1. Unit 1: Psychology’s History and Approaches

2. What is Psychology?
Psychology: the scientific study of behavior and mental processes.
Behavior: outward or overt actions and reactions.
Mental processes: internal, covert activity of our minds.

3. Psychology’s Roots
Ancient civilizations often attributed abnormal behavior as demon possession.

4. Psychology’s Roots Ancient Greeks “How does our mind work?”
“How does our body relate
to our mind?”
Socrates
Plato
Aristotle

5. Psychology’s Roots Empiricism Rene Descartes (1595 – 1650)
Mind distinct from the body
Francis Bacon (1561 – 1626)
John Locke (1632 – 1704)
Tabula Rasa (blank slate)
Empiricism
Knowledge originates in experience, and science should rely on observation & experimentation

6. Four Goals of Modern Psychology
Description
Identifying and classifying behaviors & mental processes as accurately as possible
Explanation
Proposing reasons for behaviors and mental processes
Prediction
Offering hypothesis about how or why it may happen again
Control/Influence
Using research to solve practical problems that involve behavior and mental processes

7. Psychology’s Roots Psychological Science is Born
Wilhelm Wundt (1879)
Reaction time experiment
“Atoms of
the mind”

8. Psychology’s Roots Thinking About the Mind’s Structure
The study of mental processes organized into different branches:
Structuralism
Functionalism

9. Psychology’s Roots Thinking About the Mind’s Structure
Edward Titchener
Structuralism
Physicists & chemists broke matter down into structures, why not the mind?
Self-reflective introspection reveals the structure of the mind
“Tell me about things that are yellow”

10. Psychology’s Roots Thinking About the Mind’s Function
William James
Influenced by Darwin & evolutionary theory
Wrote “The Principles of Psychology”
Functionalism
How mental and behavioral processes function – how they enable organisms to adapt, survive & flourish

11. Psychology’s Roots Thinking About the Mind’s Function
Experimental psychology
The study of behavior and thinking using the experimental method.

12. Psychological Science Develops
Sigmund Freud
Austrian medical doctor (neurologist)
Patients suffered from “nervous disorders”
Proposed people push troubling thoughts into their unconscious, which cause the disorders.
Psychoanalysis was the technique he used to uncover repressed thoughts.

13. Psychological Science Develops
Pavlov, Watson, B.F. Skinner
Behaviorism
Psychology should be an objective science
Studied observable behavior without regard to mental processes

14. Psychological Science Develops
Carl Rogers & Abraham Maslow
Humanistic Psychology
Attention on current environmental influences that can nurture or limit growth potential.
Emphasizes the importance of having our needs for love and acceptance satisfied.

15. Contemporary Psychology

17. Psychological Perspectives
Psychodynamic perspective
Behavioral perspective
Humanistic perspective
Cognitive perspective
Sociocultural perspective
Biological perspective
Evolutionary psychology
Positive psychology

18. Psychological Perspectives
From pages 10-12, create a poster from the perspective that has been assigned to you.
Title
Description of this perspective’s unique focus
Major people
2 pictures