Introduction to Psychology

• Psychology is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes.
• Psychological science relies on observation, experimentation, and verifiable data.
• Pseudoscience is based on superstition or common sense.
• Scientific thinking involves creating evidence to test a specific, falsifiable question.

Seven Modern Perspectives of Psychology

• Psychodynamic perspective emphasizes unconscious motives and past experiences.
• Behavioral perspective focuses on observable environmental influences on overt behavior.
• Humanistic perspective focuses on free will and human nature as growth seeking.
• Cognitive perspective focuses on the mental processes used in thinking, knowing, and remembering.
• Biological perspective emphasizes genetic and biological processes in the brain and nervous system.
• Evolutionary perspective focuses on natural selection, adaptation, and reproduction.
• Sociocultural perspective focuses on social interaction and the cultural determinants of behavior and mental processes.

Three Major Models of Psychology

• Biopsychological model emphasizes that biology, an individual's psychology, and their social environment all interact.
• APA Five Pillar model includes biological, cognitive, developmental, personality, and health
• DE&I, diversity, equity, and inclusion are prioritized.
• Equity is fairness, and inclusion means everyone is welcomed, respected, and supported.

Four Main Goals of Psychology

• Describe human behavior and processes by observing them.
• Explain why a behavior/process occurred.
• Predict when and under what conditions it will happen again.
• Change the world so that certain behaviors are more or less likely to occur.

Terms in The Scientific Method

• Scientific method is a series of processes used to answer questions about the world around us, including making observations, forming questions, making a hypothesis, experimenting, analyzing data, and forming a conclusion.
• Hypothesis is an educated guess that can be tested.

Ethical Guidelines for Psychological Research

• Research requires informed consent, voluntary participation, restricted use of deception, and confidentiality.
• Institutional Review Board (IRB) evaluates physical and psychological risks to participants.

Descriptive Research

• Descriptive research involves observing, collecting, and recording data.
• Descriptive research minimizes artificiality, is unable to identify cause and effect, and has little control over variables.

Correlational Research

• Correlational research identifies relationships among variables.
• Allows prediction but does not allow identifying cause and effect.
• Correlation doesn't prove causation, and there may be unclear variables causing changes to the other.

Experimental Research

• The experimental group manipulates and controls variables.
• Independent variable influences change in the dependent variable.
• Dependent variable is the variable being tested and is also known as the responding variable.
• The experimental group is the group that receives change in the independent variable, and the control group stays the same.

Cognition

• Cognition includes the mental activities involved in acquiring, storing, and using knowledge.
• Cognition is located in the prefrontal cortex.
• Concept is a mental representation of a class or category of objects, activities, or events.
• Prototypes are what first come to mind when you think about something.

Stages of Problem Solving and Decision Making

• Preparation involves defining the ultimate goal.
• Production involves generating possible solutions/hypotheses.
• Evaluation involves judging the hypothesis generated during the other two stages.

Barriers to Problem Solving

• Functional fixedness is when you can't see new uses for an object because you only think of it in its usual way.
• Availability heuristic is the estimate of how likely you think something will happen based on information you already know.
• Confirmation bias occurs when you only search for information that supports what you already believe and ignore information that disagrees with it.