Introducing Psychology

Contents

1. What is psychology?

2. Why should you learn psychology?

3. Main perspectives in psychology

4. Sensation and Perception

 What is
1 psychology
What is psychology

Psychology: The systematic

study of behavior and
experience.

Aspects of behavior depend on a variety of things, such as age,

health, past experience, and even whether one is asleep or awake.
Concept of Psychology

­ Psyche = “mind”
­ Logos = “knowledge or study”
­ Psychology is a scientific discipline that studies
the behaviors of individuals and their mental
processes
­ Behaviors include overt behaviors (public
behaviors) and covert behaviors (private
behaviors within an individual, such as thinking
and remembering) (Kelly & Saklofske, 1994).
 Research Subjects in Psychology

­ Psychology requires that psychological conclusions be

based on evidence gathered according to the principles
of the scientific method.
­ The subjects of psychological analysis are often
individual humans, but can also include animals
(chimpanzees, mice, dolphins, crows, etc.).
 y o u th i n k
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Your questions
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psychological
phenomena in
life?
Basic Psychological Phenomena

Sensation
Perception
Attention
Memory
Thinking and Language
Motivation - Emotion
Stress in life
 Psychology as a Unique Field

­ Belonging to the social sciences, yet distinct from:

 Sociology: human behavior in groups/organizations
 Anthropology: a wide range of behaviors across
different cultures.
­ Sharing interests with the fields of biology,
cognitive science, etc…
­ As a health science: seeking ways to improve
people’s mental health.
Goals of Psychology

 To describe what happens

 To explain why it happens

 To predict what will happen

 To control what happens

 Goals of Psychology

 To explain why things happen

­ Most behaviors are influenced by a

A well-trained
Multi-factor combination:: psychologist can
explain observable
• Internal: genetic makeup,
motivation, intelligence quotient,
behaviors using
self-esteem, etc… their in-depth
• External: impacts/influences from understanding,
external events to a person along with the
­ … based on underlying causes. realities that
previous
 Goals of Psychology

 To Predict What Will Happen

An accurate
­ Based on the understanding of how
explanation of
these events relate to other events
the causes
­ Specify the conditions under which
behaviors will change.
underlying some
behaviors allows
For example: The appearance of a
researchers to
stranger -> reaction = signs of
anxiety… make accurate
predictions about
 Goals of Psychology
 To Control What Happens The ability to control
behavior is
­ … is the most important goal.. important to enable
­ … is to make behavior occur or researchers to make
prevent it from occurring accurate predictions
about future
= to initiate, maintain, prevent it and behavior.
influence its form, strength, or (Gerrig & Zimbardo,
frequency. 2020, p.14)
HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY

"Psychology has a long past, yet only a

short history“
Hermann Ebbinghaus (1908 – 1973)
 HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY
About half a million years ago, primitive humans believed that psychological disorders
were caused by demons. To drive these spirits away, they performed a form of surgery
called trephining. Trephining involved drilling holes in the skull with very primitive
stone tools. Since archaeologists have found skulls with signs of healing wounds, we
can think that sometimes these patients were still alive after the treatment.

The famous physician of ancient Greece, Hippocrates, believed that each person's
personality was formed by a combination of four temperaments: sanguine (cheerful
and positive), melancholic, choleric (angry and aggressive), and phlegmatic (calm and
passive). These temperaments arose from the existence of "humors" in the body. For
example, a sanguine person was thought to have more blood than others.

Franz Josef Gall, an 18th-century scientist, argued that a trained observer could
distinguish unique intellectual and moral traits and other personality aspects based on
the shape and size of lumps on a person's skull. His theory gave rise to the "science" of
phrenology, which many people applied to practice fortune-telling in the 19th century.
 HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY

According to the philosopher Descartes, nerves were hollow tubes through which
"animal spirits" controlled impulses, similar to water passing through a pipe. When a
toe touched a flame, the heat was transmitted by this will through the hollow tubes
straight to the brain.

Although these "scientific" explanations may seem unreasonable to us today, they

once represented the most advanced thinking in what could be called the psychology
of the era. Even without a deep understanding of modern psychology, you might guess
that the quest to understand behavior has advanced significantly since these early
views were formed. Yet, most of these advancements have only been achieved
recently, as psychology was one of the younger disciplines when the popular sciences
flourished.
Pre-Scientific Psychology
Psychology was nestled within philosophy

­ The views of Socrates (470-399)

and Plato (428-347):
 The human mind exists after death,
and thoughts and ideas can exist
separately from the body.
 Knowledge is formed within a
person.
 Approach method: Introspection and
logical reasoning.
Pre-Scientific Psychology
Psychology was nestled within philosophy
­ René Descartes (1596-1650) initiated the idea
that the mind and body could connect with each
other.
 The pineal gland = brain's center = the dwelling
place of the soul, where all thoughts are formed.
 The soul flows in the body through hollow tubes
(nerves) and controls body movements.
­ John Locke (1632-1704)
 The human mind is born as a blank slate (tabula
rasa).
 Humans acquire knowledge through experiences.
Max Wertheimer Wolfgarg Kohler
(1887-1967)
(1850-1943)
Gestalt Psychology
Kurt Koffka
(1886-1947)
 Gestalt Psychology

