, language, attention and memory. They use scientific methods to construct experiments and is a fairly reductionist approach as they explain the mind by comparing it to a computer.

  There are several principles to the cognitive approach, these are:

  -Our mental systems have a limited capacity

  -A control mechanism oversees all mental processes

  -There is a two way flow of information
• Outline what schemas are

  Schemas help us to interpret organise all the information and experiences that we know, the schema for a human face for example is that it has two eyes, a nose and a mouth. When information is consistent with a schema then the schema is assimilated and strengthened. However if it is not consistent with a schema then the schema is accommodated and it changes based on the new information

  There are three types of schemas:

  Role

  Event

  Self
• Outline cognitive neuroscience


  Cognitive neuroscience is a rapidly advancing field of psychology that has become more popular after the last decade because of advances in computer technology. It is a much more scientific and detailed way of physically studying the brain without doing post morterm's or autopsies. The use of non-invasive scans such as fMRI or EEG's has allowed psychologists to see how the brains behaviour works in hand with human behaviour.
• Evaluate the cognitive approach

  :) - Research done into the cognitive approach has allowed for real life applications to surface because of it. The cognitive approach so psychopathology has been used to explain how much of a dysfunctional brain is due to faulty thinking processes and thus this lead to the therapy known as cognitive behavioural therapy which helps patients with OCD and depression.

  
  

  :) - The cognitive approaches emphasis on scientific methods is definitely a strength of it as it allows for rigorous testing and thus detailed conclusions that are based off of cause and effect relationships rather than introspection and assumptions.

  
  

  :( - The approach has been criticised for being too reductionist when comparing the brain to a computer system, it is hard to say that our brain revolves around a simple input, process and output model when we have many things that a computer doesn't such as free will, emotions and motivational factors.

  
  

  :( - Many studies done in cognitive psychology are done in a lab and although as stated earlier this can be seen as a huge benefit, it can also be looked at from a different perspective. It makes the studies very unrealistic and thus the reactions or the way humans behave in these studies may not represent real life.
• Outline the bioogical approach

  The biological approach assumes three points:

  -Human behaviour can be explained by looking at biological factors such as genes, hormones, evolution and the nervous system

  -In theory we can remove unwanted behaviour could be removed

  -Experimental research on animals can inform us about human behaviour as we share a very high percentage of biological genes

  
  

  The genotype of a person is the physical genes that they have whereas the phenotype is the characteristics that their genes produce for example hair and eye colour.

  
  

  Many biological areas of our body have an influence on our behaviour.

  The nervous system carries messages from one part of the body to another via neurons, many aspects of behaviour are under neuronal control including breathing eating and sexual behaviour.

  The brain, the largest part of this is the cerebral cortex which is responsible for many of the higher order functions such as thought and language, it is divided into two halves with each having a different specialisation.

  
  

  Neurochemistry in our body also plays a role in our behaviour

  Neurotransmitters have many roles in the body, one of which is to trigger nerve impulses in the sensory brain to tell our brain to react to it. Dopamine is an excitatory neurotransmitter that is associated with our drive or motivation.

  Hormones are similar to neurotransmitters but have much more powerful long lasting effects and travel in the blood. They are produced in the endocrine glands such as the pituitary gland.
• Outline a twin study in regards to the biological approach

  Gottesman conducted a meta-analyis of 40 twins and found that having an identical twin with schizophrenia gave you a 48% chance of developing the condition, this dropped down to 17% in non identical. He concluded that schizophrenia has a strong genetic basis.
• Evaluate the biological approach

  :) - The biological approach implies clearly that our genes can be adapted to fix unwanted behaviours. This has been fully taken advantage of and many real life applications are now used because of it, drugs in particular are used world wide because of a biological approach to explaining psychological behaviours. SSRI for example has been proven to reduce symptoms for depression

  
  

  :) - It takes a very scientific approach to prove theories, particularly making use of the experimental method. These take place in highly controlled environments so that other researchers can then easily repeat the experiments to check for consistent findings, increasing the validity of the results.

