PSY502 - Short - Notes by Pin2
PSY502 - Short - Notes by Pin2
PSY502 - Short - Notes by Pin2
LESSON 06
Renaissance
Renaissance is a French word meaning “rebirth it is the period between 13th to 16th centuries
AD The term Renaissance is used to describe the development of western civilization that
marked the transition from medieval (middle age) to modern times
RENE DESCARTES
● He originated the Cartesian coordinates and Cartesian curves; he is often said to be the
founder of analytical geometry.
● He discarded tradition and supported rationalization and logic rather than ideas based
upon experiences.
● Emotion was finally physiological at base and argued that the control of the physical
expression of emotion would control the emotions themselves.
● Descartes’s main method of acquisition of knowledge was to doubt everything called
skepticism (doubt the truth of something) Descartes had come to the conclusion that he
could doubt everything except his thinking Rene Descartes went on to say that because he
thinks therefore he exists. Descartes gave his conclusion as a French term: “Cogito ergo
sum.” It means that “I think therefore I am.”
● The two parts of the human beings are:
o The part that thinks
o The part that acts
● He proclaimed that the body is like a machine that obeys the orders of the mind body and
soul dualism
● The soul affects the body by a gland that he called “Pineal Gland,
● Two types of thoughts:
o Innate thoughts (by birth)
o Acquired thoughts (experience)
LESSON 07
● Materialist thinkers were of the view that matter is dynamic, which means that matter
changes from one form to another
● This idea of finding similarities between man and machines given by Thomas Hobbes is
called “mechanical materialism
● Empiricism
● He further proclaimed that motion in the brain creates thoughts
● According to Hobbes three things create association:
• Habits
• Wishes
• Repetition
● Hobbes was of the opinion that our thoughts and emotions are caused by the motion the
external stimuli
● He wrought a book “Leviathan”.
LESSON 08
FRENCH REVOLUTION
One of the greatest revolutions in the history of mankind is the French Revolution that
took place in France in 1789. Violent revolt against the government marking the end of
monarchy and feudalism in France
Denis Diderot
● Empiricism
● He was of materialist point of view proposing that matter is dynamic and the movement
of particles creates sensations and feelings in a body
● Memory is the functions of the brain and man and animals possess memory.
● He further proclaimed that the purpose of knowledge was not just to know the truth but
it was to increase the power of man.
Augusta Comte
LESSON 09
WILHELM LIEBNIZ
● First German philosopher/psychologist
● He called atom as Monads. Monads are spiritual in nature and they are permanent and
indestructible
● That he proposed that the soul and the body exist and operate parallel to each other. This
view of parallelism of soul and body is termed as psycho-physical parallelism.
IMUNEL KANT
● Believed in empiricism
● Support concept of association
● Kant proposed that mind has the capacity to give meaning to sensations and observation
mind is responsible for interpreting these sensations and deciding how the person and the
body have to react.
● No material existing of mind
● Psychology cannot be a science
FRIEDRICH HEGEL
● Hegel taught that there is no conflict between mind or wisdom and nature or matter.
● All phenomenons have a cause and effect relationship or may otherwise be
explained using simple methods of observational reasoning.
● Absolute idea is the absolute truth and it is non-material (other ideas derive from it).
● Objects and events cannot be studied separately. Hegel correctly and implicitly stated
that the behavior of a person, his attitude and his actions are influenced by his
environment.
● The dialectical process means that by looking at two things, i.e. the object and the
ideas we can draw conclusions about them.
● Three stages of development of thoughts
1. Thesis (generation of idea)
2. Antithesis (opposite idea)
3. Synthesis (two ideas merge to form new idea
LESSON 10
IVAN SECHENOV
● Industrial Revolution: The first really practical engine was invented by the Scotsman
James Watt in about 1775.
● Ivan was physiologist, named by Ivan Pavlov as "The Father of Russian physiology."
