Psychology
Psychology |
History |
Psychologists |
Divisions |
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Abnormal |
Applied |
Biological |
Clinical |
Cognitive |
Comparative |
Developmental |
Differential |
Industrial |
Parapsychology |
Personality |
Positive |
Religion |
Social |
Approaches |
Behaviorism |
Depth |
Experimental |
Gestalt |
Humanistic |
Information processing |
Psychology (from Greek, literally "to talk about the soul," from ψυχή, "psyche," soul, and λόγος, "logos") is both an academic and applied discipline involving the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychologists study such phenomena as perception, cognition, emotion, personality, behavior, and interpersonal relationships. Psychology also refers to the application of such knowledge to various spheres of human activity, including issues related to daily life—such as family, education, and work—and the treatment of mental health problems.
Psychology is one of the behavioral sciences—a broad field that spans the social and natural sciences. Psychology attempts to understand the role human behavior plays in social dynamics while incorporating physiological and neurological processes into its conceptions of mental functioning. Psychology includes many sub-fields of study and application concerned with such areas as human development, sports, health, industry, law, and spirituality.
History
The study of psychology in a philosophical context dates back to the ancient civilizations of Egypt, Greece, China, India, and Persia. Historians point to the writings of ancient Greek philosophers, such as Thales, Plato, and Aristotle (especially in his De Anima treatise), as the first significant body of work in the West to be rich in psychological thought.[1]
Beginning of the Scientific era
In 1879, Wilhelm Wundt founded a laboratory for the scientific study of psychology at Leipzig University in Germany, earning himself recognition as the founder of experimental psychology.[2] The American philosopher William James published his seminal book, Principles of Psychology, in 1890, laying the foundations for many of the questions that psychologists would focus on for years to come. Other important early contributors to the field include Hermann Ebbinghaus (1850–1909), a pioneer in the experimental study of memory at the University of Berlin; and the Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936), who investigated the learning process now referred to as classical conditioning.
Meanwhile, during the 1890s, the Austrian physician Sigmund Freud developed a method of psychotherapy known as psychoanalysis. Freud's understanding of the mind was largely based on interpretive methods, introspection and clinical observations, and was focused in particular on resolving unconscious conflict, mental distress, and psychopathology. Freud's theories became very well-known, largely because they tackled subjects such as sexuality, repression, and the unconscious mind as general aspects of psychological development. These were largely considered taboo subjects at the time, and Freud provided a catalyst for them to be openly discussed in polite society. His work led to much controversy, even his own former colleagues rejecting some of his ideas. The Swiss founder of analytical psychology, Carl Jung, whom Freud at one time had hoped would carry "Freudianism" into the future, separated from him when Jung's commitment to religion and mysticism, as evidenced in the significant role of the collective unconscious, conflicted with Freud's atheism and commitment to science and the use of mechanical systems to explain human nature. This separation of two great figures impacted not only their own research and theoretical development, but also affected the development of psychology, leading to divergent schools regarding the conception of the human mind that remain separate to this day.
Rise and fall of Behaviorism
Partly in reaction to the subjective and introspective nature of Freudian psychodynamics, and its focus on the recollection of childhood experiences, during the early decades of the twentieth century, Behaviorism gained popularity as a guiding psychological theory. Founded by John B. Watson and embraced and extended by Edward Thorndike, Clark L. Hull, Edward C. Tolman, and later B. F. Skinner, behaviorism was grounded in studies of animal behavior. Behaviorists shared the view that the subject matter of psychology should be operationalized with standardized procedures which led psychology to focus on behavior, not the mind or consciousness.[3] They doubted the validity of introspection for studying internal mental states such as feelings, sensations, beliefs, desires, and other unobservables. In his paper, "Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It" published in 1913, Watson argued that psychology "is a purely objective experimental branch of natural science," that "introspection forms no essential part of its methods," and that "the behaviorist recognizes no dividing line between man and brute."[4] In his work on the study of learning, Skinner famously argued that psychology was not ready for the creation of theories, but rather that progress toward an understanding of learning would be better achieved by the collection of "data showing orderly changes characteristic of the learning process." [5]
Behaviorism reigned as the dominant model in psychology throughout the first half of the twentieth century, largely due to the creation of conditioning theories as scientific models of human behavior, and their successful application in the workplace and in fields such as advertising and military science. However, it became increasingly clear that, although it had made some important discoveries, behaviorism was deficient as a guiding theory of human behavior. Another revolution occurred in psychology in the 1950s, this time the "cognitive revolution."[6]
Noam Chomsky helped spark this revolution in psychology through his review of B. F. Skinner's Verbal Behavior, in which he challenged the behaviorist approach to the study of behavior and language.[6] He showed that the rules that govern the grammatical production of sentences are not the product of overt behavior but mechanisms of cognition—processes of the mind. Others, such as Jerome Bruner, began to take seriously the notion of cognitive strategies.[7] Similarly, work by Albert Bandura showed that children could learn by social observation, without any change in overt behavior, and so this must be accounted for by internal representations.[8]
Cognitivism
The rise of computer technology promoted the metaphor of mental function as information processing. This, combined with a scientific approach to studying the mind, as well as a belief in internal mental states, led to the rise of cognitive psychology.
