Introduction To Psychology

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Introduction To Psychology

• Chapter 1

Book authors Samuel Wood Ellen G. Wood Denise
Boyd
Web link www.ablongman.com/wood5e/
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I. Psychology

• Psychology
• The scientific study of behavior and mental
  processes
• Scientific method
• The orderly, systematic procedures researchers
  follow as they
• Identify a research problem,
• Design a study to investigate the problem,
• Collect and analyze data,
• Draw conclusions, and
• Communicate their findings

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I. Psychology

• Theory
• A general principle or set of principles proposed
  to explain how a number of separate facts are
  related
• Replication
• The process of repeating a study with different
  participants and, preferably, a different
  investigator to verify research findings

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I. Psychology

• Goals of Psychology
• Describe behavior and mental processes
• Explain behavior and mental processes
• Predict behavior and mental processes
• Influence behavior and mental processes

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I. Psychology

• Goals of Psychology (continued)
• Description
• First step in understanding most behaviors or
  mental processes
• Describes the behavior or mental process of
  interest as accurately and completely as possible
• Tells what occurred

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I. Psychology

• Goals of Psychology (continued)
• Explanation
• Requires an understanding of the conditions under
  which a given behavior or mental process occurs
• Enables researchers to state the causes of the
  behavior or mental process they are studying
• Tells why a given event or behavior occurred

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I. Psychology

• Goals of Psychology (continued)
• Prediction
• When researchers can specify the conditions under
  which a behavior or event is likely to occur
• Influence
• When researchers know how to apply a principle or
  change a condition to prevent unwanted
  occurrences or to bring about desired outcomes

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I. Psychology

• Two types of research that help psychologists
  accomplish these 4 goals
• Basic research
• Research conducted to advance knowledge rather
  than for its practical application
• Example studying the nature of memory
• Applied research
• Research conducted to solve practical problems
• Example exploring methods to improve memory

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I. Psychology

• Critical thinking
• The process of objectively evaluating claims,
  propositions, or conclusions to determine whether
  they follow logically from the evidence presented
• The foundation of the scientific method

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Descriptive research methods
• Research methods that yield descriptions of
  behavior rather than causal explanations
• Naturalistic observation
• Laboratory observation
• Case studies
• Surveys
• Interviews
• Questionnaires

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Naturalistic observation
• The researcher observes and records behavior in
  its natural setting, without attempting to
  influence or control it
• Advantage
• Gives the opportunity to study behavior in normal
  settings
• Disadvantages
• Must wait for events to occur
• Cannot establish cause-and-effect relationships
• Observer bias A distortion in researchers
  observations

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Laboratory observation
• A research method in which behavior is studied in
  a laboratory setting, where researchers can exert
  more control and take more precise measurements
• Advantage
• Control established by laboratory setting
• Disadvantage
• Artificial environment for observations

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Case study
• An in-depth study of one or a few individuals
  consisting of information gathered through
  observation, interview, and perhaps psychological
  testing
• Advantage
• In-depth analysis for theoretical investigation
• Disadvantages
• Cannot establish the cause of behaviors observed
• Observer bias
• Researchers do not know how applicable their
  findings may be to larger groups or to different
  cultures

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Survey
• A method in which researchers use interviews
  and/or questionnaires to gather information about
  the attitudes, beliefs, experiences, or behaviors
  of a group of people

• Good luck is provided when you break the wishbone
  and get
• The longer piece
• The shorter piece
• Pieces of equal length
• What is a wishbone?