  
  

  :( - It is a reductionist approach, it reduces our complex human behaviour down to a few separate components that work together such as genes, hormones and neurotransmitters. For example someone with depression it would explain it only via a fault in one of these factors whereas it should really take a wholistic approach by looking at both that and also environmental factors.

  
  

  :( - There is a danger of genetic explanations for going too far in the sense that in the future there may be worldwide genetic screening for genes that may increase likelihood of criminal activity or anti social behaviour this would then lead to a discrimination against certain types of people. However on the contrary genes are not this simple and it is impossible to say this gene will cause this as other factors must be looked at as well.
• Outline the psychodynamic approach

  Pyshco refers to the mind and dynamic refers to change or activity. So therefore this approach emphasizes the active nature of mental processes and their role in shaping personality and behaviour. It was developed by Freud and assumes that:

  1) Human behaviour has unconscious course we are not aware of

  2) From birth we have a need to fulfil biological motivations such as food and shelter

  3) Childhood experiences influence our development of personality

  
  

  There are three levels of consciousness:

  Conscious - where we are aware at any given time

  Preconscious - this is made up of memories that we can recall when we want

  Unconscious - this is made up of memories fears and desires which make up anxiety and thus have been repressed

  
  

  There are also three parts of the personality:

  ID - stands for our inner desires and is the basic animal part of our personalty that contains sexual and aggressive needs. It wants to be satisfied by whatever means possible

  Ego - this exists in both the conscious and unconscious parts o the mind and acts as a rational part which develops within the first three years, it mediates between the two

  Superego - this takes our morals into consideration and tells us that we cant do certain things by making us feel guilty

  
  

  If an individual is faced with a situation that they are unable to deal with then defence mechanisms will come in and try to unconsciously deal with the problem in different ways, these may be:

  Repression - this involves the ego stopping unwanted thoughts such as being mugged, you may not be able to recall the event

  
  

  Denial - this is where a threatening or unwanted reality is simply ignored and blocked from conscious awareness

  
  

  Displacement - this is directed onto something else such as another person or an object

  
  

  Freud stated that early experiences influenced development, depending on what stage of childhood the person is in effects a particular behaviour

  
  

  The five stages are:

  Oral - 0-18 months sucking

  Anal - 18-3.5 keeping/discarding faeces

  Phallic - 3.5-6 oedipus and electra

  Latent - 6-puberty repressed sexual urges

  Genital - puberty-adult awakened sexual urges

  
  

  If a child doesn't receive enough pleasure or too much pleasure during a stage of development they will then become fixated at that stage for example if during the oral stage they do not get enough breast feeding then in the future it could lead to a fixation characterised by biting nails or smoking
• Outline the Little Hans study

  Little Hans was a case study that Freud carried out, he was a child who had a phobia with horses. Hans was observed by his father who made notes of his dreams and stuff he said, he would them mail them to Freud for analysis.

  Freud found that Hans may have been afraid of horses as they might bite him or fall on him. During the study Hans began to show interest into his penis and his mum had told him to stop playing with it or she would cut it off. Hans had also told his dad about a dream he had had where he was married to his mother and his dad was his grandfather.

  
  

  From all of this information Freud concluded that Hans had reached the phallic stage and showed evidence of the Oedipus complex whereby he wanted to be with his mum and was jealous of his father. The horse was essentially a symbolisation of his father as the horse had a black muzzle and his father had a beard. This is known as displacement where he moves the fear onto something else that is separate to it. He also had castration anxiety as he believed his dad would castrate him if he found out about his love for his mother.
• Evaluate the psychodynamic approach

  :) - Although psychoanalysis as a theory today may not be able to compete with other theories at the time the approach it took to gain information was pioneering. It presented brand new methodological procedures for gathering empirical evidence via case studies and also it was based around observations instead of relying on introspection which had validity issues.

