Chris Kim

Psychology Chapter 1

Psychology: scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

Types of Psychology:

Biopsychology: relationship between biology and psychology.

Experimental Psychology: studies the process of sensing, perceiving, learning, and
thinking.
Cognitive Psychology: studies higher mental processes.
Developmental Psychology: studies how people grow and change throughout their lives.
Personality Psychology: study change and consistency in personality over time.
Health Psychology: relationship between psychological factors and physical ailments and
disease.
Clinical Psychology: study, diagnose, and treat abnormal behavior.
Counseling Psychology: focus on adjustment problems.
Educational Psychology: focus on educational process.
School Psychology: help student with problems relating to school.
Social Psychology: study how people interact.
Industrial-organizational Psychology: focus on psychology of the workplace.
Consumer Psychology: analysis buying habits and advertisements.
Cross-cultural Psychology: study similarities and differences in psychology between
cultures.
Psychology of Women: focus on women specific issues.
Clinical Neuropsychological: combines biopsychology and clinical psychology.
Forensic Psychology: focuses on legal issues.
Sport and Exercise Psychology: focuses on applications of psychology to sports and
exercise.
Program Evaluation: focus on assessing large-scale programs.
Psychometrics: studies measuring of abilities, attitudes, and traits.
Human Factor Psychology: studies interaction between machines and humans.

Psychology Statistics:
• 3/5 of all Psychologists are male.
• Recent move toward even distribution.
• Most psychologists have Ph.D or a Psy.D
• Psychiatrists have a M.D

The Old Views of Psychology:

Trephining: drilling holes in skull to let evil spirits escape.

Phrenology: reading of personal traits through bumps on head.
Structuralism: focuses on fundamental elements.
• Introspection: people given a stimulus, then asked to describe what they were
experiencing.
Functionalism: focuses on what the mind does.
Gestalt Psychology: focuses on study of how perception is organized. Viewed it as a
whole. “The whole is different from the sum its parts”

Models (Perspectives)
Biological: Everything is explained by Biology, Chemistry, etc.
Psychodynamic: Behavior is motivated by inner forces and conflicts over which the
individual has little awareness and comfort.
Cognitive: How we process information and how our ways of thinking about the world
influence our behavior.
Behavioral: Everything is learned; observable behavior should be the focus.
Humanistic: People are naturally endowed with the capacity to make decisions about
their lives and control their behavior.
• Free Will: Human’s ability to make decisions about ones life.
• Determinism: Many aspects of life are beyond our control.

Psychologists:

Plato: Knowledge is innate. “Nature”.

Aristotle: Knowledge grows from experiences. “Nurture”
Rene Descartes: Nerves, humans are different than everything else, reflexes not
processed in brain.
Sir Francis Bacon: Experiment
John Locke: Tabula Rosa: When we are born we are a blank slate.
Thomas Hobbes: Everything is matter and energy. Consciousness is byproduct.
Wilhelm Wundt: First psychology laboratory.
Edward Titchener:
William James: Leading Functionalist.
Sigmund Freud: Psychodynamic Model.
John Watson: Behavioral Model.
B.F. Skinner: Conditioning.
Carl Rogers: Humanistic Model.
Abraham Maslow: Motivation hierarchy? Primary Needs.