● Sechenov authored major classic “Reflexes of the Brain” introducing electrophysiology
and neurophysiology into laboratories and teaching of medicine
● He showed that brain activity is linked to electric currents and was the first to introduce
electrophysiology.
● His work laid the foundations for the study of reflexes, animal and human behavior, and
neuroscience.
● Unity of body and soul. No dualism
● The behavior of the person is the response to the physiological change (sensory
stimulation) according to how the brain acts to that physiological change (candle
example).
● There are parts of brain which decides either to show response or not
LESSON 11
IVAN PAVLOV
● One of the greatest achievements of Ivan Pavlov was his research on digestive glands of
human beings
● Ivan Pavlov has the honor of being the first and only psychologist who has ever received
a Noble Prize
● Ivan Pavlov see the linkage of physiology and psychology.
● He gave the concept of learning by conditioning
● Reflex (unlearned action)
● Conditional response (response caused by conditional stimuli)
● Unconditional response (response given in result of unconditional stimuli)
● Conditioned stimuli (neutral stimuli associated with unconditional stimuli )
● Unconditional stimuli (a stimuli which cause unlearned response)
LESSON 12
VLADIMIR BEKHTEREV
● Bekhterev is his experiments on animals and humans using mild electric shocks to trace
the effect on learning. Withdrawal reaction means that humans and animals tend to
move away from the source of the stimulus This response was called Associative reflex
by Bekhterev
● He proposed that consciousness is a form of physical energy.
LESSON 13
CHARLES DARWIN
GUSTAV FECHNER
LESSON 13
WILHELM WUNDT
● Wilhelm Wundt is known for establishing the first psychology laboratory at Leipzig,
Germany, in the year 1879.
● According to him consciousness could be studied by three things:
● Experimentation: (experiments revealed the true nature of consciousness)
● Introspection: (he did not reject introspection as a method of gaining knowledge)
● Looking at the past history of man that has shaped his consciousness: (Darwin was the
first one to give rise to the nature versus nurture controversy. According to him.)
● He proposed that consciousness has three compartments:
● Ideas
● Feelings
● Emotions
● The compartment of feelings can be divided as follows:
● Pleasant/unpleasant
● Relaxed/tense
● Calm/excited
● Wundt also outlined the abnormal states of consciousness. He then went on to
elaborate hallucinations , hypnotic states and dreams. According to him, all of these
abnormal activities of the consciousness are caused due to the breakdown of attention.
LESSON 13
WILLIAM JAMES
JOHN DEWEY
● Dewey put forward the view that education, particularly of children, should be based
upon the needs of the children.
LESSON 16
DAVID KATZ
● David Katz was a European functionalists
● He gave the idea of phenomenon of color constancy( person perceive a color in the same
way as before in different lights.)
EDGAR RUBIN
● Edgar Rubin who showed by his experiments on perception, that human beings see
shapes in terms of figure and ground. When we listen to a song, the music being played is
the ground and voice of the singer is the figure.
JEAN PIAGET
● Jean Piaget Piaget is famous for his theory of how children’s minds develop. He
postulated the concept of Schemata (thinking about how everything occurs)
● Schemata develop over the time by two processes:
● Assimilation absorption of new and different information about the world
● Accommodation expanding, stretching and changing of schemata to absorb new
information about the world
● Another contribution of Jean Piaget is that he elaborated how children develop.
● The sensory-motor stage first stage of development when children learn using their
sensations. For example a child touches a hot object and is hurt, this would create
awareness in his or her mind that touching hot objects is harmful.
● The pre-operational stage second stage when the child for the first time, discovers rules
and principles of how things work
● The concrete operational stage this third stage when his reason and logic develops and he
learns by reasoning.
