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RUTH, A COLLEGE STUDENT, DECIDES TO HAVE LUNCH AT THE SCHOOL CAFETERIA. SHE WALKS TO THE CAFETERIA, GETS IN LINE, CHOOSES TUNA SALAD AND ORANGE JUICE, AND PAYS AT THE COUNTER. SHE THEN LOOKS AROUND OR SOMEONE TO SIT WITH. SHE DOESN’T SEE ANY CLOSE FFIENDS, SO SHE GOES TO A TABLE BY HERSELF SITS DOWN, AND BEGINS TO EAT. A FEW MINUTES LATER, GARY, A YOUNG MAN IN RUTH’S ENGLISH CLASS, COMES OVER TO JOIN HER. WHEN RUTH LOOKS UP AT HIM, SHE NO LONGER FEELS LIKE EATING. SHE THINKS GARY IS VERY GOOD LOOKING BUT HE NEVER SPEAKS TO RUTH UNLESS HE’S MISSED A CLASS AND WANTS TO BORROW HER NOTES. SHE GREETS HIM COOLY, BUT GARY SITS DOWN ANYWAY AND BEGINS TO TELL A LONG, RAMBLING STORY ABOUT A VISIT FROM THE LITTLE GREEN PEOPLE, THE HORROR MOVIE ON TV HE STAYED UP TO WATCH LAST NIGHT. MEANWHILE, RUTH REMEMBERS THAT GARY MISSED THIS MORNING’S ENGLISH CLASS AND CATCHES HIM EYEING HER NOTEBOOK. RUTH FANTASIZES DUMPING HER LUNCH ON GARY’S NEATLY GROOMED HAIR, BUT INSTEAD SHE GETS UP TO LEAVE. GARY ATTEMPTS A CASUAL SMILE AND ASKS TO BORROW HER NOTES. NOW RUTH IS MORE THAN ANNOYED. ALTHOUGH HER ENGLISH NOTEBOOK IS IN PLAIN SIGHT, SHE TELLS HIM CURTLY THAT SHE IS SORRY BUT SHE HAS LEFT HER NOTES IN THE LIBRARY –TO WHICH, AS A MATTER OF FACT, SHE MUST RETURN RIGHT AWAY. AS SHE LEAVES THE CAFETERIA, SHE GLANCES BACK AND SEES GARY STILL SITTING AT THE TABLE HE LOOKS DEPRESSED. SUDDENLY, SHE FEELS A BIT DEPRESSED HERSELF.
THE APPARENTLY SIMPLE EVENT,BETWEEN RUTH AND GARY, RAISES MANY QUESTIONS ABOUT WHY PEOPLE BEHAVE AND FEEL AS THE DO. HOW IS THEIR BEHAVIOR INFLUENCED BY THEIR PHYSCIOLOGICAL STATES? WHAT MOTIVATES THEM TO CHOOSE ONE ACTION INSTEAD OF ANOTHER? NEARLY ALL THE TOPICS WE COVER ARE REFLECTED IN A PSYCHOLOGIST’S PERCEPTION OF THIS BRIEF STORY.
INSIGHT • PYSCHOLOGY CAN PROVIDE INSIGHT INTO YOUR OWN AND OTHER PEOPLE’S BEHAVIOR. EX. Student convinced is hopelessly shy and doomed to be uncomfortable in groups, Social psychology- different kind group different effects, party-unstructered/bio lab-structured MUCH MORE UNCOMFORTABLE IN UNSTRUCTURED SOCIAL GROUPS THAN IN STRUCTURED, TASK-ORIENTED GROUPS
PSYCHOLOGY THE STUDY OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR AND MENTAL PROCESSES. Psychologists differ in how much importance they place on specific types of behavior. Some believe should study only behavior that you can see, observe, or measure directly. (Ruth selecting, paying for food, choosing table, refusing to lend notes – observable)
Others believe our fantasies, thoughts, and feelings are important kinds of human behavior, even though not directly observable. (Ruth guesses Gary is sad by expression on face, cannot directly observe his emotional reaction) While differ on which human behaviors important, do agree the study of behavior must be systematic. Systematic asking and answering questions about why think, act, and feel as they do reduces chance of false conclusion about behavior. (three blind man and the elephant
MANY DIFFERENT APPROACHES ARE NECESSARY TO UNDERSTAND THE COMPLEX RICHNESS OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR We spend time observing others, form conclusions about people in general from our daily interactions. Sometimes conclusions we draw are not accurate because we are not systematic in our “study” of people (box pg-8)
SCIENTIFIC METHOD Reach conclusions by identifying specific problems or question, formulating a hypothesis, collecting data through observation and experiment, and analyzing the data. HYPOTHESIS An “educated guess” – researcher has some evidence for suspecting a specific answer. State what you expect to find, expressed in a way that it can be proved or disproved
EXAMPLE People with same opinions on issues more likely to be attracted to each other than people with different opinions. Test hypothesis in a way that would enable him or her to collect data. A survey, questionnaires, analyze the data. Real answers to general questions arrived at only be general agreement of the experts after years of research on many different aspects of a problem
GOALS OF PSYCHOLOGY DESCRIBE EXPLAIN PREDICT CONTROL BEHAVIOR
DESCRIBE Gather information about the behavior being studied and present what’s known. (we describe Ruth’s behavior in the café) Psychologist interested in explaining why people behave as they do, often goes beyond observed to include ideas about why people react in certain ways.
