Psychology approaches

• Conscious

  The bit of the mind we are aware of
• Preconscious

  Information that we may become aware of during dreams or 'slips of the tongue
• Unconscious

  A large storehouse of biological drives and instincts that has a significant influence on our behaviour and personality. It also contains threatening and disturbing memories that have been repressed or locked away and forgotten.
• Freud argued that the mind is one of the driving forces behind our behaviour
• Freud argued the mind is made up of 3 parts: the Conscious, the Preconscious, and the Unconscious
• The id

  The primitive part. It operates on the pleasure principle- it gets what it wants. It is a mass of unconscious drives and instincts. It is the only part present at birth. It is entirely selfish and demands instant gratification of its needs. It is found in the unconscious part of the mind.
• The ego

  Works on the reality principle and is the mediator between the other two parts. It develops around the age of two and it's role is to reduce conflict between the demands of the id and the superego. It uses defence mechanisms to help it. It is found in the conscious part of the mind.
• The superego

  Works on the morality principle. It is our internalised sense of right and wrong. It represents the moral standards of the child's same-sex parent and punishes the ego for wrongdoing (through guilt). It is formed at the age of 5 at the end of the phallic stage. It is found in the preconscious part of the mind.
• Defence Mechanisms

  The ego has a difficult job balancing the conflicting demands of the id and the superego so it uses defence mechanisms to help it. These are unconscious and prevent the ego from being overwhelmed by threats or traumas. They involve distorting or denying reality and so are regarded as not good to use often or long-term.
• Defence Mechanisms

  • Repression- Forcing a distressing memory out of the conscious mind.
  • Denial-Refusing to acknowledge some aspect of reality.
  • Displacement-Transferring feelings from true source of distressing emotion onto a substitute target
• Psychosexual stages 


  Child development occurs in 5 stages

  Each stage (apart from latency) is marked by a different conflict that the child must resolve in order to progress to the next stage.

  Any psychosexual conflict that is unresolved leads to fixation where the child carries certain behaviours and conflicts associated with that stage through to adult life.
• Pyschosexual stages 


  Oral (0-1 years) - focus of pleasure is mouth. Sucking, eating etc.

  Anal (1-3 years) - focus of pleasure is anus. Child gains pleasure from withholding and expelling faeces

  Phallic (3-6 years) - focus of pleasure is genitals. Child experiences oedipus conflict or electra conflict

  Latency (6-11 years) - transitional stage no pleasure. Boys and girls spend little time together.

  Gential (11+ years) - focus of pleasure is the genitals and experiencing pleasure with a partner.
• Oedipus complex


  Boys develop incestious feelings towards their mother and a desire to get rid of their father.

  They also have a fear that their father will castrate them and so repress feelings towards mother and identify with their father taking on his gender role and moral values.
• Electra complex

  Girls develop incestious feelings towards their father because they experience penis envy.

  They hate their mothers but are afraid of their mothers finding out and stop loving them.

  Overtime girls give up the desire for their father and replace this a desire for a baby so identifying with the mother.
• Cognitive approach - assumptions

  • Internal mental processes such as memory, attention and thinking should be studied.
  • Mental processes can be studied in an objective, scientific way through experiments
  • Mental processes can't be observed directly, they are studied indirectly by making inferences.
  • Inferences are drawing conclusions about the way mental processes operate from experiments
• Cognitive -Theoretical models

  These are similar to models or types of programming used by computers like flowcharts.

  An example is Information Processing model which suggests information flows through the cognitive system in a sequence of stages
• Cognitive - Computer models


  This is where the mind is compared to a computer (computer analogy)

  These models use concepts of central processing unit (the brain), the concept of coding (turning information into a useful format) and the use of stores to hold information.

  Some computer models of the mind has proved useful in the development of thinking machines and AI.
• Cognitive - schemas 


  Mental framework of beliefs and expectations that influence cognitive processing.

  They are packages of ideas and informations developed through experience.

  As we go through life we develop representations of how things look and work.
• Cognitive - schemas 


  As we age, our schemas become more sophisticated. We development mental interpretations for everything.

  Strengths - they enable us to process information quickly, gives us a shortcut to prevent us being overwhelmed by environment.

  Weakness - may distort our interpretations of sensory information leading to perceptual errors.
• Cognitive - emergence of cognitive neuroscience


  This is the scientific study of brains structures on mental processes.

  There has been advances of brain imaging techniques such as fMRI and PET scans that allow us to systematically observe and describe neurological basis of mental processes.
• Cognitive - usefulness of brain imaging techniques

  Proved useful in establishing the neurological origins of some mental disorders like OCD.

  Computer generated models are designed to read the brain and have lead to development of mind mapping techniques like brain fingerprinting.
• Biological - assumptions

  Everything psychological has a biological basis, to fully understand behaviour we must look into biological structures and processes within the body.

  Behaviour is affected by:

  • Brain structures
  • Neurochemistry
  • Genes
  • Evolution
• Biological structures - The brain

  Understanding brain structure can explain our thoughts and behaviour.

  The mind is believed to live in the brain meaning that all thoughts, behaviours and feelings have a physical basis.
• Neurochemistry 


  Neurotransmitters - chemical messangers in the brain that transmit messages between neurons. Biologists consider an imbalance of neurotransmitters to be an appropriate explanation of mental disorders

  Hormones - chemicals produced by the endocrine system and released into the bloodstream to target cells altering activity. Biologists consider an imbalance of hormones could be responsible for certain behaviours like aggression.
• Genes

  It is believed that behavioural characteristics such as intelligence and personality can be inherited like physical characteristics.

  Twin studies are used to see the extent of which a characteristic is cause by genes.
• Twin studies

  Used to determine the likelihood of certain traits having a genetic basis by comparing concordance rate between pairs of twins.

  Monozygotic = identical and should have 100% concordance as they have 100% genetic materials

  Dizygotic = non identical and should have 50% concordance as they have 50% genetic material
• Genotype and phenotype


  Genotype - a persons genetic makeup

  Phenotype - the way the genes are expressed through physical, behavioural and pyschological characteristics. Influenced by the environment.
• Behaviourist approach - assumptions

  Behaviour is learned through stimulus and response reactions

  Two forms of learning: Operant conditioning and Classical conditioning

  Behaviourists are only interested in behaviour that can be observed and measure, not mental processes.

  Suggest that animals could replace humans as experimental subjects and results could be generalised to humans.
• Social learning theory - assumptions

  • People learn through observation and imitation of the behaviours of others within a social context.
  • We learn by seeing someone else modelling behaviour
• Vicarious reinforcement and punishment

  Vicarious reinforcement - when we see model being rewarded for their behaviour. Makes it more likely to copy it as we think we get the same rewards.

  Vicarious punishment - when we see model being punished for their behaviour. Makes it less likely to copy it.