INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY

HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES

What is Psychology?

The scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

Where did the science of psychology come from?

"Trinity" by Orlando Tisato

Theology – “Messages from the Gods”"... it is by no means to everyone that the gods grant a clear sight of

themselves." [Homer, Odyssey 16.160]

Narcissus and Echo Narcissus was a youth possessed of incredible beauty, and while everyone who saw him loved him, males as well as females, he spurned them all through pride.  The hapless nymph Echo, whom Hera had punished by

turning her speech into a repetition of what others said, came across Narcissus in a glade and pleaded with him, using his own words, to love her.  He rejected her.  Artemis grew angry and caused him to fall in love with himself.  Narcissus came to a clear pond and became enraptured when he saw his reflection.  He sat down and gazed longingly at himself hour upon hour.  At length he desperately killed himself with a knife, unable to bear his self-love, and where his blood fell grew up the narcissus flower, which has medicinal properties.  Echo repeated his dying word, "Alas!"

Greek Philosophers & The Golden Age (480 – 399)

The Physicalists - physical causes of neural and mental processes

Psychologists

Wundt – Structuralism

William James – Functionalism; “When two elementary brain-processes have been active together in

immediate succession, one of them, on reoccurring, tends to propagate its excitement into the other” (James, 1890/1983, p. 534)

Sigmund Freud – Psychoanalysis

John Watson – Behaviorism;

Carl Rogers & Abraham Maslow

– Humanism

Rogers

Contemporary Psychology

Biological – nervous system, endocrine system, immune system, genetics

Psychodynamic – Freudian; unconscious influence

Behavioral – observable, laws of learning Humanist – people naturally seek to self-actualize Cognitive – mental processes Cross-Cultural – cultural influence Evolutionary Perspective -- survival of the fittest