● The formal operational stage most developed and the last stage of development where the
child is able to learn by abstraction
BEHAVIORIST
LESSON 17
Psychologists started analyzing, predicting and controlling human behavior since it was
visible while consciousness was not. It gave birth to the school of thought now called the
Behaviorist School
LESSON 18
ALBERT WEISS
● Anything that cannot be studied with the methods of natural sciences should not
be a part of psychology
● No mental forces apart from physiological forces which are reducible to physical
forces. In other words, all mental forces can be studied using a physiological
approach and not considering them to be extraordinary forces
● He said that every person’s behavior is impacted by social forces
EDWIN HOLT
● He was of the view that psychology should concern itself only with directly observable
facts and data
I. Behavior is the result of two factors:
a. Learning
Learning takes place when an organism is exposed to internal or external stimulation, e.g.
internal stimulation may be hunger, thirst etc. while external stimulation may be heat,
coldness etc. Organism behaves in response to these stimuli
b. Canalization
Further, behavior is also the result of canalization which is what we learn in our
childhood. Childhood experiences influence and produce behavior and in any study of
psychology we must not ignore those childhood experiences.
WALTER HUNTER
● Psychology should concern itself with observation of behavior of humans and should not
concern itself with the problems of consciousness
● The environment and social circumstances have a profound impact on the behavior
● He is credited with the development of temporal maze for his experiments. Temporal
maze was used to conduct experiments in which an animal was allowed to find its way
around the maze to the food. When the animal had become familiar with the maze, it
would take much less time to reach the food and thus Hunter drew his conclusions based
on these observations. He conducted experiments on delayed reaction time of animals for
which he is known for
LESSSON 19
J.B.WATSON
NEO-BEHAVIORIST
LESSON 20
Neo-behaviorists followed the Watsonian line of thinking although they were born after Watson.
CLARK HULL
EDWARD TOLMAN
● He said behavior has a “purpose.” That is why he is also called a “purposive
behaviourist.”
● He defined behaviour in a precise equation that is:
B= f (S, A)
Where:
B is behaviour
f is the function of
S is situation variables (a part of the environment that affects a subject’s
……………………………………..behavior in a way, e.g. the hot or cold weather)
A is antecedent variables (that is a part of the subject such as age, gender etc. and
……………………………………….it impacts its behavior).
This means that behaviour is a function of situational variables and antecedent variables.
EDWIN GUTHIERE
● He put forward the view that behavior can be predicted and controlled by the “law of
recency,” given by Thorndike, which states that “the last act is most likely to be
repeated.”
● Gutherie developed a theory of neurosis in his book “The Psychology of Human
Conflict” and because of this he may be regarded as one of the first behaviorist
psychotherapists. He explained neurosis to be caused due to conflict of responses
LESSON 21
B.F SKINNER
● His main research work is now known by the title of Instrumental or Operant
Conditioning
● He distinguished between positive reinforcement(reward) and negative
reinforcement(punishment)
● four schedules of reinforcement:
a. Fixed ratio schedule (after fixed number of responses)
b. Variable ratio schedule (after varial number of responses)
c. Fixed interval schedule (after fixed time period)
d. Variable interval schedule (after variable time period)
● His famous book was: “Beyond Freedom and Dignity”
HARVEY HARLOW
HOBART MOWRER
● Hobart Mowrer at the University of Illinois showed that factors such as hope and
disappointment influence learning.
DONALD HEBB
● Donald Hebb was a Canadian psychologist, who showed that, when a part of the human
brain was removed accidentally, it did not affect a person’s IQ.
KARL LASHLEY
● He was a pupil of Watson
● , he proposed that psychology is a science of behavior and behavior is the result of
activity of the cerebral cortex, a part of the brain. which lead to the development of two
principles given by Lashley himself.
i. Principle of equi-potentiality:
According to Lashley, one part of the cortex is the same as another part. Therefore, even
if one part is cut off, the brain activity still takes place. In other words, both parts of the
cortex have equal potential to make the brain work properly.
ii. Principle of mass action:
He also proposed that the more the cortex in mass, the better the learning and called it the
“principle of mass action.” So Lashley showed that behaviour and more precisely
learning is a function of the activity of the cortex.