  
  

  :) - Critics point out that the psychoanalytic approach is not scientific and is not testable however many of the claims that psychoanalysis made at the time have now been proven via scientific methods. Fisher summarised around 2500 of these studies concluding that experimental studies of psychoanalysis compared well with the studies relevant to any other area of psychology.

  
  

  :( - Within psychoanalysis there is a massive gender bias. His theory was very much based on boys rather than girls, and he seemed to remain ignorant of female sexuality and how it may differ. Dismissing women and their sexuality is problematic because his theories today are still very influential and thus must be adapted

  
  

  :( - As well as being gender biased his theory is also said to be culture biased. Sue found that psychoanalysis had little relevance for anyone from a non-western culture. The theory states that once an individual has used a defence mechanism to lock away a negative memory or thought they should open up in an environment such as within therapy however non-western cultures do not see opening up as such a benefit. China for example would do the exact opposite and if a person is depressed they should avoid the negative thoughts
• Outline the humanistic approach

  Humanistic psychology focuses on the person as a whole. It believes that all people are inherently good and are driven to achieve their full potential. Unlike other approaches, it looks at peoples feelings rather than just there observable behaviour. Thus we can say it has an idiographic approach where it looks at each individual separately and does not class everyone under the same categories. It assumes peoples behaviour is as a result of their subjective feelings and their self concept (view on themselves). It is a strictly free will approach saying that we all have decisions and choices on how to better ourselves.

  Maslow came up with a hierarchy of needs which essentially shows how human needs can be categorised and prioritised from least to most important.

  From the bottom up it goes: Needs for survival, safety, love, esteem and after we have reached this point we can then self actualise. Self actualisation is when we are at our fullest potential and have become the best we are capable of being.

  People who have self actualised tend to have certain characteristics that include:

  -A strong sense of self awareness

  -A fully accepting view of themselves and others

  -Ability to deal with uncertainty and the unknown

  -Creativity

  
  

  Like Maslow Rogers agreed that people aim to achieve self actualisation and that we are all naturally good however the difference came about how it was that we reach self actualisation. He believed it wasn't as strict as Maslow but rather you simply move up the way to self actualisation depending on their own thoughts about themselves and the way they are treated by others. From this he stated that you would develop in a healthy way unless there are blocks which can range from things such as being raised in a difficult environment.

  He said there were two parts to the self, how we see ourself (self concept) and how we would like to be seen (ideal self).

  Two factors affect our self concept and this is firstly unconditional positive regard and secondly conditions of worth (approval and praise given as a result of behaving in a certain manner)

  If our self concept and ideal self meet then we have reached congruence and become fully functioning however if they are different we will experience incongruence.

  Rogers said that many psychological problems could be due to this incongruence and thus he established a therapy known as client centred therapy (CCP) as the name suggests the client is in charge of what is talked about and it is their responsibility to solve their problems, the therapists job is to try and make the client aware of their thoughts doing this by rephrasing their comments.
• Outline evidence for the humanistic approach

  Aranoff compared fisherman and cane cutters, cane cutters worked in teams and would get paid based on how much the whole team had cut, even if off sick, and fisherman had much more demanding job and were only paid for their own work and no one else's but overall they earned more. After being assessed to see what level on the hirearchy of needs they were all at they found that as a whole the fishermen were higher up. This suggests that only those who had reached the lower levels would choose to become fishermen allowing them to develop a high self esteem.
• Evaluate the humanistic approach

  :) - Free will is a major part of the humanistic approach which is much less restrictive compared to determinism. Many psychologists believe that in order to get a good understanding into the complex behaviour of humans we must not take a deterministic approach as it constricts what people can and cant do.

  
  

  :) - There are real life applications that have arose from research into the humanistic approach. Client centred therapy has proven to work on may patients over the years, Gibbard studied the impact of CCT on 700 mentally ill patients over five years and found that nearly 70% of participants showed significant improvements.

  
  

  :( - It is difficult to evaluate the humanistic approach as most of the methods used to gather data used a non-experimental approach failing to establish a relationship between variables. So although studies do show that when a participant undergoes therapy they do tend do become better it is however very difficult to prove that one causes the other.

