chapter in review
Psychology is the science of behavior and mental processes.
Psychologists gather scientific data in order to describe, understand, predict, and control behavior.
• Psychologists are professionals who create and apply psycho-logical knowledge. Psychologists engage in critical thinking as they systemically gather and analyze
• Psychology spans a wide variety of specialty areas of research.
• Some psychologists are directly interested in animal behavior.
Others study animals as models of human behavior.
• As a science, psychology’s goals are to describe, understand, predict, and control behavior.
Critical thinking is the ability to reflect on, evaluate, compare, analyze, critique, and synthesize information. Critical thinking is central to the scientific method, to psychology, and to effective behavior in general.
• To judge the validity of a claim, it is important to gather evi-dence for and against the claim and to evaluate the quality of the evidence.
Pseudopsychologies are unfounded systems that resemble psychol-ogy. Unlike psychology, pseudopsychologies change little over time because followers seek evidence that appears to confirm their beliefs and avoid evidence that contradicts their beliefs.
• Numerous pseudopsychologies are frequently confused with valid psychology. Belief in pseudopsychologies is based in part on uncritical acceptance, the fallacy of positive instances, and the Barnum effect.
Psychological research begins by defining problems and proposing hypotheses. Next, researchers gather evidence, test hypotheses, and
publish results. Scientific debate and theories suggest new hypoth-eses, which lead to further research.
• Because the scientific method is a powerful way to observe the natural world and draw valid conclusions, scientific research provides the highest quality information about behavior.
• In the scientific method, systematic observation is used to test hypotheses about behavior and mental events.
• Concepts must be defined operationally before they can be studied empirically.
• The results of scientific studies are made public so that others can evaluate them, learn from them, and use them to produce further knowledge.
The field of psychology emerged 130 years ago when researchers began to directly study and observe psychological events.
• The first psychological laboratory was established in Germany by Wilhelm Wundt, who studied conscious experience.
• The first school of thought in psychology was structuralism, a kind of “mental chemistry” based on introspection.
• Structuralism was followed by functionalism, behaviorism, and Gestalt psychology.
• Psychodynamic approaches, such as Freud’s psychoanalytic theory, emphasize the unconscious origins of behavior.
• Humanistic psychology accentuates subjective experience, human potentials, and personal growth.
• Even though most of the early psychologists were men, women have contributed to psychology from the beginning.
Three complementary streams of thought in modern psychology are the biological perspective, including biopsychology and evolutionary psychology; the psychological perspective, including behaviorism,
cognitive psychology, the psychodynamic approach, and humanism;
and the sociocultural perspective.
• There is an eclectic blending of sviewpoints within psychology.
• Psychologists have recently begun to formally study positive aspects of human behavior, or positive psychology.
• Most of what we think, feel, and do is influenced by the social and cultural worlds in which we live.
There are dozens of specialties in psychology including clinical, coun-seling, industrial, educational, consumer, school, developmental, engineering, medical, environmental, forensic, community, psycho-metric, and experimental psychology.
• Although psychologists, psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, and counselors all work in the field of mental health, their training and methods differ considerably.
• Psychological research may be basic or applied.
Experiments involve two or more groups of subjects that differ only with regard to the independent variable. Effects on the dependent variable are then measured. All other conditions (extraneous vari-ables) are held constant.
• Since the independent variable is the only difference between the experimental group and the control group, it is the only possible cause of a change in the dependent variable.
• The design of experiments allows cause-and-effect connections to be clearly identified.
• Psychological research must be done ethically, in order to pro-tect the rights, dignity, and welfare of participants.
• To be taken seriously, the results of an experiment must be statisti-cally significant (they would occur very rarely by chance alone).
In a double-blind experiment, neither the research participants nor the researchers collecting data know who was in the experimental group or the control group, allowing valid conclusions to be drawn.
• Research participant bias is a problem in some studies. The placebo effect is also a factor, especially in experiments involving drugs.
• A related problem is researcher bias. Researcher expectations can create a self-fulfilling prophecy, in which a participant changes in the direction of the expectation.
Psychologists also rely on naturalistic observation, the correlational method, case studies, and the survey method.
• Unlike controlled experiments, nonexperimental methods usually cannot demonstrate cause-and-effect relationships.
• Naturalistic observation is a starting place in many investigations.
• Two problems with naturalistic observation are the effects of the observer on the observed and observer bias.
• In the correlational method, relationships between two traits, responses, or events are measured and a correlation coefficient is computed to gauge the strength of the relationship.
• Correlations allow prediction but do not show cause and effect.
• Relationships in psychology may be positive or negative.
• Case studies provide insights into human behavior that can’t be gained by other methods.
• In the survey method, people in a representative sample are asked a series of carefully worded questions.
Interactive Learning
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• Obtaining a representative sample of people is crucial when the survey method is used to study large populations.
Information in the mass media varies greatly in quality and accuracy and should be approached with skepticism and caution.
• It is essential to critically evaluate information from popular sources (or from any source, for that matter) in order to sepa-rate facts from fallacies.
• Problems in media reports are often related to biased or unreli-able sources of information, uncontrolled observation, mis-leading correlations, false inferences, oversimplification, use of single examples, and unrepeatable results.
Web Resources
For an up-to-date list of direct links to interesting sites, including those listed here, visit the student companion site for this book at www.cengage.com/psychology/coon
What Is Psychology? Discusses psychology as a science, with links to other articles about various branches of psychology.
Critical Thinking in Everyday Life: 9 Strategies Some useful critical thinking strategies, along with many other articles on aspects of criti-cal thinking.
Today in the History of Psychology Events in the history of psychol-ogy by the date, including podcasts.
Careers in Psychology Marky Lloyd’s Careers in Psychology Page.
The Experimental Method An introduction to experimental research methods.
Psychological Research on the Net Find and complete a survey study.
That’s Infotainment! Article about sensationalism in the news media.
Hill Street Studios/Photolibrary
Gateway Questions
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How do nerve cells operate and communicate?•
What are the major parts of the nervous system?•
How is the brain studied?•
Why is the human cerebral cortex so important, and what are its parts?•
What are the major parts of the subcortex?•
Does the glandular system affect behavior?•
In what ways do right- and left-handed individuals differ?Brain and Behavior
Gateway Theme
Brain activity is the source of human consciousness, intelligence, and behavior.
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Like miniature cables, axons carry messages through the brain and nervous system. Altogether, your brain contains about 3 million miles of axons (Rosenzweig, Breedlove, & Watson, 2004).
Axons “branch out” into smaller fibers ending in bulb-shaped axon terminals. By forming connections with the dendrites and somas of other neurons, axon terminals allow information to pass from neuron to neuron.
Now let’s summarize with a metaphor. Imagine that you are standing in a long line of people who are holding hands. A person on the far right end of the line wants to silently send a message to the person on the left end. She does this by pressing the hand of the person to her left, who presses the hand of the person to his left, and so on. The message arrives at your right hand (your den-drites). You decide whether to pass it on. (You are the soma.) The message goes out through your left arm (the axon). With your left hand (the axon terminals), you squeeze the hand of the person to your left, and the message moves on.