Links between brain and nervous system function were also becoming common, partly due to the experimental work of those such as Donald O. Hebb and neuroscientist Charles Sherrington, and partly due to studies of people with brain injury. With the increasing involvement of other disciplines (such as philosophy, computer science and neuroscience) in the quest to understand the mind, the umbrella discipline of cognitive science has been created as a means of focusing such efforts in a constructive way.
Humanistic movement
Humanistic psychology also developed in the 1950s in reaction to both behaviorism and psychoanalysis. By using phenomenological, intersubjective, and first-person categories, the humanistic approach seeks to get a glimpse of the whole person and not just the fragmented parts of the personality or cognitive functioning.[9] Humanism focuses on uniquely human issues and fundamental issues of life, such as self-identity, death, aloneness, freedom, and meaning. Some of the founding theorists behind this school of thought were Abraham Maslow who formulated a hierarchy of human needs, Carl Rogers who created and developed Client-centered therapy, and Fritz Perls who helped create and develop Gestalt therapy. It has become so influential as to be called the "third force" within psychology (preceded by behaviorism and psychoanalysis).[10]
As the new millennium dawned with the twenty-first century, Positive psychology arose, originally a development of humanistic psychologists' research on happiness. Positive psychologists seek "to find and nurture genius and talent," and "to make normal life more fulfilling,"[11] not simply to treat mental illness. It does not seek to deny the importance of studying how things go wrong, but rather to emphasize the importance of using the scientific method to determine how things go right: "We believe that a psychology of positive human functioning will arise, which achieves a scientific understanding and effective interventions to build thriving individuals, families, and communities."[12] Research topics include states of pleasure or flow, values, strengths, virtues, and talents, as well the ways in which they can be promoted by social systems and social institutions.[13]
Subfields
Psychology encompasses a vast domain, and includes many different approaches to the study of mental processes and behavior. Below are the major areas of inquiry that comprise psychology, divided into fields of research psychology and fields of applied psychology.
Fields of research
Research psychology encompasses the study of behavior for use in academic settings, and contains numerous areas. It contains the areas of abnormal psychology, biological psychology, cognitive psychology, comparative psychology, developmental psychology, personality psychology, social psychology and others. Research psychology is contrasted with applied psychology.
Abnormal psychology
Abnormal psychology is the study of abnormal behavior in order to describe, predict, explain, and change abnormal patterns of functioning. It studies the nature of psychopathology and its causes, and this knowledge is applied in clinical psychology to treat patients with psychological disorders.
Of course, the definition of what constitutes "abnormal" has varied across time and across cultures. Individuals also vary in what they regard as "normal" or "abnormal" behavior, or merely idiosyncratic. In general, abnormal psychology can be described as an area of psychology that studies people who are consistently unable to adapt and function effectively in a variety of conditions. The four main contributing factors to how well an individual is able to adapt include their genetic makeup, physical condition, learning and reasoning, and socialization.
Biological psychology
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Biological psychology, also known as behavioral neuroscience, is the scientific study of the biological substrates of behavior and mental states. There are different specialties within behavioral neuroscience. For example, physiological psychologists use animal models, typically rats, to study the neural, genetic, and cellular mechanisms that underlie specific behaviors such as learning and memory and fear responses.[14] Cognitive neuroscientists investigate the neural correlates of psychological processes in humans using neural imaging tools, and neuropsychologists conduct psychological assessments to determine, for instance, specific aspects and extent of cognitive deficit caused by brain damage or disease.
