Introduction to Psychology

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Introduction

Human behavior is perhaps one of the interesting topics of any discipline as it plays

significant role not only in understanding the individual’s unique personality but also his or her

functioning in a complex socio-cultural context. Psychology, with its major perspectives, core

concepts, and recent developments unravel the mystery behind human behavior through

scientific scrutiny of this topic.

Objectives:

At the end of the session, the students should be able to:

1. Analyze and explain the definition of psychology;

2. Identify and expound the goals of psychology;

3. Discuss the significance of studying psychology;

4. Trace the history of psychology and the development of different schools of thoughts;

5. Distinguish the different perspectives in studying psychology;

6. Gain familiarity with the terms relevant to the topic; and

7. Enumerate and explain the different areas of specialization in psychology

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A. History of Psychology
The earliest origins of psychology are found in the
writings of ancient Greek philosophers about the nature of
human life, particularly in the work of Aristotle
(384B.C.E.) He used the term psyche to refer to the essence
of life. This term is translated in Greek to mean “mind,”
but it is closely linked to the word “breath.”
Aristotle believed that psyche escaped in the last
dying breath. Modern psychologists study the same
actions, thoughts, and feelings that fascinated Aristotle.
Indeed, the term psychology comes from Aristotle’s word
psyche plus the Greek word logos, which means the “the
study of.” Psychology has been described as having a long
past but only a short history. Although psychology did not
formally become a science until the 1870s, people have
always been interested in explaining behavior. The roots of
psychology can be traced back to philosophy and medicine
in ancient Egypt, Greece, India, and Rome. Although these
issues were not considered “psychological” at the time,
doctors and philosophers debated many of the same issues
that concern modern psychologists.

B. Definition of Psychology

Psychology is defined as the science of behavior

and mental processes. This definition contains three key
terms – science, behavior, and mental processes.
Behavior refers to all of a person’s overt actions that others
directly observe. When you walk, speak or frown, you are
behaving in this sense. The term mental processes refer to
the private thoughts, emotions, feelings and motives that
other people cannot directly observe. Your private
thoughts and feelings about your dog catching a Frisbee in
midair are examples of mental processes. Finally, it is
considered as a science because psychologists attempts to
understand people by thinking critically about careful,
controlled observations.

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C. Goals of Psychology
The four goals of the science of psychology are to
describe, predict, understand, and influence behavior and
mental processes.
1. Describe. Information gathered in scientific
studies helps psychologists describe behavior and mental
processes accurately. For example, descriptive information
gathered in survey of the frequency of sexual behavior
among college students without the protection of condoms
would be an important first step in designing a program to
prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases such as
aids.
2. Predict. Psychologists have developed tests
that enable employers to predict more accurately which job
applicants will perform their jobs well.
3. Understand. Behavior and mental
processes can be understood using theories or tentative
explanations of facts and relationships in science.
4. Influence. Psychologists design
interventions that would help a teenage boy with severe
depression; to help college students select their careers; or
help parents raise a child with conduct disorder.

D. Early Approaches: Structuralism, Functionalism, Gestalt

psychology and Psychoanalytic Theory
Traditionally, psychology’s birth is linked with the
first psychology laboratory, which was established by
Wilhelm Wundt in 1879 at the University of Leipzig, in
Germany. As you will see, some of the people who brought
psychology into the scientific arena were trained as
physicians; others were more philosophical in nature.
However, these differences produced a field that was broad
and complex, with many avenues of exploration.

1. Wilhelm Wundt, Edward Titchener, and Structuralism

For Wilhelm Wundt, the goal of psychology was to

study conscious processes of the mind and the body. He
wanted to know what thought processes enable us to
experience the external world. In particular, Wundt
attempted to detail the structure of our mental experiences.
Like a chemist who questions what elements combine to
create different substances, Wundt questioned what

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elements, when combine it would explains mental

processes. Wundt’s view that mental experiences were
created by different elements is referred to as
structuralism.

To identify the structure of thought, British

psychologist Titchener used a process known as
introspection that is a self – observation technique.
Trained observers were presented with an event and asked
to describe their mental processes. The observations were
repeated many times. From these introspections, Titchener
identified three basic elements of all conscious experiences;
sensations, images, and feelings.

