Psy 200 Ch. 1

The scientific study of behavior and mental process.

The use of systematic methods to observe the natural world, including human behavior, and to draw conclusions.

The thoughts, feelings, and motives that people experience privately but that cannot be observed directly.

Everything we do that can be directly observed.

The process of thinking deeply and actively, asking questions, and evaluating the evidence.

Gaining knowledge through the observation of events, the collection of data, and logical reasoning.

• 1.In 1879, Wilhelm Wundt, ‘The Father of Psychology’, establishes the form of Structuralism and the 
• first formal laboratory for research in psychology at the University of Leipzig
• 2. Soon after, Wundt established the first psychology journal.
• 3. Stanley
• Hall, a student of Wundt’s, established the first research laboratory in the
• United States at Johns Hopkins University.
• 4. Established the first psychology journal in the United States.
• 5. Helped establish and became the first president of the American
• Psychological Association.

• 1.Founded by Titchner at Cornell
• University.
• 2.Studied under Wundt.
• 3.Believed psychology involved
• analyzing consciousness into its basic elements, or building blocks, and
• investigating how these elements are related.
• 4. Used introspection (systematic
• self observation of  one’s conscious
• experience)
• 5. Focused on taking a whole
• experience and breaking it down into parts.
• 6.Influences modern psychology’s
• study of sensation and perception.

• 1. Founded by William James.
• 2. Believed that psychology
• should focus on the function or purpose of consciousness, rather than its
• structure.
• 3. Influenced by Darwin’s theory.
• 4. Natural selection / survival
• of the fittest / adaptation.
• 5. Focused on the ‘flow of
• consciousness’ rather than individual elements.
• 6. Influenced behaviorism and
• applied psychology.

• 1.Sigmund Freud, an Austrian
• physician, developed his theory not only by treating people troubled by
• psychological problems, but also his own anxieties, conflicts and desires.
• 2. Focused on unconscious
• determinants of behavior.
• 3. Id, Ego, Superego, defense
• mechanisms, dream analysis, free association…

• 1. Behaviorism believed that
• scientific psychology should study only observable behavior.
• 2. Focused on overt behavior.
• 3. Proper use of the scientific
• method incorporates only observable behaviors.
• 4. Campaigned for psychology to
• be viewed as a science.
• 5. Watson:  stimulus - response
• 6. Pavlov: conditioning and
• associations.
• 7. Skinner: reinforcement,
• punishment, free will is an illusion….

• 1. Max Wertheimer
• 2. Believed that the conscious
• experience still warranted study rather than overt behavior.
• 3. Focused on perception.
• 4. Also believed in looking at a
• whole experience, not just the parts.

• 1. Believed that other schools or
•     views of psychology failed to recognize         unique qualities of human behavior.
• 2. Free will.
• 3. Personal growth.
• 4. Self concept
• 5. Optimistic view of human
•     nature.
• 6. Carl Rogers
• 7. Abraham Maslow

• 1. To DESCRIBE behavior – This simply involves being aware of the world around you and trying to look at the world in specific terms.
• 2. To UNDERSTAND behavior - Why do different behaviors happen?  Why do human or animals act in a certainway?  What results in certain behaviors being present?
• 3.  To PREDICT behavior – Are there specific patterns that lead up to a particular behavior?
• 4.  To CONTROL or modify behavior – What can we do to prevent, change or modify behavior?

Darwin's principle of an evolutionary process in which organisms that are best adapted to their environment will survive and produce offspring.

An approach to psychology focusing on the body, especially the brain and nervous system.

The scientific study of the structure, function, development, genetics, and biochemistry of the nervous system, emphasizing that the brain and nervous system are central to understanding behavior, thought, and emotion.

An approach to psychology emphasizing the scientific study of observable behavioral responses and their environmental determinants.

An approach to psychology emphasizing unconscious thought, the conflict between biological drives (such as the drive for sex) and society's demands, and early childhood family experiences.

An approach to psychology emphasizing a person's positive qualities, the capacity for positive growth, and the freedom to choose one's destiny.

An approach to psychology emphasizing the mental processes involved in knowing: how we direct out attention, perceive, remember, think, and solve problems.

An approach to psychology centered on evolutionary ideas such as adaptation, reproduction, and natural selection as the basis for explaining specific human behaviors.

An approach to psychology that examines the influences of social and cultural environments on behavior.

• 1. Observing some Phenomenon
• 2.  Formulating hypotheses and predictions
• 3.  Testing through empirical research
• 4.  Drawing conclusions
• 5.  Evaluating conclusions

Anything that can change.

A broad idea or set of closely related ideas that attempts to explain observations and to make predictions about future observations.

A testable prediction that derives logically from a theory.

A definition that provides an objective description of how a variable is going to be measured and observed in a particular study.

Also called a case history, an in-depth look at a single individual.

Descriptive research allows researchers to get a sense of something but cannot answer questions about how and why things are the way they are.

Research that examines the relationships between variables, whose purpose is to examine whether and how two variables change together.

The circumstance where a variable that has not been measured accounts for the relationship between two other variables.  Third variables are also known as confounds.

A special kind of systematic observation, used by correlational researchers, that involves obtaining measures of the variables of interest in multiple waves over time.

A carefully regulated procedure in which the researcher manipulates one or more variables that are believed to influence some other variable.

Researchers' assignment of participants to groups by chance, to reduce the likelihood that an experiment's results will be due to preexisting differences between groups.

A manipulated experimental factor, the variable that the experimenter changes to see what its effects are.

A person who is given a role to play in a study so that the social context can be manipulated.

The outcome-the factor that can change in an experiment in response to changes in the independent variable.

The participants in an experiment who are as much like the experimental group as possible and who are treated in every way like the experimental group except for a manipulated factor, the independent variable.

The soundness of the conclusions that a researcher draws from an experiment.

The degree to which an experimental design actually reflects the real-world issues it is supposed to address.

The degree to which changes in the dependent variable are due to the manipulation of the independent variable.

The influence of the experimenter's expectations on the outcome of research.

Any aspects of a study that communicate to the participants how the experimenter wants them to behave.

In an experiment, the influence of participants' expectations, and of their thoughts about how they should behave, on their behavior.

The situation where participants' expectations, rather than the experimental treatment, produce an experimental outcome.

In a drug study, a harmless substance that has no physiological effect, given to participants in a control group so that they are treated identically to the experimental group except for the active agents.

An experimental design in which neither the experimenter nor the participants are aware of which participants are in the experimental group and which are in the control group until the results are calculated.

The entire group about which the investigator wants to draw conclusions.

The subset of the population chosen by the investigator for study.

A sample that gives every member of the population an equal chance of being selected.

The observation of behavior in a real-world setting.