  
  

  :( - A criticism of the humanistic approach is that it may be unrealistic. It states that everyone has the opportunity to reach self actualisation however it ignores pessimism within people and also that some people are just grown up in environments where it may be extremely difficult if not impossible to reach a full positive view of themselves and everyone around them
• Origins of Psychology


  Wundt founded first ever psychological lab in Germany in 1879.

  
  

  Aimed to document and describe the nature of human consciousness.

  
  

  Developedintrospection

  
• Introspection


  Involved recording own conscious thoughts.

  
  

  Aim was to break these thoughts down into their constituent parts.

  
  

  Isolating the structure of consciousness in this way is known asStructuralism

  
• Origins of psychology - Evaluation

  -Wundt's methods were unreliable:

  - non observable responses

  - hard to reproduce

  
  

  -Introspection is inaccurate

  
  

  +Scientific approach

  - Brought objective systematic methods

  
  

  -Lab studies produce low ecological results
• Assumption of the behaviourist approach

  Blank slate

  
  

  All behavior is learnt other than survival instincts

  
  

  Animals can be used in research

  
  

  No difference between man and brute

  
  

  Rejection of introspection

  
  

  Reliant upon lab experiments to maintain control and objectivity

  
  

  2 forms of learning: classical and operant conditioning.

  
• Classical conditioning


  Learning through association

  
  

  Pavlov research - dogs associate sound of bell with food if bell is rung consistently before feeding.

  
• Classical conditioning procedure


  Before conditioning:

  Unconditioned stimulus (Food) = unconditioned response (Salivation).

  Neutral stimulus (Bell) = no conditioned response (No salivation).

  
  

  
  

  During conditioning:

  Neutral stimulus (Bell) + Unconditioned stimulus (Food) = Unconditioned response (Salivation).

  
  

  
  

  After Conditioning:

  Conditioned stimulus (Bell) = Conditioned Response (Salivation)
• Operant conditioning


  Learning through consequences

  
  

  Skinner (1953) suggested that learning is an active process where humans and animals operate in their environment.

  
  

  There are 3 types of consequences of behaviour: Positive reinforcement, Negative reinforcement, punishment.

  
• Positive reinforcement


  Receiving a reward when a certain behaviour is performed.

  
  

  Example - Praise from a teacher for answering a question.

  
• Negative reinforcement


  Performance of a behaviour to avoid something unpleasant.

  
  

  Example - Handing in homework to avoid being told off.

  
• Behaviourist Approach - Evaluation

  +Influential in giving psychology greater credibility and status as a result of its largely lab based research.

  
  

  +Real life application - Token economy systems

  
  

  -Mechanistic view of behaviour - humans seen as passive machine like responders with no conscious insight into own behaviour.
• Assumptions of social learning theory


  People learn throughobservation and imitationof others within a social context.

  
  

  Behaviour is learned

  
  

  Learning occurs directly through classical and operant conditioning but also through indirect means (observation)
• SLT - Vicarious reinforcement


  Indirect reinforcement

  
  

  Learner observes a behaviour

  
  

  Imitation occurs if the learner sees the behaviour being reinforced rather than punished

  
  

  The learner observes the consequences of a behaviour
• SLT - Mediational processes

  Cognitive factors involved in learning

  
  

  Attention- Extent to which we notice certain behaviour

  
  

  Retention- How well the behaviour is remembered

  
  

  Motor Reproduction- The ability of the observer to perform the behaviour

  
  

  Motivation- The will to perform the behaviour
• SLT - Identification


  People (especially children) are more likely to imitate the behaviour of people they identify with.

  
  

  These are called role models

  
  

  A person becomes a role model if they are seen to have similar characteristics to the observer and if they have high status.

  
• Social Learning Theory - Research

  Bandura (1965)

  
  

  Children were most likely to perform aggressive behaviour when they observed an adult act aggressively and be rewarded.