PSYC 104

study of the mind, grain and behavior. Spans over many levels of analysis

actions are multiply determined

reciprocal determinism

Culture

belief that we see the world like it is

empiricism

explanation for a large finding

prediction based on a theory

general hypothesis=scientific predictions

tendency to seek out evidence that supports our hypothesis and neglect of distort evidence contradicting it

tendency to stick to our initial beliefs even when evidence contradicts them

set of claims that seem scientific but are not

testable beliefs not tested

warning signs: exaggerated claims, lack of review, over reliance on anecdotes

when we find connections among random phenomenon

seeing meaningful images in meaningless visual stimuli

error of using our emotions as guides for evaluating the validity of a claim

a claim that has to be true because no one has yet to prove it false

lots of people believe it so it must be true

they believe that they are immune to biases, other people make mistakes but not me

coming with an open mind but need to see scientific evidence before believing it

a set of skills for evaluating all claims in an open minded fashion- allows us to overcome biases

• 1. ruling out rival hypotheses
• 2. correlation vs causation- correlations doesn't equal causation
• 3. falsifiability- can the claim be disproven
• 4. replicability- idea that a studies finding can be duplicated
• 5. extraordinary claims- is the evidence as convincing as the claims
• 6. occams razor or kiss - if two explanations fit equally, accept the simpler one

anything that can vary across people

made fitst lab in germany

William Wundt trained people to reflect on their own mental experiences

Wundt, EB Titcher aimed to identify basic elements of psyc experience used introspection

insistence on systemic data collection

William James hoped to understand the adaptive purposes of psyc characteristics

influence of evolutionary theory

Watson & Skinner focuses on uncovering the general laws of learning by looking outside the organisms

"black box"- the mind is a black box, only need to look at what goes in and comes out

help understand how we learn and importance on scientific rigor

Piaget, Neisser focuses on mental process involved in different aspects of thinking, focuses on not only rewards or punishers but interpretation

Freud, Jung. Focuses on internal psychological processes which we are unaware of

• everyday lives filled with symbols/dreams
• early experience- what happened when a child?
• controversy because it focuses on unconsisous "retarded" studies and many theories not falsifiable

are our behaviors because our genes or rearing environments

blank slate when you are born

interests and personality and mental is influenced by genes

social biology

to what extent are out behaviors freely selected rather than caused by outside factors?

• basic- examines how the mind works
• applied- examines how we use basic research to solve real world problems

someone sat next to children and "guided" their hands

• mental shortcuts or rules of thumb that we use daily
• this reduces cognitive energy required to solve problems

• like goes with like
• judge the probability of something by its superficial similarity to something else
• we ignore how common behaviors actually are in population and commit base rate fallacy

• off the top of my head
• estimating the likelihood of an occurrence based on the ease with which it comes to mind

systemic errors in thinking that can lead to confidence in false conclusions

"I knew it all along"

seek out info that you like but disregard any evidence against it

overestimate our ability to make correct predictions

• statistical programs
• foxes
• experts in a different field
• hedge hogs- most confident

• watching behavior in real world settings
• high degree of external validity( extent to which we can generalize our findings to the real world)
• low degree of internal validity ( extent to which we can draw cause and effect inferences

• studying one person of a small number of people for an extended period of time
• depth is traded for breadth

• access characteristics such as personality and mental illness
• pros- easy to administer
• cons- accuracy is skewed, potential for dishonesty
• response sets- subjects distort responses

ask about a persons opinions or abilities

• key to generalizability in surveys and studies
• ensures every person has an equal chance of being chosen

• sent 100,000 surveys to women and showed many were unhappy with relationships
• problem was only 4.5 of people responded
• example of random selection

consistence of measurement

• extent to which a measure access what it claims to measure
• a test must be reliable to be valid, but a reliable test can still be invaild

• examine how two variables are related
• depicted in scatter plots
• pros- reveal the nature of the relationship
• cons- appear to be correlated but are not

perception of a statistical association where none exists

only way to determine through an experimental design

possible to infer with random assignment and manipulation of independent variable

• experimental group receives manipulation
• control group does not

the dependent variable is what the experimenter measures to see if manipulation had an effect

• placebo effect- improvement resulting from the mere expectation of improvement
• experimenter expectancy effect- lead researchers to unintentionally bias outcome (clever hans)
• demand characteristics- cues that participants pick up that allow them to generate guesses regarding what the researchers expect to happen

African American men diagnosed with syphilis they they only studied the men, never treated it

research has to go through review institutional review board

Reporters are not scientists, consider the source

emphasis on central finding

lessing effect of other information

dont want to be partisan, make two sides equal

• For- foucalt, people with MI are stigmatized, diagnoses used for social control, difficult to tell if someone has an MI
• Against- plenty of behaviors mainstream society doesn't like that are not called MI (laziness, jealously) none deal with whether MI is a valid concept

• MD are mental conditions which are rare and few people experience them
• For- some are very rare
• Against- some are rare are not mental disorders (high intelligence, creativity) and some are quite common (depression)

• anything therapists are concerned about
• for-practical
• against-not everything they treat is a mental illness(marital problems) sometimes professional clients are wrong, does something stop being an MI if therapists stop caring about it?

• like physical pain actually helps us more than hurts us (feeling pain after touching a stove)
• for- they are harmful, they are heritable and relitavely common, adapted because they served a purpose in the past
• against- too debilitating

are all MD created by society?

• asked to recall details whether they are real or not
• is unreliable
• make people remember events that didnt happen
• most people with MPD are borderline personality disorder

marked by instability in mood identity

disorder is when a persons brain mechanisms don't perform their functions

• suffer relapse
• found difference in brains of people who have been depressed and people who haven't

demonic, odd behaviors were the result of evil spirits

• saw MI as a physical illness
• housing people in asylums , crowded and understaffed

• wanted more moral treatment
• still no effective treatments

• chlorpromazine- appeared to decrease symptoms
• deinstitutionalization- due to invention of new drugs

• community mental health centers
• patients return to normal life but many have no follow up care

• diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders
• contain criteria for mental disorders

• major mental disorders
• depression, alcohol abuse

• personality disorders and mental retardation
• longstanding harmful dysfunctions in personality traits

• associated medical conditions
• brain injury, neck pain

• life stressors
• boss, poverty, family issues

overall level of daily functioning

• not all criteria for disorders are based on science
• high level of comorbidity, many people meet criteria for more than one disorder
• reliance on categorical rather than deminsional model
• people are vulnerable to social influences
• validity problem- possible for two people to have the same diagnosis with no shared symptoms

2 weeks

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