EXPLAIN Psychologists present ideas in the form of hypotheses, which can be grouped together into theories. Theory past hunches or trial explanations about the facts observed. Theories subject to change as more info about people and behaviors are gathered. Theories fulfill 1st 2 goals, to describe and explain observed behavior
PREDICT A result of accumulated knowledge, what people will think, feel, or do in certain situations. Studying descriptive accounts linking certain behaviors together, psych’s, can predict certain events.
INFLUENCE/CONTROL BEHAVIOR Many Psych’s research to find more about human behavior, others interested in discovering ways to use what is already known about people to benefit others. Some interested in both basic science, or research and applied science, or practical applications of the principles discovered in basic science research.
BASIC Studying ability of infants to perceive visual patterns – basic research – not concerned with implications findings may have on crib design. Study REM in sleep research – basic research – if discover individual has sleep disturbance, try to understand and explain situation, but will not try to correct it. Correcting it is job of the applied scientist. Clinical psychologists. Ex. Consultant to toy manufacturer, Psych’s into applying principles, not discover
Rene’ Descartes – French Philosopher Their is a link between mind and body, mind controls the body’s movements, sensations and perceptions. Mind and body influence each other to create a person’s experiences. 3 minute philosophy – you tube
John Locke empiricism all knowledge is obtained through observation and experience. Infants come into this world with blank minds, with no experiences. Tabula rasa (Latin blank tablet) JL used this term to describe the mind of the human infant. Knowledge is the result of a build up of experiences
Wilhelm Wundt 1879 Germany - Laboratory of Psychology founder of psychology as a science. Real interest was in study of the human mind. Developed a method of self-observation introspection collect information about the mind. In controlled situations, trained subjects reported their thoughts, Wundt tried to map out the basic structure of thought processes. Attracted many students who carried on tradition of psych research.
Father of Psychology. Wundt was important because he separated psychology from philosophy by analyzing the workings of the mind in a more structured way, with the emphasis being on objective measurement and control. This laboratory became a focus for those with a serious interest in psychology, first for German philosophers and psychology students, then for American and British students as well. All subsequent psychological laboratories were closely modeled in their early years on the Wundt model.
William James 1st American psychologist more writing than research. Speculated that thinking, feeling, learning, remembering – all the activities of the mind serve one major function, to help us survive as species. Focused on function of the conscious mind.
Sigmund Freud Interest in the unconscious mind. Beneath the surface are primitive biological urges that are in conflict with the requirements of society and morality, these conflict are responsible for much human behavior. Free Association 1st thing comes to mind. Psychoanalyst Be objective listen and interpreted associations Dream analysis Apply same free association techniques to dreams.
Sir Francis Galton Heredity and inherited traits influences a person’s ability, character, and behavior. Greatness runs in families, cousin of Darwin, concluded genius is hereditary. Faulty idea, might be result of socioeconomic and environmental advantages. Invented procedures for testing abilities and characteristics of a wide range of people. Beginnings of individual psychology, determine, is behavior by heredity or environment.
Sir Francis Galton first coined the term “eugenics” in 1883. Put simply, eugenics means “well-born.” Initially Galton focused on positive eugenics, encouraging healthy, capable people of above-average intelligence to bear more children, with the idea of building an “improved” human race. Some followers of Galton combined his emphasis on ancestral traits with Gregor Mendel’s research on patterns of inheritance, in an attempt to explain the generational transmission of genetic traits in human beings.
Negative eugenics, as developed in the United States and Germany, played on fears of “race degeneration.” At a time when the working-class poor were reproducing at a greater rate than successful middle- and upper-class members of society, these ideas garnered considerable interest. One of the most famous proponentsin the United States was President Theodore Roosevelt, who warnedthat the failure of couples of Anglo-Saxon heritage to producelarge families would lead to “race suicide.”
