PSYCO104 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Positive Psychology, Sociobiology, Cognitive Revolution

• School: University of Alberta
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYCO104
• Professor: Blaine Mullins

Document Summary

Chapter 1: psychology: the science of behaviour ! Two assumptions made:: materialism - that assumption that we can explain everything in terms of physical processes, reductionism - we can explain complex things in the term of more simpler things ! Pros: offers concise explanations, makes it useful and productive, if there is a concise explanation that is true, can conduct a useful intervention like creating a drug that blocks dopamine ! From the greek > romans > dark ages ! Dark ages: very unlikely to survive child birth, probably be diseased and poor, knowledge was divided into 2 parts:! measurement. father of modern western science! Scriptural knowledge that you could look up in the bible, fate etc. 18th century : the development of cell theory, share the same cells with other living organisms , atomic theory- 20th century made up of atoms, karl popper- argued for falsi ability -can never actually prove anything!