Introduction to Psychology

Lecture 1

“Psychology is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes”.

Seven thousand years ago, people assumed that psychological problems were caused by evil
spirits. To allow those spirits to escape from a person’s body, ancient healers chipped a hole in a
patient’s skull with crude instruments.

According to the 17th-century philosopher Descartes, nerves were hollow tubes through which
“animal spirits” conducted impulses in the same way that water is transmitted through a pipe.
When a person put a finger too close to a fire, heat was transmitted to the brain through the tubes.

Psychologists try to describe, predict, and explain human behavior and mental processes, as well
as helping to change and improve the lives of people and the world in which they live. They use
scientific methods to find answers that are far more valid and legitimate than those resulting from
intuition and speculation, which are often inaccurate.

PSYCHOLOGICAL SCHOOLS OF THOUGHTS

1-STRUCTURALISM

The formal beginning of psychology as a scientific discipline is generally considered to be in the

late 19th century, when Wilhelm Wundt established the first experimental laboratory devoted to
psychological phenomena in Leipzig, Germany. When Wundt set up his laboratory in 1879, his
aim was to study the building blocks of the mind. He considered psychology to be the study of
conscious experience. His perspective, which came to be known as structuralism, focused on
uncovering the fundamental mental components of perception, consciousness, thinking, emotions,
and other kinds of mental states and activities. To determine how basic sensory processes shape
our understanding of the world, Wundt and other structuralists used a procedure called
introspection, in which they presented people with a stimulus such as a bright green object or a
sentence printed on a card—and asked them to describe, in their own words and in as much detail
as they could, what they were experiencing. Wundt argued that by analyzing people’s reports,
psychologists could come to a better understanding of the structure of the mind.

Criticism
Over time, psychologists challenged Wundt’s approach.

1. They became increasingly dissatisfied with the assumption that introspection could reveal the
structure of the mind.

2. Introspection was not a truly scientific technique, because there were few ways an outside
observer could confirm the accuracy of others’ introspections.

3. People had difficulty describing some kinds of inner experiences, such as emotional responses.

2-FUNCTIONALISM

The perspective that replaced structuralism is known as functionalism. William James, an

American psychologist, led the functionalist movement. Rather than focusing on the mind’s
structure, functionalism concentrated on what the mind does and how behavior functions.
Functionalists, whose perspective became prominent in the early 1900s, asked what role behavior
plays in allowing people to adapt to their environments. For example, a functionalist might
examine the function of the emotion of fear in preparing us to deal with emergency situations.
Functionalists examined how people satisfy their needs through their behavior. The functionalists
also discussed how our stream of consciousness, the flow of thoughts in our conscious minds—
permits us to adapt to our environment. In other words, the subject matter of functionalism was
thought of as the “fundamental utilities of consciousness”, its methods were experimental
including the use of introspection.

Criticism

This school of thought was also criticized by psychologists.

1. Functionalists did not explain the functions of mind/consciousness.

2. They did not describe the relationship of mind and body.

3. They did not explain the concepts of unconsciousness.

4. They used introspection method to study consciousness, which was not scientific method.

3- BEHAVIORISM: OBSERVING THE OUTER PERSON

Proponents of the behavioral perspective rejected psychology’s early emphasis on the inner
workings of the mind. Instead, the behavioral perspective suggests that the focus should be on
observable behavior that can be measured objectively. John B. Watson was the first major
American psychologist to advocate a behavioral approach. Working in the 1920s, Watson was
adamant in his view that one could gain a complete understanding of behavior by studying and
modifying the environment in which people operate. In fact, Watson believed rather optimistically
that it was possible to elicit any desired type of behavior by controlling a person’s environment.
This philosophy is clear in his own words: “Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my
own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him
to become any type of specialist I might select—doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and yes,
even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations and
race of his ancestors” (Watson, 1924). Watson used experimental method to study behavior.
According to him science of psychology just focus on those events that can be measured and
observed.

The behavioral perspective was championed by B. F. Skinner and Ivan P. Pavlov, a pioneers in the
field. Much of our understanding of how people learn new behaviors is based on the behavioral
perspective. Along with its influence in the area of learning processes, this perspective has made
contributions in such diverse areas as treating mental disorders, curbing aggression, resolving
physical problems and ending drug addiction.

Criticism

1. They limited psychology to the study of observable behavioral response given by organism to
the stimulus.

2. They did not explain consciousness and unconsciousness.

Psychology is still considered as the science of behavior. Of course, the concept of behavior has
been broadened to include the unseen cognitive/mental process such as thinking, feeling which
leads the observable behavior. The school of behavior greatly influenced psychology.

4-GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY
Another important reaction to structuralism was the development of Gestalt psychology in the
early 1900s. The word “Gestalt” means whole and Gestalt psychology goal was to study
perception, learning problems and personality as a whole. Gestalt psychology emphasizes how
perception is organized. Instead of considering the individual parts that make up thinking, gestalt
psychologists took the opposite track, studying how people consider individual elements together
as units or wholes. Led by German scientists such as Max Wertheimer, Wolfgang Kohler,
Hermann Ebbinghaus and Kurt Koffka, gestalt psychologists proposed that “The whole is different
from the sum of its parts,” meaning that our perception, or understanding, of objects is greater and
more meaningful than the individual elements that make up our perceptions. Gestalt psychologists
have made substantial contributions to our understanding of perception.

Criticism

1. Gestalists performed only in the area of perception.

2. They did nothing about unconscious processes which are three fourth of our cognitive process.

3. Their approach was not truly scientific.

5-THE PSYCHOANALYSIS PERSPECTIVE: UNDERSTANDING THE

INNER PERSON

Proponents of the psychodynamic perspective argue that behavior is motivated by inner forces and
conflicts about which we have little awareness or control. They view dreams and slips of the tongue
as indications of what a person is truly feeling within unconscious psychic activity. The origins of
the psychodynamic view are linked to one person: Sigmund Freud. Freud was an Austrian
physician in the early 1900s whose ideas about unconscious determinants of behavior had a
revolutionary effect on 20th-century thinking, not just in psychology but in related fields as well.
He specialized in the disorders of the nervous system. He observed that some of his patients had
nothing physically wrong with them, even though they had symptoms of physical illness. He
suspected that mental conflicts lay behind these symptoms—conflicts that had been pushed out of
normal awareness and into a part of mind called unconsciousness. He believed that if unconscious
conflicts could be brought into patient's consciousness, they would lose their power to control
patient’s life. Freud helped his patients to interpret and understand their mental problems. He
called this approach to treatment as psychoanalysis. Freud believed that early past experiences of
which a person is unaware significantly influence his current behavior. Psychoanalytic had its deep
impact on concepts of personality and therapy techniques in psychology. The contemporary
psychodynamic perspective has provided a means not only to understand and treat some kinds of
psychological disorders but also to understand everyday phenomena such as prejudice and
aggression.

Criticism

Although some of the original Freudian principles have been roundly criticized.

1. Freud laid strong emphasis on physical problems

2. He did not fully explain consciousness and human behavior.