Wundt’s and Titchener’s research went beyond

introspection and structuralism to encompass a very broad
view of psychology. They also conducted detailed studies
on color vision, visual illusions, attention, and feelings and
influenced the field of psychology through their students,
many of whom went on to establish psychology
departments and laboratories in the United States. For
example, Titchener’s first graduate student, American
Margaret Washburn became the first woman awarded a
doctorate in Psychology. Wash burn did not share
Titchener’s emphasis on structuralism, but instead
investigated the connection between motor movement and
the mind and conducted extensive research on animal
behavior.

2. Max Wertheimer and Gestalt Psychology

Max Wertheimer, a professor of psychology at the

University of Frankfurt in the early 1900s, was also
interested in the nature of conscious experience. However,
his ideas about consciousness were quite different from
those of the structuralists. He led a group of psychologists
known as Gestalt psychologists. Their approach to
psychology was based on the German concept of Gestalt, or
whole. Gestalt psychologists thought that human
consciousness could not be meaningfully broken down into
raw elements, as structuralist tried to do. For them, “The
whole is different from the sum of its parts.”

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3. William James and the Functionalism

American psychologist and philosopher William

James proposed a focus on the wholeness of an event and
the impact of the environment on behavior. He emphasized
how a mental process operates as opposed to the structure
of a mental process. He came to believe that consciousness
and thought evolved through the process of natural
selection, to help the organism adapt to its environment.

James’ perspective on psychology became known

as functionalism. Functionalism’s focus on the adaptive
value of behavior was influenced by Charles Darwin’s
Theory of evolution. Darwin’s theory speculated that
certain behaviors or traits that enhance survival are
naturally selected. James suggested applications of
psychology to teaching, creating the field of Educational
Psychology.

4. Sigmund Freud and Psychoanalytic Theory

Sigmund Freud is probably the best known

historical figure in psychology, and his ideas inculcate
Western culture in music, media, advertising, art, and
humor is a testament to his influence and importance. Freud
also studied medicine, focusing on neurology and disorders
of the nervous system. He began studying people with all
kinds of “nervous” disorder, such as an intense fear of
horses or heights or the sudden paralysis of an arm. He
began to interview his patients and asked them to express
any thought occurred to them. Freud theorized that
encouraging patients to say whatever came to their mind
and allowed them to recall memories that seemed to trigger
their problems. This process is known as free association,
one element of psychoanalysis, the therapy that Freud
developed.

From his experiences, Freud came to believe that

the unconscious plays a crucial role in human behavior. For
Freud, the unconscious was the part of the mind that
includes impulses, behaviors, and desires that we are
unaware of but influence our behavior. Freud’s focus on the
unconscious was unique and led to his formulation of
psychoanalytic theory. According to this theory, humans
are similar to animals in that they posses basic sexual and

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aggressive instincts that motivate behavior. Unlike animals,

humans can reason and think, especially as they mature.

5. Behaviorism: A True Science of Psychology

In the 1920s, functionalism was slowly being

replaced by a school of thought referred to as behaviorism.
A growing number of psychologists believed that in order
for psychology to be taken seriously as a true science, it
must focus on observable behavior and not on the mind. In
this case, you can’t see the mind or what a person thinks,
you only see what a person does. Behaviorists believed that
only overt, observable behaviors could truly be measured
consistently form person to person.

6. John B. Watson’s Behaviorism

One of the most vocal proponents of this school of

thought was American psychologist John B. Watson.
Watson was influenced by Russian physiologist Ivan
Pavlov’s studies of digestion in dogs. While measuring and
analyzing the first process of digestion is the Salivation.
Pavlov noticed that his dogs started to salivate before he
gave them meat powder. When the experiments first
started, the salivation had occurred only after the dogs were
given the meat powder. To further study this curious
change in response, Pavlov performed experiments to train
the dogs to salivate to other non-food stimuli.

Pavlov’s experiments were important to Watson as

examples of how behavior is the product of stimuli and
responses. A stimulus is any object or event that is
perceived by our senses. A response is an organism’s
reaction to a stimulus. To further his point, Watson and his
associate, Rosalie Rayner, performed an experiment on a 9-
month-old infant named Albert. Watson first presented
“Little Albert” with the stimulus of a white rat. Albert
played with the rat and showed no fear of it. Knowing that
infants fear loud noises, Watson paired the two stimuli, first
presenting the rat to Albert and then presenting a loud gong
sound behind Albert’s head. Little Albert reacted to the

loud noise with the startle, or fear, response. Over and over
again, Watson repeated the procedure of pairing the two

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stimuli – presenting the rat followed by the loud gong.