LESSON 22
Gestalt psychology adopted both the behaviorist’s views and the structuralists’ views.
Gestalt is a German word meaning patterns
MAX WERTHEIMER
● Wertheimer’s discovery of the phi-phenomenon, apparent movement (concerning the
illusion of motion) gave rise to the influential school of Gestalt psychology. Human mind
has the tendency to develop something to fill into the gap.
● He wrote a book named Productive Thinking
● Factors of organization that help us to perceive in patterns or Gestalts
✔ Closure (filling gab)
✔ Familiarity
● Wertheimer also tried to discover what is creative thinking or problem solving thinking
✔ we are able to concentrate on discovering new rather than analyzing new from
the already existing point of views. That is how we can become productive,
creative thinkers
LESSON 23
WOLFGANG KOHLER
● Köhler is best known for his experiments with problem-solving in apes at Tenerife and
the influence of his writings in the founding of the school of Gestalt psychology
● His writings include Gestalt Psychology and The Mentality of Apes
● Kohler‘s main contribution in the Gestalt School is his discovery of learning by insight. He
conducted experiments on monkey and saw that monkeys were able to solve their
problems through insight , Kohler concluded trial and error as a method of learning.
● Kohler also postulated the concept of isomorphism , the map is the individual‘s
perception about the world around him
KURT KOFFKA
● His book Growth of the Mind (1924) was considered responsible for awakening much
interest in Gestalt concepts.
● He distinguished between the geographical field and the field of experience In his
views, an individual tends to ignore the geographical field in face of the field of
experience which dominates his understanding or perceptions
● He is noted for his work in the study of happiness, creativity, subjective well-being, and
fun, but is best known as the architect of the notion of flow and for his years of research
and writing on the topic
● American Psychological Association, described Csikszentmihalyi as the world's leading
researcher on positive psychology
EDWARD DE BONO
● He developed his theory of Lateral Thinking which is akin to creative or problem solving
thinking
● He developed some exercises to inculcate lateral thinking. Some of his exercises are,
―question‖ ―rotate,‖ discover ―dominant idea‖ etc
LESSON 24
Kurt Lewin
● Kurt Lewin gave a theory which he called the Field Theory. The individual has many
attractions which may be positive or negative , because of these positive and negative
opportunities, conflicts arise in the mind of individuals who have the chance to avail
either of the two opportunities. He proposed three kinds of conflicts that a person may be
faced with:
o The approach-approach conflict (challenge of choosing between two liking
things)
o Approach-avoidance conflict (choose a thing with its good and bad qualities)
o Avoidance-avoidance conflict (choose between two unlikely things)
● The other important contribution is his theory of leadership
▪ Authoritarian (to control everything)
DYNAMIC PSYCHOLOGY
WILLIAM MCDOUGALL
● According to McDougall, behavior is the result of
✔ internal striving
✔ an urge to live
✔ horme.
● This ―horme or the urge to live expresses itself in various forms and kinds of behavior.
In other words, all organisms try to survive against the environment his point of view is
called the ―hormic‖ view point
LESSON 25 & 26
LEON VYGOTSKY
● He showed that environment effects man, but then in turn man also effects the
environment
● Leon proposed that the higher mental function of consciousness also developed through
the process of evolution
● He emphasized on the fact that the structure and the functions of the consciousness
cannot be separated.
● Consciousness functions separates man from animals
SERGEI RUBENSTEIN
● Rubenstein rightly pointed out the importance of internal conditions apart from the
external stimulus and response relationships
● Rubenstein also showed that external factors affect psyche and then in turn psyche also
affects external factors in the environment
● He argued that consciousness originates as a result of sensitivity to certain stimuli
ALEXEI LEONTIEV
● When the body receives stimuli from the environment, it reacts to them
● Leontiev classified these stimuli into two categories.
a) Ordinary stimuli
b) Symbolic stimuli
● Leontiev also showed by pointing toward various stages of man’s development that man
learnt by conditioning according to a set pattern. The order of learning is as follows:
o Man first learnt lower order things and functions(eating drinking)
o later the higher functions ( thinking )
K.M BYKOV
● Bykov points out the development of verbal communication and man’s ability to respond
to verbal stimulus
In 1790 laws were made that separation of patients suffering from nervous diseases is required, from
those suffering from other diseases
PHILIPPE PINEL
SAMEUL TUKE
● British physician
● He also freed mental patients from their chains and started to treat them as sick rather
than possessed by spirits, demons or the devil.
