Approaches

• What is Psychology?

  It is the scientific study of the human mind and behaviour
• What are the different Approaches to human behaviour in Psychology?

  • Biological, cognitive, behavioural, humanistic and psychodynamic
• Explain the biological approach to human behaviour.

  it mainly focuses on understanding human behaviour by looking at biological structures and processes within the body- including genes, neuro-chemistry and nervous system.
• Explain the behavioural approach

  it mainly focuses on the fact that info is received from our senses and processed by the brain and this directs how we behave and at least justifies the reasons for our behaviour.
• Explain the humanistic approach.

  It mainly focuses on the fact that all people are unique individuals as they have 'free will'. This approach takes positive view, everyone has the ability to reach their full potential
• Explain the psychodynamic approach

  it suggests that behaviour is determined by unconscious forces that we cannot control. it uses dream analysis to unlock the conscious mind it suggests the idea that we humans are not aware of the reasons of our behaviour.
• Who is the father of psychology?

  Wilhelm Wundt
• In what year did Wundt create his first laboratory dedicated to psychology?

  1875
• What was Wundt's approach?

  Structuralism
• What is structuralism?

  It is the scientific study of sensation and perception, by breaking particular parts of observations of objects, images, events down to consistent parts.
• What is introspection?


  it is the process of looking into and examining one's innerworld- i.e. their inner thoughts and emotions.
• Outline Wundt's method of introspection.

  Upon opening his lab in Leipzig, he conducted a standardized experiment in which participants were placed under controlled conditions and asked to self-report on their thoughts, images and cognitive thoughts. He also used a ticking metronave as a stimuli during this. His study came up with the idea of structuralism, that we can break down into components of thoughts.
• How has psychology as a discipline evolved over the years?

  it has become more scientific due to the modernisation of methods used when studying the human brain.
• define reliability

  whether something is consistent- in case of a study; whether it is replicable
• define systematic

  a sampling technique that uses a predetermined system to select the participants from a target group
• define replicable

  a piece of research which could be carried out again by the same or another research and still show consistent results
• define objective

  a piece of evidence has not been affected by subjectivity- personal feelings, bias, judgements or opinions
• define subjective

  affected by personal feelings, prejudice and interpretations
• describe predictability

  describes the likelihood at which an event is going to to occur or results research will produce
• define cause-effect

  used to describe the relationship between variables psychologists look at to identify 'effect' one variable has on another variable and vice versa
• define scientific method

  the aim of a study is what the purpose is of a piece of research
• Outline and discuss the strengths of Wundt's work in psychology (6marks)

  ->one strength of Wundt's work is that he set the foundation for psychological research

  ->he produced the first academic journal and wrote the first textbook. He is often referred to as the founder of modern psychology

  ->it is even suggested that Wundt's pioneering research set the foundation for approaches to come, particularly the cognitive and behaviourist approaches which means that his research was very useful to psychology as a profession
• what are the limitations of Wundt's work in psychology (6marks)

  ->one limitation of Wundt's work is that some aspects of his work is unscientific

  ->Wundt relied on his participants self-reporting their mental processes, this data is subjective and could have been altered by his patients. they may not have been honest about their thoughts.

  ->this suggests that some of Wundt's early efforts to study the mind were flawed and would not meet the scientific rigour of today's psychological research