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Interviews
• Survey results can be affected by the questions
  wording and context
• The truthfulness of the responses can be affected
  by characteristics of the interviewers
• Questionnaires
• Completed more quickly and less expensively than
  interviews

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Population
• The entire group that is of interest to
  researchers and to which they wish to generalize
  their findings the group from which a sample is
  selected
• Sample
• The portion of any population that is selected
  for study and from which generalizations are made
  about the larger population

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II. Descriptive Research Methods

• Representative sample
• A sample of participants selected from the larger
  population in such a way that important subgroups
  within the population are included in the sample
  in the same proportions as they are found in the
  larger population
• Biased sample
• A sample that does not adequately reflect the
  larger population
• Random sample
• A sample selected where everyone in the
  population has an equal chance of being included
  in the sample

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III. Experimental Method

• Experimental Method - The research method in
  which researchers
• Randomly assign participants to a control group
  or an experimental group
• Control all conditions other than one or more
  independent variables, which are then manipulated
• Determine their effect on some behavioral
  measure, the dependent variable in the experiment

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III. Experimental Method

• Hypothesis
• A prediction about the relationship between two
  or more variables
• Variable
• Any condition or factor that can be manipulated,
  controlled, or measured

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III. Experimental Method

• Independent variable
• In an experiment, the factor or condition that
  the researcher manipulates in order to determine
  its effect on another behavior or condition known
  as the dependent variable
• Sometimes referred to as the treatment
• Dependent variable
• The variable that is measured at the end of an
  experiment and is presumed to vary as a result of
  manipulations of the independent variable

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III. Experimental Method

• Experimental group
• In an experiment, the group that is exposed to
  the independent variable, or the treatment
• Control group
• In an experiment, a group that is similar to the
  experimental group and is exposed to the same
  experimental environment but is not exposed to
  the independent variable used for purposes of
  comparison

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III. Experimental Method

• Confounding variables
• Any factors or conditions other than the
  independent variable that could cause observed
  changes in the dependent variable

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III. Experimental Method

• Selection bias
• The assignment of participants to experimental or
  control groups in such a way that systematic
  differences among the groups are present at the
  beginning of the experiment
• Random assignment
• Assignment of participants to experimental and
  control groups by using a chance procedure, which
  guarantees that each has an equal probability of
  being placed in any of the groups

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III. Experimental Method

• The placebo effect
• The phenomenon that occurs when a persons
  response to a treatment or response on the
  dependent variable in an experiment is due to
  expectations regarding the treatment rather than
  to the treatment itself
• Placebo
• Some inert substance, such as a sugar pill or an
  injection of saline solution, given to the
  control group in an experiment as a control for
  the placebo effect

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III. Experimental Method

• Experimenter bias
• A phenomenon that occurs when the researchers
  preconceived notions in some way influence the
  participants behavior and/or the interpretation
  of experimental results
• A researchers expectations can be communicated
  to participants, perhaps unintentionally, through
  tone of voice, gestures, or facial expression
• Double-blind technique
• An experimental procedure in which neither the
  participants nor the experimenter knows who is in
  the experimental or control groups until after
  the results have been gathered

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III. Experimental Method

• Limitations of the experimental method
• The more control a researcher exercises over the
  setting, the more unnatural and contrived the
  research setting becomes
• Unethical or not possible in many areas of
  interest
• For instance, researchers could not addict humans
  to tobacco to establish that smoking tobacco
  causes cancer
• Scientists could not testify that smoking tobacco
  causes cancer only that smoking tobacco is
  highly correlated with cancer

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Design an Experiment

• An apple a day keeps the doctor away.
• You cant teach an old dog new tricks.
• Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man health,
  wealthy, and wise.
• Find a penny, pick it up all the day, youll
  have good luck.
• Fuzzy caterpillars black, brown, black amount
  of brown determines severity of winter.
• Same pencil to study, luck on test.

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IV. Correlational Method

• Correlational method
• A research method used to establish the degree of
  relationship (correlation) between two
  characteristics, events, or behaviors
• For use when it is impossible to manipulate
  variables of interest
• There are many variables of interest to
  psychologists that cannot be manipulated
• Can be done more quickly and cheaply than
  experiments

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IV. Correlational Method

• Correlational coefficient
• A numerical value that indicates the strength and
  direction of the relationship between two
  variables
• Coefficients range from 1.00 (a perfect positive
  correlation) to 1.00 (a perfect negative
  correlation)
• The further the correlation coefficient is from
  zero, the stronger the coefficient
• The sign determines the direction of the
  relationship
• () Positive as one variable increases, the
  other must also increase
• (-) Negative as one variable increases, the
  other must decrease

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IV. Correlational Method

• Classroom Correlation
• Procedure
• Select two variables (heights and shoe sizes).
• Collect the data and plot the data on a graph.
• Speculate on the relationship between height and
  shoe size.

