Psychology 1000 Lecture Notes - Lecture 16: Murder Of Kitty Genovese, Habituation, Test Anxiety

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 1000
• Professor: Laura Fazakas- De Hoog

Document Summary

1: raped and stabbed, 38 neighbours heard her scream, but they did not help. Katerine (17- year- old canadian girl: beaten and left half- naked, remained in a coma for hours. Scientific principles in psychology: diffusion of responsibility, each person feels that their responsibility to intervene decreased. Gathering evidence: steps in the scientific process. Two approaches to understanding behaviour: I knew that all along : based on common sense and folk knowledge, problem past events can be explained in many ways. You"re never too old to learn vs. you can"t teach an old dog new tricks . If causes of behaviour are known, then we can predict when that behaviour will occur. If we can control the condition, then we can produce the behaviour: theory development = strongest test of scientific understanding. Good theories lead to predictions. Characteristics of good theory: 3: organizes information, testable, works with law of parsimony: if two theories explain the same thing, simpler.