Then, when Watson presented the rat to Albert with no
gong, the infant responded with the startle response.
Watson conditioned Little Albert to fear a white rat, a rat
that Albert had played with earlier without fear. This
demonstrated for Watson that observable stimuli and
responses should be the focus of psychology. Unfortunately
for Watson, a personal scandal resulted in his dismissal as
the chair of the psychology department at Johns Hopkins
University.

7. B.F. Skinner and Behavioral Consequences

Skinner, like Watson, believed that psychology

should focus on observable behavior. But Skinner added a
dimension to Watson’s framework: consequences. He
believed that psychologists should look not only at the
stimuli in the environment that cause a particular response
but also at what happens to a person or animal after the
response – what Skinner called the consequence of the
behavior. Feeling less fear or anxiety is a good
consequence, or outcome. Whenever Albert saw the rat
again, he probably moved away even faster. Skinner
asserted that positive consequences, such as the reduction
of Albert’s anxiety, would lead him to engage in the same
behavior again. Negative consequences, or outcomes that
are not liked, would lessen Albert’s desire to engage in the
behavior again.

E. Beyond Behaviorism: Humanism, Cognitive Psychology, and the

Birth of Positive Psychology
Behaviorism was a dominant force in American
Psychology until the 1960s. By that time, it became evident
that this one theory could not account for all behaviors.
Behaviors such as feelings and thoughts could not easily be
reduced to stimuli and responses. This criticism combined
with the social climate of the time, opened the door for
other views on behavior and a willingness to explore topics
previously ignored.

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1. The Humanists

Discontent with behaviorism and the social

upheaval of the 1960s led to a growing interest in an
approach toward treatment called humanism. Many
psychologists did not accept the behaviorists’ view that
humans were governed by stimuli and responses, with no
will of their own to change their behavior. In the 1960s,
societal values were rapidly changing, and the civil rights
movement and the Vietnam War sparked widespread civil
disobedience. Many young Americans were endorsing
women’s rights, free love, and free will. Psychology was
changing too, and humanists emphasized that everyone
possesses inner resources for personal growth and
development. The goal of humanistic therapy, therefore,
would be to help people use these inner resources to make
healthier choices and thus lead better lives. Humanism
stressed the free will of individuals to choose their own
patterns of behavior.

2. Cognitive Psychology

While humanism was changing how psychologists

were treating clients, changes were also occurring in
research psychology. Researchers were becoming
disenchanted with the limits of testing stimuli, responses,
and consequences in the laboratory, and there was renewed
interest in the study of mental processes. Research
expanded to subjects such as memory, problem solving,
and decision making. However, unlike the earlier
functionalism and structuralism, this new study of mental
processes was based on more objective experimental
methods. Acknowledging that mental processes are not
directly observable to the eye, scientists believed that
reasonable inferences about mental processes could be
made from performance data. By the 1980s, the study of
cognitive processes, or cognitive psychology became part
of the mainstream psychology.

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3. The Birth of Positive Psychology

Focusing on how we think, particularly whether our

thoughts are pessimistic or optimistic in nature, soon led to
a growing emphasis on human strengths and on how
humans attain happiness, called positive psychology. Led
by American Psychologists Martin Seligman and Ed
Diener, positive psychology has produced an explosion of
research over the past decade describing the factors that
contribute to happiness, positive emotions, and well-being.
By scientifically studying positive aspects of human
behavior, the goal of positive psychology is to enable
individuals, families, and communities to thrive.

F. Modern Perspectives and the Eclectic Approach

Psychologists who adopt a biological perspective
look for a physical cause for a particular behavior. Such
psychologists examine genetic, biochemical, and nervous
system relationships to behavior and mental processes. The
biological perspective is also a branch of science referred to
as neuroscience. For example, knowing how the brain
monitors motor behavior has enabled neuroscientists to
develop devices to assist people with severe motor deficits
or spinal cord injuries.

Closely aligned to the biological perspective is the

evolutionary perspective. This approach is similar to the
biological approach in that both see the cause of behavior
as biological. However, this is where the similarity ends.
The evolutionary perspective proposes that natural
selection is the process at work. Behaviors that increase
your chances of surviving are favored or selected over
behaviors that decrease your chances of surviving.
Remember James’ functionalism? One could say that
James was an early evolutionary psychologist. Similarly,
this approach analyzes whether a particular behavior
increases a person’s ability to adapt to the environment,
thus increasing the chances of surviving, reproducing and
passing one’s genes on to future generations.