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V. Participants in Psychological Research

• Participant-related bias
• Gender bias
• Over-generalizing findings of a study
• Ageism

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V. Participants in Psychological Research

• Protecting research participants rights
• The main provisions of the code
• Legality
• Institutional approval
• Informed consent
• Deception
• Debriefing
• Clients, patients, students, and subordinates
• Publication

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V. Participants in Psychological Research

• Important guidelines for using animals in
  psychological research
• Legality
• Must comply with all relevant federal, state, and
  local laws
• Supervision by experienced personnel
• Must be supervised by people who are trained in
  the animals care
• Minimization of discomfort
• Researchers are ethically bound to minimize any
  discomfort to research animals

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VI. Exploring Psychologys Roots

• Founders of psychology
• Historians acknowledge that three German
  scientists, Ernst Weber, Gustav Fechner, and
  Hermann von Helmholtz, were the first to
  systematically study behavior and mental
  processes
• Wilhelm Wundt is thought of as the father of
  psychology

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VI. Exploring Psychologys Roots

• Wilhelm Wundt
• Established a psychological laboratory at the
  University of Leipzig in Germany in 1879
  (considered the birth of psychology as a formal
  academic discipline)
• Used introspection
• A research method that involves looking inward to
  examine ones own conscious experience and then
  reporting that experience
• Believed that consciousness could be reduced to
  its basic elements
• Believed these elements to be pure sensations,
  such as sweetness, coldness, or redness

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VI. Exploring Psychologys Roots

• Edward Bradford Titchener
• Gave his first school of thought in psychology
  the name structuralism
• Aimed at analyzing the basic elements of
  conscious mental experience
• Believed that consciousness could be reduced to
  its basic elements

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VI. Exploring Psychologys Roots

• Functionalism
• An early school of psychology that was concerned
  with how mental processes help humans and animals
  adapt to their environments
• Broadened the scope of psychology to include the
  study of behavior, as well as mental processes
• Allowed the study of children, animals, and the
  mentally impaired
• Charles Darwin
• His idea about evolution and the continuity of
  species was largely responsible for an increased
  use of animals in psychological experiments

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VI. Exploring Psychologys Roots

• William James
• Advocate of functionalism
• Wrote Principles of Psychology
• Taught stream of consciousness
• Functioned to help humans adapt to their
  environment

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VI. Exploring Psychologys Roots

• Christine Ladd-Franklin
• Mary Whiton Calkins
• Margaret Floy Washburn
• Francis Cecil Sumner
• Albert Sidney Beckham
• Kenneth Clark
• Jorge Sanchez

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• John B. Watson
• Wrote the article Psychology as the Behaviorist
  Views It
• This proposed Watsons new approach to
  psychology, one that rejected the subjectivity of
  both structuralism and functionalism
• Science of behavior termed behaviorism by Watson

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• Behaviorism
• The school of psychology founded by John B.
  Watson that views observable, measurable behavior
  as the appropriate subject matter for psychology
  and emphasizes the key role of environment as a
  determinant of behavior
• Most influential school of thought in American
  psychology until the 1960s

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• B. F. Skinner
• Agreed with Watson that concepts such as mind,
  consciousness, and feelings were neither
  objective nor measurable
• Argued that behavior can be explained by
  analyzing conditions that were present before a
  behavior occurred and by analyzing the
  consequences that follow the behavior
• Provided research on operant conditioning that
  emphasized the importance of reinforcement in
  learning and in shaping and maintaining behavior

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• Sigmund Freud
• Developed a theory of human behavior based
  largely on case studies of his patients
• Psychoanalysis
• The term Freud used for both his theory of
  personality and his therapy for the treatment of
  psychological disorders the unconscious is the
  primary focus of psychoanalytic theory