Cognitive psychology
Cognitive psychology studies cognition, the mental processes underlying behavior. Perception, attention, reasoning, thinking, problem solving, memory, learning, language, and emotion are areas of research. Classical cognitive psychology is associated with a school of thought known as cognitivism, whose adherents argue for an information processing model of mental function, informed by functionalism and experimental psychology.
On a broader level, cognitive science is an interdisciplinary enterprise of cognitive psychologists, cognitive neuroscientists, researchers in artificial intelligence and human–computer interaction, linguists, logicians, and other social scientists.
Comparative psychology
Comparative psychology refers to the study of the behavior and mental life of animals other than human beings. It is related to disciplines outside of psychology that study animal behavior, such as ethology. Although the field of psychology is primarily concerned with humans, the behavior and mental processes of animals is also an important part of psychological research, either as a subject in its own right (such as animal cognition and ethology), or with strong emphasis about evolutionary links, and somewhat more controversially, as a way of gaining an insight into human psychology by means of comparison or via animal models of emotional and behavior systems as seen in neuroscience of psychology (such as affective neuroscience and social neuroscience).
Developmental psychology
Mainly focusing on the development of the human mind through the life span, developmental psychology seeks to understand how people come to perceive, understand, and act within the world and how these processes change as they age. This may focus on intellectual, cognitive, neural, social, or moral development. In addition to studying children, developmental psychologists also study aging and processes throughout the life span, especially at other times of rapid change (such as adolescence and old age).
Developmental psychologists draw on the full range of theorists in scientific psychology to inform their research. Swiss researcher and theoretician Jean Piaget notably pioneered the study of cognitive development, and other theorists, such as Russian Lev Vygotsky, have regarded social cognition, or knowledge about people and social processes, as fundamental to human development. Urie Bronfenbrenner's theory of development in context is also influential in this field, as are theories in educational psychology as well as many other areas.
Researchers who study children use a number of unique research methods to make observations in natural settings or to engage them in experimental tasks. Such tasks often resemble specially designed games and activities that are both enjoyable for the child and scientifically useful, and researchers have even devised clever methods to study the mental processes of small infants.
Personality psychology
Personality psychology studies enduring psychological patterns of behavior, thought and emotion, commonly referred to as an individual's personality. Theories of personality vary between different psychological schools. They carry different assumptions about such issues as the role of the unconscious and the importance of childhood experience. Sigmund Freud's structural theory divided personality into the ego, superego, and id. Freud's theory of personality has been criticized by many, including many mainstream psychologists.
Trait theories attempts to break personality down into a number of traits, by use of factor analysis. The number of traits have varied between theories. One of the first, and smallest, models was that of Hans Eysenck, which had three dimensions: extroversion—introversion, neuroticism—emotional stability, and psychoticism. Raymond Cattell proposed a theory of 16 personality factors. The theory that has most empirical evidence behind it today may be the "Big Five" theory, proposed by Lewis Goldberg, and others.
Quantitative psychology
Quantitative psychology involves the application of mathematical and statistical modeling in psychological research, and the development of statistical methods for analyzing and explaining behavioral data. It includes the two longer standing subfields of psychometrics and mathematical psychology.
Psychometrics is concerned with the theory and technique of psychological measurement, which includes the measurement of knowledge, abilities, attitudes, and personality traits. Psychometrics, on the other hand, is mainly concerned with individual differences and population structure, mathematical psychology is concerned with modeling of mental and motor processes of the average individual.
Psychometrics is more associated with educational, personality, and clinical psychology. Mathematical psychology is more closely related to psychonomics/experimental and cognitive, and physiological psychology and (cognitive) neuroscience.
Social psychology
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Social psychology is the study of the nature and causes of human social behavior, with an emphasis on how people think towards each other and how they relate to each other. It studies how individuals are influenced by their group membership and interactions, and other factors that affect social life, such as social status, role, and social class.
Social psychology investigates how we make sense of social situations. For example, this could involve the influence of others on an individual's behavior (such as conformity or persuasion), the perception and understanding of social cues, or the formation of attitudes or stereotypes about other people. Social cognition is a common approach and involves a mostly cognitive and scientific approach to understanding social behavior.
Social cognition fuses elements of social and cognitive psychology in order to understand how people process, remember, or distort social information. The study of group dynamics reveals information about the nature and potential optimization of leadership, communication, and other phenomena that emerge at least at the microsocial level. Many social psychologists have become increasingly interested in implicit measures, mediational models, and the interaction of both person and social variables in accounting for behavior.
