Evolutionary Approach

Evolutionary approach uses evolutionary ideas such as adaptation, reproduction, and natural selection as the basis for explaining specific human behaviors.The purpose of this approach is to bring the functional way of thinking about biological mechanisms such as the immune system into the field of psychology and to approach psychological mechanisms in a similar way.

In other words, evolutionary psychology is focused on how evolution has shaped the mind and behavior.

The evolutionary perspective considers many different traits which include memory, perception and language. In this perspective, however, it considers these traits as adaptations that have occurred within the human body over time. With the evolutionary perspective scientists look at the way a new trait will evolve in the average person.

The evolutionary perspective says the only reason that the human race continues to survive and continues to function in the best way possible is through natural selection. This is believed to be the way that the human race has come from the caveman era to the modern era as far as skills, traits and abilities.

This approach also influence our decision making, level of aggressiveness, fears, and making patterns.

A strength of this approach is that it can explain behaviors that appear dysfunctional, such as anorexia, or behaviors that make little sense in a modern context

Sociocultural approach

The sociocultural approach examines the influences of social and cultural environments on behavior. A major influence on people’s behavior, thought processes and emotions are other people and the society they have created.

The understanding of human behavior and personality can be developed by examining rules of the social groups and subgroups in which the individual is apart of. Race and ethnicity, religion, gender, social class, family traditions, peer groups, and age are some of the subgroups that may influence someone’s behavior.

Using this approach, a theory was developed by Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky and he claim that are 3 cultural tools which children use to inform their cognitive abilities.

Psychodynamic Approach

The psychodynamic approach emphasizes unconscious thought, the conflict between biological drives and society’s demands, and early childhood family experiences.

The psychodynamic perspective derives from the work of Sigmund Freud and his students and followers. Its defined by unconscious, the part of mind that contains hidden desires and motivating forces. The main method of investigation in the psychodynamic perspective in psychoanalysis which attempts to uncover the unconscious elements that affect a person. Through the analysis of a person dreams. So in psychodynamic perspective, the model of the mind is as an iceberg, with only the tip visible.

Freud proposed that our thoughts, feelings, self perception and personality is composed of 3 elements. The ego which represents our conscious thoughts, the superego which represents our social conscience and the id which represents our subconscious, pleasure-seeking and inner desires. The id isn’t logical or reasonable, the ego tries to satisfy the id in a safe manner and the superego keeps track of our guilt and social norms.

Those 3 elements are known as our psyche and Freud says that the primary energy i our psyche was the libido and libido is energy created by survival and sexual needs below constantly seeking satisfaction of the desires to be safe and experience pleasure but as we grow, the need of want/needs comes in conflict with id. According to Freud, there are five stages of pschosexual development:

  1. oral stage- birth to 18 months
  2. anal stage- 18 months to 3 years
  3. phallic stage- 3 to 6 years
  4. latency stage- 6 to puberty
  5. genital stage- puberty and beyond

Also, according to Freud the ego develops strategies to defend you from daily conflicts that may cause stress or anxiety due to our id’s desires and your superego’s attempts to control those desires. These protective strategies are called defense mechanisms.

A strength of this approach is actually providing a better understanding of dense mechanism.

Did you know that our behavior and feelings as adults are rooted in our childhood experiences because of the psychodynmaic theory??

Behavioral Approach

The behavioral approach emphasizes the scientific study of observable behavioral responses and their environmental determinants. In other words its the study of the connection between our minds and behavioral.

Contemporary behaviorists still emphasize the importance of observing behavior to understand an individual; however, not every behaviorist today accepts the earlier behaviorists rejection of thought processes, which are often called cognition.

This comic explains how behaviorism is an influential approach in psychology and how all human behavior can be explained by learning. Learning from stimuli, responses and reinforces. Stimuli presents excitement, response is the reactions to stimuli that are desirable or undesirable, and reinforces is something that increases the rate of response.

Reinforcement and punishment examples:

The researchers and scientists who study behavioral psychology are trying to understand why we behave the way we do and they are concerned with discovering patterns in our actions and behaviors. The hope is that if we can use behavioral psychology to help us predict how humans will behave, we can build better habits as individuals, create better products as companies, and develop better living spaces as communities. Also, how rewards and punishments determine our behavior.

One of behaviorism strengths are modification procedures have many advantages over other therapies. Also the approach has had great success working with specific population of people. However, not everything can be studied with this approach.

Cognitive Approach

Apparently your brain houses a mind whose mental process allow you of remember, make decisions, plan, set goals and be creative and the cognitive approach next emphasizes the mental process involved in knowing how we direct our attention, perceive, remember, think, and solve problems.

Humanistic Approach

The humanistic approach emphasizes a person’s positive qualities, the capacity for positive growth and the freedom to choose one’s destiny. Humanistic psychology begins with the existential assumptions that phenomenology is central ad that people have free will.

Humanism is a psychological perspective that that study the whole person.

The humanistic approach has been applied to relatively few areas of psychology compared to other approaches. Its contributions are limited to areas such as therapy. 

A human being is more than just a sum of his or her parts. A person’s behavior is influenced by his or her environment. Social interactions are key in the development of a human being.People are aware of their existence, that is, they are conscious of themselves and their surroundings. They are aware of past experiences and use them to inform present and future behavior. They are not driven by instinct or impulse alone.Human beings have intentional goals and seek to create meaning in life.

 

Biological Approach

The biological approach believes us to be as a consequence of our genetics and physiology. It is the only approach in psychology that examines thoughts, feelings, and behaviors from a biological and thus physical point of view.

A biological perspective is relevant to the study of psychology in three ways and they are used to help explain human behavior

-The comparative- Used to help search to understand human behavior

-Physiology(The brain)- how the nervous system and hormones work, how the brain functions, how changes in structure and/or function can affect behavior.

-The genetic- Determines what people will inherit from there parents

One strength of the biological approach is that it is deterministic. This is a strength because it increases the likelihood of being able to treat people with abnormal behavior and provides explanations about the causes of behavior. This understanding can then be used to improve people’s lives.

One weakness of the biological approach is that it is nomothetic. This is a weakness because it develops theories about disorders and generalizes them to apply to everyone. It does not take into account the view that humans are unique. An example of this is that General Adaptation Syndrome assumes that everyone responds in the same way to stress but does not take into account that some people have more support than others.

 

History of Psychology

Psychology is the study of behavior and mental processes. Behavior is everything we do that can be directly observed. Mental processes are the thoughts, feelings, and motives that each of us experiences privately but that cannot be observed directly.

When dealing with science, psychology uses systematic methods to observe human behavior and draw conclusions. The goals of psychological science are to describe, predict, and explain behavior. Also, psychologists are often interested in controlling or changing behavior, and they use scientific methods to examine interventions that might help.

Psychology is the study of how and why we behave as we do. In this course, you may come across factors which affect behavior; such as habits, attitudes, emotions and personality and how they are developed. It also includes discussions of how we learn and how to get along with others. Psychologist uses 7 approaches to help with the studies of learning psychology.

Those approaches are:

1.Biological-Belief that cause of behavior is your brain

2.Evolutionary-Mental abilities evolve over millions years

3. Psychodynamic-Behavior is result of unconscious dynamics

4.Behavioral-Environmental conditions like rewards/punishments

5.Cognitive-Based on mental process(Speaking, Thinking, etc.)

6.Humanistic-Main task of humans is a grow and develop

7.Social-Cultural-Behavior results from social and cultural influences