Psychology Theories Quiz

Cognitive Personality Theories

• Cognitive theorists view humans as active information processors who interpret events.
• They focus on internal thought processes and how individuals interpret and anticipate events.
• Cognitive theories acknowledge that humans are not passive responders to the environment; instead, individuals are constantly interpreting and constructing their world.

Learning Outcomes

• Students should be able to describe how cognitive theorists view human behaviour.
• Students should explain Kelly's personal construct theory.
• Students should describe explanatory (attributional) style and how it affects perspectives.
• Students should apply cognitive principles to mental health considerations and treatment.

Part 1: Conceptual Issues and the Rise of Cognitive Psychology

• The rise of cognitive psychology as a distinct perspective in psychology.
• This theory emphasizes the crucial role of mental processes (e.g., thoughts, feelings, memories) in understanding behaviour.

Father of Experimental Psychology: Wilhelm Wundt

• Born in 1832, in Neckerau, Baden. He studied medicine in Tübingen, Heidelberg, and Berlin.
• Wilhelm Wundt earned his doctorate in Medicine in 1856.
• In 1875, a room in Leipzig was dedicated to demonstrating perception research.
• In 1881, he started the journal Philosophische Studien.
• In 1883, he began offering courses in experimental psychology
• In 1894, the first institute for experimental psychology was established.
• Wundt was widely recognized as the pioneer of psychology research.

What Was the Institute Like?

• The institute included an antechamber, a darkroom for vision research, and two rooms with electromagnetic instruments for attention studies.
• The rooms also housed demonstrations of anatomical models, maps, and reproductions of anatomical pieces.
• A reading room containing materials like models for experiments and lessons existed as part of the institute.

Wundt's Psychology

• Psychology is viewed as the science of immediate experience.
• Mental events have an emergent form and quality.
• Immediate experiences can be broken down into their most fundamental components.
• Focus on apperception (active interpretation) rather than mere perception.
• Introspection employed to understand the perception process.

Social Organization of Self-Observation in Wundt's Lab

• Experimenters (typically students and demonstrators) were of lower status than the participant
• Wundt held the highest status and was the 'subject' of the experiments.

Roots of Cognitive Approaches: Gestalt Theory (1920s-1930s)

• A reaction against the atomistic approach to psychology.
• Focused on the overall organization of experience rather than its elements.
• Emphasized the whole being greater than the sum of its parts.
• Relied on observation of visual illusions and experiments rather than introspective methods.
• Key figures include Max Wertheimer and the Gestalt School of Psychology (in Berlin, 1920s).

Lewin's Field Theory

• First major systematic theory of social behavior in psychology.
• Behavior is a function of the person (P) and their environment (E).
• Behaviour is viewed as dynamic and emergent.
• Environment is interpreted based on personal perception.
• Emphasizes the interrelation between the person and their environment. The interplay between the two.

Individual Differences in Field Dependence

• Global vs. Local processing. (aka Left vs. Right brain)
• Differentiated between field-dependent and field-independent individuals. - Field-independent individuals tend to have detached and analytic tendencies, preferring engineering/maths, and lower interpersonal skills. - Field-dependent individuals tend to be more attentive to context, oriented more towards others, and have better interpersonal skills.

Tolman's "Beyond the Information Given" Approach

• Cognitive maps allow organisms to anticipate the outcomes if various alternative actions are taken.

Chomsky and the Development of Linguistics

• Chomsky critiqued Skinner's Verbal Behavior, arguing that language is fundamentally innate and more complex than operant conditioning could explain.
• He distinguished language competence (potential) from performance (actual use).
• He proposed the idea of a universal grammar.

From Turing Machines to Turing Tests

• Development of the Turing machine in 1937 as a theoretical computer model.
• McCulloch and Pitts theorized the nervous system as a logical calculus machine (1943).
• Turing's 1950 paper "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" introduced the Turing Test.

The New Metaphor for Mind: Imitation Games

• Turing suggested a way to explore the concept of machine intelligence using a game.
• The objective of the test was to determine whether a machine could exhibit intelligent behavior indistinguishable from a human's.