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The cognitive perspective explains behavior with

an emphasis on thoughts and interpretations based on
memory, expectations, beliefs, problem solving, or decision
making. A cognitive view focuses on how people process
information and on how that process may influence
behavior. For example, in explaining depression, a
cognitive approach focuses o how people who are
depressed think and perceive the world differently from
people who are not depressed.

The psychodynamic perspective is a collective

term that refers to those assumptions about behavior
originally conceived by Freud, which have been modified
by his followers. The psychodynamic view focuses on
internal, often unconscious mental processes, motives, and
desires or childhood conflicts to explain behavior. For
example, many children lie to or manipulate parents to get
what they want. It may also suggest that such behavior is an
unconscious expression of feelings of powerlessness and
lack of control that all children face from time to time.

The behavioral perspective focuses on external

causes of behavior. It looks at how stimuli in our
environment and/or the rewards and punishments we
receive influence our behavior and mental processes. This
approach suggests that behavior is learned and is influenced
by other people and events. For example, if a student
studies and then aces an exam, that reward may encourage
her to study again the next time. If she only gets an average
score, merely passing the test may not be rewarding enough
to encourage the student to study for future exams. This
perspective stems from Watson’s and Skinner’s behaviorist
views.

The sociocultural perspective adopts a wider view

of the impact of the environment on behavior and mental
processes. It suggests that your society or culture influences
your actions. Consider, for example, that from 1996 to
2006 the United States had a higher teen birth and abortion
rate than Canada, Sweden and England/Wales. The
sociocultural perspective would attribute this phenomenon

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to aspects of society that may differ in these countries such

as sexual values, contraceptive availability and use, and
exposure to sex education.

The humanistic perspective explains behavior as

stemming from your choices and free will. These choices
are influenced by your self-concept and by your self-
esteem. This view of the self and these feelings toward the
self will lead you to choose certain behaviors over others.
For example, if you see yourself as a low achiever in
school, you may be less likely to take challenging courses
or to apply yourself in the courses that you do take.

Many psychologists do not rigidly adhere to just

one of these perspectives but are likely to take what is
referred to as an eclectic approach when explaining
behavior. An eclectic approach integrates or combines
several perspectives to provide a more complete and
complex picture of behavior.

G. Areas of Specialization in Psychology

1. Behavioral Neuroscience – focuses on

biological processes, especially the brain’s role in behavior.
2. Cognitive Psychology – examines attention,
consciousness, information processing, and memory. It
also focuses on cognitive skills and abilities such as
problem solving, decision making, expertise, and
intelligence.
3. Developmental Psychology – examines
how people become who they are, from conception to
death, concentrating on biological and environmental
factors
4. Health Psychology emphasizes
psychological factors, lifestyle, and behavior that influence
physical health.
5. Industrial and Organization psychology
applies findings in all areas of psychology in the
workplace.

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6. Community psychology is concerned with

providing accessible care for people with psychological
problems. Community-based mental health centers are one
means of delivering such services as outreach programs.
7. Environmental psychology explores the
effects of physical settings in most major areas of
psychology including perception, cognition, learning, and
others.
8. Forensic Psychology applies psychology to
the legal system. Forensic psychologists might help with
jury selection or provide expert testimonies in trials.
9. Personality Psychology focuses on the
relatively enduring characteristics of individuals including
traits, goals, motives, genetics, and personality
development (King, 2013)
10. Clinical Psychology. Psychologist
understand and treat serious emotional and behavioral
problems
11. Counseling Psychology. Specialist in this
field helps people with personal or school problems and
with career choices.
12. Social Psychology study the influence of
other people on our behavior; interpersonal attraction and
intimate relationships; and attitudes and prejudice toward
others (Lahey, 2012).

Reference:
King, L. (2013). Experience psychology. (2nd ed.)
Columbia. McGrawHill

Lahey, B. (2012). Psychology: An Introduction. (11th Ed.)

NY: McGraw Hill.

Pastorino, E. & Doyle-Portillo, S. (2013). What is

Psychology? Essentials. (2nd Ed.) Canada: Wadsworth,
Cengage Learning.

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