Ivan Pavlov Concept of conditioned reflex- a response (salivation) elicited by a stimulus (the tuning fork) other than the one that first produced it (food)—was used by psychologists as a new tool, as a means of exploring the development of behavior. They could begin to account for behavior as the product of prior experience.
Theory Pavlov concluded that he was able to pair a neutral stimulus with an excitatory one and have the neutral stimulus eventually elicit the response the was associated with the original, unlearned reflex. In Classical Conditioning terminology, an unconditioned stimulus (US) is an event that causes a response to occur, which is referred to as the unconditioned response (UR). And, in Pavlov's study with dogs, the food within the dog's mouth is the US, and the salivation that results is the UR. Pavlov took a step further and added an element known as the nonexcitatory, conditioned stimulus (CS), which is paired with the US.
Pavlov used a metronome as the CS which he rang first, then fed the dogs. This pairing would eventually establish the dog's conditioned response of salivating to the sound of the metronome. After repeating this procedure several times, Pavlov was able to remove the US (food) and by only ringing the bell the dogs would salivate (CR). Since the bell alone now produced the unconditioned response (salivation), the association had been established (Conditioned). Pavlov continued to present the CS with any pairing with the US until the CR no longer occurred. This elimination of the CR is known as extinction. However, waiting a few days and then reintroducing ticking metronome resulted in the dogs once again salivating to the CS. Pavlov termed this, spontaneous recovery.
Pavlov continued of the conditioned response. He replaced the metronome with other stimuli for use as the CS. He conditioned the dogs using a buzzer, the flash of a light, a touch on the dog's harness, and the use of different pitches of a whistle in which the dogs had to differentiate between to determine which pitch resulted in access to food. Pavlov's experimental research gained much respect throughout Russia as well as America and the rest of the nations. Although he began his investigations late in life he managed to develop the major constructs of a fully realized field of learning. He summarized his discoveries in his remarkable book, Conditioned Reflexes.
John B. Watson – 1924 American Behaviorists stressed investigating observable behavior. Psychology should concern itself only with the observable facts of behavior. All behavior, even instinctive behavior, is the result of conditioning and occurs because the appropriate stimulus is present in the environment. Nature vs. Nurture
The Little Albert Study In 1920 Watson and an assistant, Rosalie Rayner, published one of the most famous research studies of the past century. Watson attempted to condition a severe emotional response in Little Albert, a nine-month-old child. Watson determined that white, furry objects, such as a rat, a rabbit, and cotton, did not produce any negative reaction in the baby. But by pairing together a neutral stimulus (white, furry animals and objects) with an unconditioned stimulus (a very loud noise) that elicited an unconditioned response (fear), Watson was able to create a new stimulus-response link: When Albert saw white, furry objects, this conditioned stimulus produced a conditioned response of fear. This study is generally presented as a seminal work that provided evidence that even complex behaviors, such as emotions, could be learned through manipulation of one's environment. As such, it became a standard bearer for behaviorist approaches to learning and is still widely cited in the early twenty-first century.
B. F. Skinner Refined and popularized behaviorist position. Attempted to show how, in principle, his laboratory techniques might be applied to society as a whole. Utopia Widely criticized , many people think that he seeks to limit personal freedom with his “manipulative” conditioning techniques. Reinforcement , or controlled reward and punishment, increasingly popular in education., modern computer education programs
With pigeons, he developed the ideas of "operant conditioning" and "shaping behavior." Unlike Pavlov’s "classical conditioning," where an existing behavior (salivating for food) is shaped by associating it with a new stimulus (ringing of a metronome) operant conditioning is the rewarding of a partial behavior or a random act that approaches the desired behavior.
Operant conditioning can be used to shape behavior. If the goal is to have a pigeon turn in a circle to the left, a reward is given for any small movement to the left. When the pigeon catches on to that, the reward is given for larger movements to the left, and so on, until the pigeon has turned a complete circle before getting the reward. Skinner compared this learning with the way children learn to talk -- they are rewarded for making a sound that is sort of like a word until in fact they can say the word. Skinner believed other complicated tasks could be broken down in this way and taught. He even developed teaching machines so students could learn bit by bit, uncovering answers for an immediate "reward." They were quite popular for a while, but fell out of favor. Computer-based self-instruction uses many of the principles of Skinner's technique.
Humanistic Psychology Abraham Maslow Rollo May Carl Rogers
Humanistic Psychology has given rise to a subject called the Positive Psychology in 21st century. Positive psychology is the scientific study of human happiness. The history of psychology as a science shows that the field has been primarily dedicated to address mental illness rather than mental wellness.
Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers and Erich Fromm, developed successful theories and practices that involved human happiness despite there being a lack of solid empirical evidence behind their work.