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• Humanistic psychology
• The school of psychology that focuses on the
  uniqueness of human beings and their capacity for
  choice, growth, and psychological health
• Rejects the behaviorist view that behavior is
  determined by factors in the environment
• Rejects the pessimistic view of the
  psychoanalytic approach that human behavior is
  determined primarily by unconscious forces

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• Cognitive psychology
• A specialty that studies mental processes such as
  memory, problem solving, decision making,
  perception, language, and other forms of
  cognition often uses the information-processing
  approach

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• Gestalt psychology
• The school of psychology that emphasizes that
  individuals perceive objects and patterns as
  whole units and that the perceived whole is more
  than the sum of its parts
• Lead by Max Wertheimer
• Phi phenomenon experiment

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VII. Schools of Thought in Psychology

• Information-processing theory
• An approach to the study of memory and problem
  solving that uses the computer as a model for
  human thinking
• The brain interprets information rather than just
  responding to it

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Evolutionary psychology
• The school of psychology that studies how humans
  genetically inherited tendencies and dispositions
  influence a wide range of behaviors
• Has been called a combination of evolutionary
  biology and cognitive psychology

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Differences in evolutionary psychology and
  biological psychology
• Evolutionary psychology
• Provides explanations of how certain biologically
  based behaviors came to be common in an entire
  species
• Focuses on traits that exist in every member of a
  species

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Differences in evolutionary psychology and
  biological psychology (continued)
• Biological psychology
• Looks for links between specific behaviors and
  equally specific biological processes that often
  help explain individual differences
• Studies the structures of the brain and central
  nervous system, the functioning of neurons, the
  delicate balance of neurotransmitters and
  hormones, and heredity to look for links between
  these biological factors and behaviors

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Neuroscience
• A field that combines the work of psychologists,
  biologists, biochemists, medical researchers, and
  others in the study of the structure and function
  of the nervous system
• Discovered that defects in nerve cell membranes
  interfere with the cells ability to make use of
  brain chemicals that help us control body movement

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Background and cultural experiences affecting
  behavior
• Sociocultural explanations and research studies
  emphasize social and cultural influences on human
  behavior and stress the importance of
  understanding those influences when interpreting
  the behavior of others

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Psychological perspectives
• General points of view used for explaining
  peoples behavior and thinking, whether normal or
  abnormal
• Psychologists occasionally have an eclectic
  position
• Choosing a combination of approaches to explain a
  particular behavior

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Major perspectives in psychology, and the kinds
  of variables each emphasizes in explanations of
  behavior
• Behavioral perspective environmental factors
• Psychoanalytic perspective emotions, unconscious
  motivations, early childhood experiences
• Humanistic perspective subjective experiences,
  intrinsic motivation to achieve
  self-actualization
• Cognitive perspective mental processes

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VIII. Current Trends in Psychology

• Major perspectives in psychology, and the kinds
  of variables each emphasizes in explanations of
  behavior (continued)
• Evolutionary perspective inherited traits that
  enhance adaptability
• Biological perspective biological structures,
  processes, heredity
• Sociocultural perspective social and cultural
  variables

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IX. Psychologists at Work

• Clinical psychologists
• Specialize in the diagnosis and treatment of
  mental and behavioral disorders
• Counseling psychologists
• Help people who have adjustment problems that are
  less severe than those generally handled by
  clinical psychologists
• Physiological psychologists
• Also called neuropsychologists
• Study the relationship between physiological
  processes and behavior

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IX. Psychologists at Work

• Experimental psychologists
• Specialize in the use of experimental research
  methods
• Conduct experiments in most fields of
  specialization in psychology
• Developmental psychologists
• Study how people grow, develop, and change
  throughout the life span
• Educational psychologists
• Specialize in the study of teaching and learning

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IX. Psychologists at Work

• Social psychologists
• Investigate how the individual feels, thinks, and
  behaves in a social settingin the presence of
  others
• Industrial/organizational psychologists
• Study the relationships between people and their
  work environments