­ Some things and phenomena must be perceived

as a whole.
­ The organization and arrangement of elements
are important, not the elements themselves.
­ Gestalt psychologists focus on the study of
perception.
Psychoanalytic Psychology
 Psychoanalytic Psychology

­ Behavior is driven/activated by intense inner forces:

sexual instincts, forbidden desires, painful childhood
memories,...
­ People are often unaware of these motivating forces
(dynamics) even though they significantly influence
human behavior.
­ Many desires are repressed... continuously affecting the
conscious mind, manifested through dreams, slips of the
tongue, or symptoms of psychological disorders...
 Psychoanalytic Psychology

­ The unconscious contains all

memories, experiences, and repressed
items, especially from childhood..
­ The needs and motives that cannot be
traced do not belong to consciousness
and therefore are not within the control
of consciousness.
+ Conscious: 15%
+ Unconscious: 85%
Abraham Maslow
(1908 – 1970)

­ People strive to reach their fullest potential.

 Cognitive Perspective

­ Focuses on the operation of the human

brain and understanding how information
received from the environment is
processed.
 Cognitive Perspective

­ The development of brain

­ Thinking is both a result
imaging techniques allows
and a cause of action. cognitive psychologists to
­ Studies higher mental examine neural processes.
processes: recognition, ­ Example: how memories are
memory, language use, problem-
stored; damage to brain areas
increases the risk of mental
solving, and decision-making...
disorders...
Discussio
n
1. What is your dream job? What type of
education would you need to get a job in
that field?
2. How will a background in psychology help
you succeed in that field?
3. What other training in the field of
psychology will help you achieve your
work-related goals?
1 Sensation
Sensation

Sensation is the detection of stimuli. Our

eyes, ears, and other sensory organs are
packed with receptors. (James W. Kalat, 2022)

Stimuli Receptors
Energies from the Specialized cells that convert
world around us environmental energies into
that affects us in signals for the nervous
some way. system.
Five Human Senses
The Functional Areas of the Brain

01 The Visual area 06 Language writing area

02 Auditory area 07 Language speaking area

03 Olfactory area 08 Speech understanding area

04 Taste area ……………………………

05 Emotional area
 Interpreting Sensory Information
Difference Weber’s law or
Absolute threshold threshold Weber-fechner law

• The weakest • The smallest • The JND is a

sounds, lights, and difference that constant fraction of
touches that people people could detect the original
could detect between one stimulus.
stimulus and • For example, if you
another. feel two weights
• The difference and you can just
threshold = the just barely tell that 102
noticeable grams feels heavier
difference (JND) than 100 grams,
then you can also
just barely tell that
204 grams is
Interpreting Sensory Information
• The smallest difference that people could detect
between one stimulus and another.
• Hearing: The absolute threshold refers to the
lowest level of sound that can be detected by
normal hearing without the presence of other
interfering sounds. An example of this could be
measured by how well participants can detect the
ticking sound of a clock.
• Vision: The absolute threshold refers to the
smallest amount of light a participant can detect.
Determining the absolute threshold for vision may
involve measuring the distance at which a
participant can detect the presence of a candle
flame in the dark.
Interpreting Sensory Information
• Smell: The absolute threshold relates to the smallest
concentration that a participant can smell. An example of
this is to measure the smallest amount of perfume a
subject can smell in a large room.
• Touch: The amount of force necessary for you to detect
the sensation of a feather lightly brushing your arm is an
example of the absolute threshold for touch.
• However, problems arose, especially with regard to
finding absolute thresholds. Your absolute threshold
depends on what you had been doing just before the test.
• If you had spent the last hour on the beach on a sunny day, you
will be poor at detecting faint lights.
• If you spent the last hour listening to loud music, you will be poor
at hearing soft sounds.
• But even if you spent the last hour in a quiet, dark room, your
responses might be hard to interpret.
2 Perception
Perception

Perception is the process of receiving and

interpreting sensory information.

Perception is a psychological process that fully

reflects the superficial properties of objects and
phenomena that directly impact our senses.
 Perception Process

Sight (Eyes)
Sound
(Ears)
Smell Exposure Attention
Interpretati
on
(Nose)
Taste
(Mouth)
Touch (Skin)
Senses Perception Process
(Stimuli inputs)
 Gestalt Psychology (Structural Psychology)
Gestalt psychology emphasizes
perception of overall patterns.
To reject the idea of breaking
down a perception into its
component parts. a melody
broken into individual notes is
no longer a melody, their
slogan was, “the whole is
different from the sum of its
parts.”
Thanks