Conceptualization and Institutionalization of Cognitive Psychology

• Bruner and Miller established the Centre for Cognitive Studies.
• Ulric Neisser published a key textbook on cognitive psychology in 1967.
• The 1990s saw new brain-imaging techniques influence studies that adjudicated debated topics.

Key Tenets of Cognitive Psychology

• Internal thought processes are essential to understand human behavior.
• Scientifically controlled experiments are crucial to investigate behavior.
• Humans are information processors, parallel to computers.
• Models of cognition should follow similar structures.

Part 2: Cognitive Psychology and Personality

The Role of Cognitive Processes

• Personality processes are channeled by how people anticipate events.
• Individuals engage in active interpretation and construction of the world.

People as Naive Scientists (Kelly, 1955)

• People construct their own meanings for the world.
• They are proactive and use hypotheses to anticipate events and control outcomes.

People as Having Free Will

• Constructs and personalities are open to change.
• Personal constructs are subjective and error-prone.
• Individuals generate diverse hypotheses.

Personal Construct Theory (1955)

• Personal constructs help people make sense of the world and guide actions.
• They are bipolar (have opposites, such as friendly/unfriendly).
• They are organized hierarchically (prioritized in different ways).
• Application occurs in various parts of life and varies by individual.

Development of Constructs

• Individuals use available constructs to interpret a situation.
• They critically evaluate existing constructs.
• The individual considers alternative possibilities by utilizing pre-emption.

Kelly's Corollaries (Principles)

• Detailed description of the factors that affect choices.
• Some factors are presented as fixed and unchangeable, while others are presented as flexible and adaptable to unique circumstances.

Characteristics of Constructive Alternatives

• These constructs are open to change and adaptation based on experience and new information.

Evaluating Cognitive Theories

• Strengths and weaknesses of cognitive approaches to understanding personality.
• The ability to examine how well these theories explain human personality and behaviour.

1990s Cognitive Psychologists

• Brain studies took an increasing role, with a focus on neuroimaging techniques.
• The investigation into cognitive theories, methods, phenomena, and their underlying bases (e.g., attention, memory, concepts, language, decision-making).

False Dawn of Neuroimaging

• Challenges to brain imaging techniques' usefulness.
• Commentators' views that neuro-imaging doesn't help psychologists sufficiently.

Summary

• Major tenets and highlights of cognitive theories of personality.
• The role of active information processing in interpreting the world.
• The application of these theories to understanding mental health problems and developing cognitive and behavioural therapies.

Personal Constructs and Psychological Health

• Healthy personal constructs are validated through experience and adjusted when necessary and when encountering new information.
• Clinging to outmoded constructs and testing faulty hypotheses can lead to psychological issues.

Kelly's Therapy Focus

• Addresses maladaptive personal constructs through challenge, revision, and replacement.

Kelly's 1950s Therapy Techniques

• Fixed-role therapy: Clients enact a specific role to understand themselves and explore different perspectives.

Explanatory Style: Attributions

• Individuals explain events through attributions (e.g., internal/external, stable/unstable, global/specific).
• Attributional style (tendencies to attribute events to specific causes) is tied to mental health.

Individual Differences: The Attributional Style Questionnaire

• This questionnaire measures the tendencies of individuals to attribute different outcomes to various factors.

Attributions and Depression

• Depressed individuals often attribute negative events to internal, stable, and global causes, and positive events to external, unstable and specific causes.

Learned Helplessness

• In uncontrollable situations, the feeling of helplessness may be inappropriately generalized.
• External interventions such as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) can help reverse learned helplessness.

Predictors of Learned Helplessness

• Attributional style, external and stable attributions.
• Self-efficacy and locus of control.

The Concept of Free Will or Determinism?

• Different theories offer contrasting perspectives on the role of free will in human behavior, with some arguing for complete determinism and others for significant free will.

What Motivates Us in Personal Construct Theory?

• Individuals are active and alive rather than passive or inert.
• Psychological phenomena are dynamic, and do not require special dynamics to stay in motion.

Test your knowledge on key psychological theories, including Lewin's formula, the role of cognition in psychology, and the arguments between cognitive psychology and behaviorism. This quiz explores foundational concepts introduced by influential psychologists like Kurt Lewin, George Miller, and others.