What is Psychology?

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What is Psychology?

• A set of questions about mental functioning
• trace back to philosophy
• The scientific method
• A product of history
• Dualism in philosophy

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The BIG Question Is knowledge innate ?

• Empiricism
• Empiricism-
• ( John Locke)- Tabula Rasa

• Nativism
• Nativism- is the view that elementary ideas are
  innate

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Foundations of Modern Psychology

• Rene Descartes ( 1596-1650)
• How is man different from other animals?
• Our minds control our body
• ( except reflex)
• Charles Darwin (1809-1882)
• Theory of natural selection (1859)

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Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than
does knowledge
I think therefore I am.
Charles Darwin
Rene Descartes
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A New Science is Born

• Separated from philosophy in 19th century
• Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920)
• Leipzig, Germany
• applied laboratory techniques to study of the
  mind
• Developed theory of Structuralism
• -Mind combines objective sensation subjective
  emotion

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The Battle Begins

• Edward Titchener (1867-1927)
• Wundts student, professor at Cornell University
• structuralism
• -Wrote first Psychology Textbook
• William James (1842-1910)
• started psychology at Harvard in 1870s
• functionalism investigate purpose of
  consciousness led to behaviorism

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If merely 'feeling good' could decide,
drunkenness would be the supremely valid human
experience."
I
What can I say????
William James
Edward Tichener
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Behaviorism Debuts

• Behaviorism- asserts that psychology should only
  study behavior that is observable (scientific)
• Emphasis on environment
• Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936)
• Russian physiologist
• discovered conditioned reflexes
• John Watson( 1878-1958)

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While you are experimenting, do not remain
content with the surface of things.
Ivan Pavlov
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Freud Unconscious

• Psychoanalytic Theory emphasis on the
  unconscious as a behavior determinant
• Eros Thanatos
• -Originally controversial

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Dreams are often most profound when they seem the
most crazy.
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Behaviorism Flourishes

• B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
• American psychologist at Harvard
• studied learning and effect of reinforcement
• behaviorism
• Free Will is an illusion
• Prominence in 1950s

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Education is what survives when what has been
learned has been forgotten.
B. F. Skinner
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The Humanists Revolt

• Humanism- Human beings have freedom and endless
  growth potential
• Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow

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The curious paradox is that when I accept myself
just as I am, then I can change
Carl Rogers
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Cognition and Physiology Resurface

• In the 1960s and 70s emphasis on mental
  processes ( consciousness) and biological basis
  of behavior reemerged.
• MRI- PET Scan, EEG

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Evolutionary Psych Develops

• In the 1980s and 90s Darwin's ideas resurfaced