APSY-UE 2 Study Guide - Fall 2018, Comprehensive Midterm Notes - Visual Field, Psychology, Nervous System
12 Oct 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
APSY-UE 2
MIDTERM EXAM
STUDY GUIDE
Fall 2018
09/04/18
-Psychology investigates questions about human behavior and does so in scientific ways
-The definition has evolved over time, oversimplified by social media with misconceptions
-Psychologists are not necessarily therapists but are composed of many subfields
-Psyche-translates into the mind
-Logos-means logic
-Psychology was referred to as the study of the soul instead of the study of the mind, wasn’t a
discipline to be studied under a little over a hundred years ago
-Founder of Psychology-Willian Wundt
-First to establish a psychology lab with a systematic method of studying psychology, saw it as
the study of conscious experience (things you realize that are happening), field began to grow
and became rapid in North America where two schools of thoughts emerged
1) Structuralism-school of thought that viewed the goal of psychology as analyzing
consciousness into its basic elements (what makes you aware), what is consciousness itself
and its structure
2) Functionalism-based on the belief that psychology should investigate the purpose/function of
consciousness (What does thinking actually offer for us? How does it operate?)
-William James (functionalism)-how ppl adapt their behavior and change, acclimate (patterns of
child development, effectiveness of educational practices, behavioral differences across gender)
Additional School of Thoughts
-Psychoanalytic Theory-approach taken by Freud to treat individuals with mental illness such as
irrational fears, obsessions, and anxiety, treated with a method called psychoanalysis, believed
that we have thoughts, desires, and memories that are well beneath our consciousness, we don’t
know they exist but these very thoughts exert great influence on us in an everyday way, most
forms of psychological disorders stem from these things that are buried
-Behaviorism-closely associated with John B Watson, based on the premise that scientific
psychology should only focus on observable behaviors, believed that psychologists should
abandon the thought that psychology is a study of consciousness, also known for his abuse on of
nature vs nurture where who we are either from our upbringing or from our genetics, Watson
believed that genetics and heredity don’t matter, it’s the environment (nurture) part that
influences how an individual behaves, Skinner insisted that although we cannot study them
scientifically, internal mental states do exist, believed that environment molds our behavior
-Humanism-Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow that emphasized the unique quality of humans
especially human’s potential for personal growth, as humans we don’t remain stagnant over
time, we have an incredible potential to change, known for taking an optimistic view of human
nature, believing that humans are fundamentally different from animals because we strive to
fulfill our potential
-Today-we believe that psychology is the science that studies behavior and the psychological and
cognitive processes that underline that behavior, also seen as the profession that applies the
accumulated knowledge of this science to solve practical problems
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
-When exploring psychology as a field of study, some of the key themes are that psychology is
-Empirical (meaning that with the conclusions drawn based on what is observed and
tested)
-Theoretically diverse (theory is a set of interrelated ideas that are used to explain some
kind of observation, many theories-no one size fits all theory)
-Evolves in a socio-historical context (social trends have impacted psychology so what
happens in the world influences our understanding of psychology)
-Behavior is determined by multiple causes (behavior is shaped by our culture, culture
refers to the widely sheered customs, beliefs, values, norms, institutions, and other
aspects of the community that are transmitted socially from one generation to the next)
-Heredity and the environment jointly influence behavior (both of them play a role,
cannot be explained solely through one experience
-Experiences of the world are highly subjective (the way you experience something are
not going to be necessarily the same as someone else’s experience, cannot make blind
generalizations, look for patterns but people experience differently makes each of us
unique)
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Psychology investigates questions about human behavior and does so in scientific ways. The definition has evolved over time, oversimplified by social media with misconceptions. Psychologists are not necessarily therapists but are composed of many subfields. Psychology was referred to as the study of the soul instead of the study of the mind, wasn"t a discipline to be studied under a little over a hundred years ago. William james (functionalism)-how ppl adapt their behavior and change, acclimate (patterns of child development, effectiveness of educational practices, behavioral differences across gender) Today-we believe that psychology is the science that studies behavior and the psychological and cognitive processes that underline that behavior, also seen as the profession that applies the accumulated knowledge of this science to solve practical problems. When exploring psychology as a field of study, some of the key themes are that psychology is. Empirical (meaning that with the conclusions drawn based on what is observed and tested)