FRANZ MESMER
● During the same time mental diseases or insanity was being treated by a method called
Mesmerism. His interest in “animal magnetism” developed into a system of treatment
through hypnotism that was called mesmerism
● According to Mesmer, people have a force that he called “animal magnetism,” and when
the balance of animal magnetism gets upset in the body, people get mad or insane.
JAMES BRAID
● In this book he coined the words hypnotism, hypnotize, and hypnotist, which remain in
use. Braid thought of hypnotism as producing a "nervous sleep" which differed from
ordinary sleep. The most efficient way to produce it was through visual fixation on a
small bright object held eighteen inches above and in front of the eyes
JEAN CHARCOT
BERNHEIM
● He showed that hypnotism cannot treat hysteria only but also other mental diseases
LESSON 29 & 30
SIGMUND FREUD
Neurosis=Predisposition + trauma
ANNA FREUD
HEINZ HARTMANN
● His work marked the development of the theoretical movement known as
Ego-psychology
ERNST KRIS
LESSON 31 & 32
LESSON 33
ALFRED ADLER
● Individual psychology refers to the idea that we should see people as wholes rather than
parts. The word individual means literally "un-divided." Second, instead of talking about
a person's personality, with the traditional sense of internal traits, structures, dynamics,
conflicts, and so on, Adler preferred to talk about lifestyle
● Alfred Adler postulates a single "drive" or motivating force behind all our behavior and
experience. He called that motivating force ―striving for perfection
● Further, according to Adler the concept of ―organic inferiority. He thought that because
of organic inferiority a person develops ―striving for superiority.‖
● This striving for superiority leads to:
✔ Compensation
✔ Over compensation
● One way to compensate inferiority feelings or complex is to become aggressive. The
person develops a drive to aggression but also has social interest
● The Adlerian therapy consists of:
✔ A good human relationship between patient and doctor
✔ Direct conversation
✔ Dream interpretation
LESSON 29 & 30
HARRY STACK SULLIVAN
● He put forward the view that a baby feels euphoria because his mother feeds and
protects him, The mother may convey insecurity in him if she is tense herself. So a
person’s psyche is the result of interpersonal relationships
● Sullivan says that because of interpersonal relationships, the concept of self develops. He
defined three types of self: ‰
a) “Good me” ‰ The good me is everything we like about ourselves. It represents the part
of us we share with others
b) “Bad me” ‰ The bad me represents those aspects of the self that are considered negative
and are therefore hidden
c) “Not me” represents all those things that are so anxiety provoking that we can not even
consider them a part of us. Pushing it deep into the unconscious.
● He put forward the view that because of our interpersonal relationships we come to have
three types of experiences: ‰
a) Prototaxic experience ‰( experience the infant has and the order or arrangement in
which it occurs. Unorganized not clear)
b) Parataxic experience ‰(things learned through signs symbols like language)
c) Syntaxic experience (developed experience in which free communication takes place)
● Sullivan stated that there are about seven stages of human development:
1. Infancy From 0-1,
2. The childhood period 2-6 years
3. The juvenile era 7-8
4. Pre-adolescence; 8 to 12 years
5. Early adolescence This is from 13 to 18.
6. Adolescence
7. Maturity
● Sullivan’s therapy mainly related to schizophrenia and he discovered that interview was
an important tool of psychotherapy. He used empathy as another tool of psychotherapy.
