Approaches to Psychology

• Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behavior.
• It encompasses a wide range of subfields, including clinical, cognitive, developmental, social, and organizational psychology.

Approaches to Psychology

• Biological approach: Focuses how the brain, nervous system, and genetics influence behavior.
• Behavioral approach: Emphasizes the role of learning and environmental factors in shaping behavior.
• Cognitive approach: Studies mental processes such as memory, problem-solving, and language
• Psychodynamic approach: Focuses unconscious drives and early childhood experiences and how they shape behavior.
• Humanistic approach: Emphasizes personal growth, self-actualization, and the individual's subjective experience.
• Evolutionary approach: Examines how behavior and mental processes have evolved over time through natural selection.
• Sociocultural approach: Investigates the influence of social and cultural factors on behavior and mental processes.

Research Methods in Psychology

• Descriptive research: Describes phenomena without manipulating variables (e.g., naturalistic observation, surveys, case studies).
• Correlational research: Examines the relationships between variables without determining cause and effect.
• Experimental research: Manipulates one or more variables to determine their effect on other variables, allowing for cause-and-effect conclusions.

Key Concepts in Psychology

• Sensation and perception: Study of how sensory information is detected, processed, and interpreted.
• Consciousness: Awareness of oneself and the environment; includes topics such as sleep, dreams, and altered states.
• Learning: Relatively permanent change in behavior due to experience (e.g., classical conditioning, operant conditioning, observational learning).
• Memory: Processes involved in encoding, storing, and retrieving information.
• Cognition: Mental processes involved in thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.
• Intelligence: Ability to learn from experience, solve problems, and adapt to new situations.
• Motivation: Factors that energize, direct, and sustain behavior.
• Emotion: Subjective experience involving physiological arousal, expressive behavior, and cognitive appraisal.
• Developmental psychology: Study of physical, cognitive, and social changes across the lifespan.
• Personality: Individual's characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving.
• Social psychology: Study of how individuals think about, influence, and relate to one another.
• Psychological disorders: Patterns of thoughts, feelings, or behaviors that are deviant, distressful, and dysfunctional.

Major Figures in Psychology

• Wilhelm Wundt: Established first psychology laboratory in 1879 and is considered the "father of psychology."
• William James: Key figure in functionalism, emphasizing the purpose of consciousness and behavior.
• Sigmund Freud: Developed psychoanalysis, emphasizing the role of unconscious processes in shaping behavior.
• Ivan Pavlov: Discovered classical conditioning through his experiments with dogs.
• B.F. Skinner: Pioneered operant conditioning, studying how behavior is shaped by reinforcement and punishment.
• Albert Bandura: Known for his social learning theory, emphasizing the role of observation and imitation in learning.
• Jean Piaget: Developed a theory of cognitive development, outlining stages of intellectual growth in children.

Sensation and Perception

• Sensation: The process by which sensory receptors and the nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment.
• Perception: The process of organizing and interpreting sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events.
• Absolute threshold: The minimum stimulation needed to detect a particular stimulus 50% of the time.
• Difference threshold (just noticeable difference): The minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50% of the time.
• Sensory adaptation: Diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation.
• Vision: Light enters the eye and is processed by receptors in the retina (rods and cones).
• Hearing: Sound waves enter the ear and are converted into neural signals processed by the auditory system.
• Other senses: Touch, taste, smell, and the vestibular sense (sense of balance).

Learning

• Classical conditioning: Learning by association, where a neutral stimulus becomes associated with a meaningful stimulus (Pavlov's dogs).
• Operant conditioning: Learning through consequences, where behavior is strengthened by reinforcers and weakened by punishers (Skinner's boxes).
• Reinforcement: Increases the likelihood of a behavior (positive reinforcement adds something desirable; negative reinforcement removes something undesirable).
• Punishment: Decreases the likelihood of a behavior (positive punishment adds something undesirable; negative punishment removes something desirable).
• Observational learning: Learning by watching others and imitating their behavior (Bandura's Bobo doll experiment).

Memory

• Encoding: Processing information into the memory system.
• Storage: Retaining encoded information over time.
• Retrieval: Getting information out of memory storage.
• Sensory memory: Immediate, very brief recording of sensory information.
• Short-term memory: Activated memory that holds a few items briefly before the information is stored or forgotten.
• Long-term memory: Relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system.
• Explicit (declarative) memory: Memory of facts and experiences that one can consciously know and declare.
• Implicit (nondeclarative) memory: Memory of skills and procedures that are automatically retrieved.

Social Psychology

• Attribution: Process of explaining one's own behavior and the behavior of others.
• Attitudes: Feelings, often influenced by our beliefs, that predispose us to respond in a particular way to objects, people, and events.
• Cognitive dissonance: Discomfort experienced when attitudes and behavior are inconsistent.
• Conformity: Adjusting one's behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard.
• Obedience: Compliance with an authority figure's demands.
• Group behavior: Social facilitation (improved performance in the presence of others), social loafing (reduced effort in a group), deindividuation (loss of self-awareness and self-restraint in group situations).
• Prejudice: Unjustifiable negative attitude toward a group and its members.
• Aggression: Physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt someone.
• Altruism: Unselfish regard for the welfare of others.

Psychological Disorders

• Anxiety disorders: Characterized by excessive worry, fear, and avoidance (e.g., generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, phobias).
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD): Characterized by unwanted, repetitive thoughts (obsessions) and/or actions (compulsions).
• Depressive disorders: Characterized by persistent sadness, loss of interest, and other symptoms (e.g., major depressive disorder).
• Bipolar disorder: Characterized by alternating periods of mania (high energy and elevated mood) and depression.
• Schizophrenia: Characterized by hallucinations, delusions, disorganized thinking, and other psychotic symptoms.
• Personality disorders: Characterized by inflexible and enduring behavior patterns that impair social functioning (e.g., antisocial personality disorder, borderline personality disorder).
• Neurodevelopmental disorders: Disorders that manifest early in development and are characterized by developmental deficits (e.g., autism spectrum disorder, ADHD).

Therapy

• Psychotherapy: Treatment involving psychological techniques; consists of interactions between a trained therapist and someone seeking to overcome psychological difficulties or achieve personal growth.
• Biomedical therapy: Treatment involving medication or other medical procedures to alter the brain's chemistry or physiology.
• Cognitive therapy: Therapy that teaches people new, more adaptive ways of thinking; based on the assumption that thoughts intervene between events and our emotional reactions.
• Behavior therapy: Therapy that applies learning principles to the elimination of unwanted behaviors (e.g., exposure therapy, systematic desensitization).
• Humanistic therapy: Therapy that emphasizes self-awareness, acceptance, and growth (e.g., client-centered therapy).
• Group therapy: Therapy conducted with groups rather than individuals, permitting therapeutic benefits from group interaction.