The History of Psychology: Theoretical Perspectives

I. Psychology – give a definition and explain what it means

A. “Nature” – or Biology. Text: “The Boundary with Biology”.

• Explain Biopsychology
• Phenomenon: Phineas Gage. Who was he? What does his famous case of brain damage illustrate?
• Explain localization of function. Use Broca’s area as an example in your explanation. You will need to look it up outside the text.
• Do neuroscientists still believe in localization of function?

B. “Nurture” or Culture. Text: “The Boundary with Culture”
Explain cross-cultural psychology. Give an example as part of your
explanation

C. Nature-nurture controversy. See the beginning of “The Evolutionary Perspective”. This the oldest debate about human behavior. Explain it.

II. From Philosophy to Psychology

 A.  1879 – the first scientific approach to studying the mind. 

Wundt establishes the 1st psychology lab. His method
of observing the mind was called introspection. Explain it.

B. Titchener develops introspection into the first way of thinking about psychology called “Structuralism”. Explain it.

C. Explain the other early school of thought, functionalism

III. Theoretical Perspective or Paradigm
Explain this VERY important idea – what is a paradigm?

IV. The Psychodynamic Perspective ~1900

A. Explain what Freud meant by psychodynamics – the
motives, or emotional forces, that control our behavior. Go beyond the text and use an example to illustrate.

B. What does Freud mean by the idea that our most important
motives – the most important psychodynamics – are unconscious?

C. Freud likened the mind to an iceberg. Go beyond the text –
why did he believe the mind is like an iceberg?

V. The Behaviorist Perspective - a.k.a. “Behaviorism” ~ 1915

A. Explain the focus of behaviorism. Make sure you explain
why behaviorists do not study the mind, only behavior.

B. Behaviorists believe that human behavior is completely controlled by the environment/ environmental stimuli. Explain this statement. Can you describe an example to illustrate?

VI. The Cognitive Perspective (*also a field of study) ~1950s-60s

A. Explain this paradigm. Make sure you explain:

1. What cognition, or information processing, is
2. Give two examples of “cognition”

B. Cognitive psychologists liken the mind to a computer. Explain why the computer is a fitting metaphor for the cognitive perspective.

VII. The Evolutionary Perspective

A. Explain this way of thinking about human psychology.

B. This perspective is based on Darwin’s theory of evolution: Natural Selection. Explain natural selection by giving an example of an adaptive trait – one that promotes the ability of a species to adapt to its environment, survive and reproduce

C. Inclusive fitness – explain this concept, and how it is used by evolutionary psychologists to explain human behavior

VII. “Commentary: Making Sense of Perspectives”
Describe the contributions of each of the perspectives:

1. Behaviorist
2. Cognitive
3. Evolutionary
4. Psychodynamic

X. Summary: The History of Psychology
**You don’t need to take notes about this table. It is to help you see the big picture: how psychology evolved in its brief, 120-year history.

Perspective Focus Psychology is a science of:

1. Structuralism Conscious mind Consciousness
2. Psychodynamic Unconscious forces Unconsciousness
3. Behaviorism Conditioning Behavior
4. Cognitive Cognition Mind and behavior
5. Neuroscience Biopsychology Mind, brain and behavior
6. Evolutionary Universal behavior Mind, brain, gene and behavior