KAREN HORNEY
● He put forward the view that parental roles can produce basic anxiety in a child and that
is one of the main driving forces in a person. The child sees the world as hostile, and he
feels helpless.
● His reactions to anxiety and aggression may take the form of:
1. Disguised hostility (unfriendly)
2. Temper tantrums (rolling down screaming)
3. Withdrawal (isolated)
● Karen Horney offered a list of ten neurotic needs which are:
I. Need for approval
II. Need for domination
III. Confine life
IV. Independence
V. Perfection
VI. Power
VII. Exploiting others
VIII. Prestige
IX. Ambition
X. Admiration
● These needs lead to neurotic trends
a) Movement towards
These people have an intense need to be liked, involved, to be important, and appreciated.
Their Attempts to make other person love them create a clinginess and neediness and it often
results in the other person leaving the relationship.
b) Movement away
This protects them from emotional pain of relationships, it also keeps away all positive
aspects of relationships. It leaves them feeling alone and empty.
c) Movement against
Those with this personality style come across as bossy, demanding, selfish, and even cruel.
ERICH FROMM
● In his famous book “Escape from Freedom” written in 1941 he proclaimed his break
from Freud and classical psychoanalysis.
● . Fromm said that this need for freedom and dependence creates orientations
1. Receptive orientation man tends to accept what is being enforced upon him.
2. Exploitative orientation means to be aggressive and using others for own purposes
3. Hoarding orientation distrust for others
4. Marketing orientation the person behaves in a manner which is liked by others.
5. Productive Orientation Productive orientation is the healthy way of life. This is the way
of life where the individual realizes his full potential.
LESSON 36
J.L. MORENO
ERIK ERIKSON
LESSON 37
ABRAHAM MASLOW
● Maslow's primary contribution to psychology is his Hierarchy of Human Needs
a) Physiological needs
b) Safety needs
c) Need for belongingness
d) Esteem Needs
e) Need for Self Actualization
CARL ROGERS
Positive psychology
Positive psychology is the scientific study of human happiness. William James. In his 1902 book,
The Varieties of Religious Experience, James argues that happiness is a chief concern of human
life and those who pursue it should be regarded as "healthy-minded."
LESSON 40
D.L. ROSENHAN
● He conducted an experiment three women and five men who were perfectly normal and
most of them were well educated, entered in 12 mental institutions of different places in
U.S.A. They posed as mental patients saying that they hear voices, but apart from this,
offered completely correct information about themselves. These “patients” remained in
hospitals for 19 days on the average
• It is impossible to distinguish between normal people and patients according to the rules
and procedures of mental hospitals.
• Mental hospitals leave extremely negative effects on inmates.
• Mental hospitals treat patients without pity and with cruelty.
• That the overall environment of mental hospitals needs great improvement. Further,
research showed in this context that up to 80% patients released from mental hospitals
went back and are re-admitted.
R.D. LAING
● His book “The Divided Self” appeared in 1959 and is considered to represent the basic
view of antipsychiatry movement.
● Laing used the existential philosophy to understand and explain the concept of mental
illness, thereby trying to look at schizophrenia from the patient’s point of view.
● He was against labeling mental diseases, because he thought that from the patient’s view,
he is not suffering from a disease. In his opinion labeling was used to control people. In
other words, in his own view no patient was sick
● In his view the cause of mental disease was division in the self and the therapy suggested
by Laing is known as “Metanoia.” Metanoia means a change in the mind.
● This could be achieved in various ways such as arts, discussions, seminars, etc. He
established a place called Kingsley Hall where activities such as seminars, discussions,
dance, yoga, painting, stitching were carried out to create and achieve metanoia.
AARON ESTERSON
● Esterson focused on family therapy and showed that the family picks up a person and
then labels that person “mad.” This is called scapegoating
● His method of treatment was to expose the mechanisms of scapegoating to the patient and
make the patient realize that he or she was not sick but was just being called sick. In that
way the patient would be able to deal with any future labeling upon him