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Overview of
Psychology
- Psychology is the scientific study
of behavior and mental processes
of both humans and animals
- when applied to
humans, psych covers
what people think,
feel, and do.
- psychologists differ in
how much importance
they place on specific
types of behavior
- they do agree, however,
that the study of behavior
must be systematic
- systematic method:
asking and answering
questions about what
people think, act, and feel
as they do reduces the
chances of coming to false
conclusions
- systematic method:
asking and answering
questions about what
people think, act, and feel
as they do reduces the
chances of coming to false
conclusions
- they do agree, however,
that the study of behavior
must be systematic
- in order to understand our
observations, we usually have to
combine all of our thoughts
- Overall,
psychologists seek
to do four things
- 3.) Prediction: They then
predict what organisms
will do, and, I case of
humans, what they think
or feel in various
situations
- By studying
descriptive and
theoretical
accounts of past
behaviors,
psychologists can
predict future
behaviors
- By studying
descriptive and
theoretical
accounts of past
behaviors,
psychologists can
predict future
behaviors
- Influence: finally,
some
psychologists
seek to influence
behavior in
helpful ways
- ones with a long-term goal of
finding out more on behavior
are doing basic science
- ones who are more interested in discovering ways to
use what we know to benefit others view psych as an
applied science and are using psychological
principles to solve more immediate problems
- see pages 11-12 for
more examples
- ones with a long-term goal of
finding out more on behavior
are doing basic science
- 1.) Description: the
first goal is to
describe or gather
info about the
behavior being
studies and to
present what is
known
- 2.) Explanation:
Psychologists are not
content simply to state
the facts. They seek to
explain why people (or
animals) behave as they
do.
- such
explanations
can be called
psychological
principles
- psychologists
propose these
explanations as
hypotheses- an
educated guess
about some
phenomenon
- more complex
theories are
constructed...they
change as new
data improves our
understandings
- such
explanations
can be called
psychological
principles
- 3.) Prediction: They then
predict what organisms
will do, and, I case of
humans, what they think
or feel in various
situations
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