Fields of application
Applied psychology encompasses both psychological research that is designed to help individuals overcome practical problems and the application of this research in applied settings. Much of applied psychology research is utilized in other fields, such as business management, product design, ergonomics, nutrition, law and clinical medicine. Applied psychology includes the areas of clinical psychology, industrial and organizational psychology, human factors, psychology and law, health psychology, school psychology, community psychology and others.
Clinical psychology
Clinical psychology includes the study and application of psychology for the purpose of understanding, preventing, and relieving psychologically-based distress or dysfunction and to promote subjective well-being and personal development. Central to its practice are psychological assessment and psychotherapy, although clinical psychologists may also engage in research, teaching, consultation, forensic testimony, and program development, and administration.[15] Some clinical psychologists may focus on the clinical management of patients with brain injury—this area is known as clinical neuropsychology. In many countries, clinical psychology is a regulated mental health profession.
The work performed by clinical psychologists tends to be influenced by various therapeutic approaches, all of which involve a formal relationship between professional and client (usually an individual, couple, family, or small group). The various therapeutic approaches and practices are associated with different theoretical perspectives and employ different procedures intended to form a therapeutic alliance, explore the nature of psychological problems, and encourage new ways of thinking, feeling, or behaving. Four major theoretical perspectives are psychodynamic, cognitive behavioral, existential–humanistic, and systems or family therapy. There has been a growing movement to integrate the various therapeutic approaches, especially with an increased understanding of issues regarding culture, gender, spirituality, and sexual-orientation. With the advent of more robust research findings regarding psychotherapy, there is evidence that most of the major therapies are about of equal effectiveness, with the key common element being a strong therapeutic alliance.[16][17] Because of this, more training programs and psychologists are now adopting an eclectic therapeutic orientation.[18]
Clinical psychologists do not usually prescribe medication, although there is a growing movement for psychologists to have limited prescribing privileges.[19] In general, when medication is warranted clinical psychologists work in cooperation with psychiatrists to ensure that their clients' therapeutic needs are met.[15] Clinical psychologists may also work as part of a team with other professionals, such as social workers and nutritionists.
Counseling psychology
Counseling psychology is a specialty that facilitates personal and interpersonal functioning across the lifespan. The field encompasses research and applied work in several broad domains: counseling process and outcome; supervision and training; career development and counseling; and prevention and health. Some unifying themes among counseling psychologists include a focus on assets and strengths, person–environment interactions, educational and career development, brief interactions, and a focus on intact personalities rather than psychopathology.[20]
Counseling psychologists are employed in a variety of settings, including universities, hospitals, schools, governmental organizations, businesses, private practice, and community mental health centers.
Educational psychology
Educational psychology is the study of how human beings learn in educational settings, the effectiveness of educational interventions, the psychology of teaching, and the social psychology of schools as organizations. The work of child psychologists such as Lev Vygotsky, Jean Piaget and Jerome Bruner has been influential in creating teaching methods and educational practices.
Educational psychology includes study of subjects such as theories of learning and motivation, span of life development, cognitive science, neurobiology, linguistics, psychosocial studies, and moral development. Much of the research in this field is designed to address the desire of teachers to improve their skills, methods, and testing.
The related area of school psychology combines principles from educational psychology and clinical psychology but focuses on the student rather than the teacher, with the goal of helping young people succeed academically, socially, and emotionally. School psychologists collaborate with educators, parents, and other professionals to create safe, healthy, and supportive learning environments for all students that strengthen connections between home and school. Practitioners in this field work to understand and treat students with learning disabilities; to foster the intellectual growth of gifted students; to facilitate prosocial behaviors in adolescents; and otherwise to promote safe, supportive, and effective learning environments. School psychologists are trained in educational and behavioral assessment, intervention, prevention, and consultation, and many have extensive training in research.[21]
Forensic psychology
Forensic psychology is the intersection between psychology and the criminal justice system. It covers a broad range of practices primarily involving courtroom testimony on given issues. Forensic psychologists are required to understand criminal law in the relevant jurisdictions in order to be able to interact appropriately with judges, attorneys, and other legal professionals. An important aspect of forensic psychology is the ability to testify in court, reformulating psychological findings into the legal language of the courtroom, providing information to legal personnel in a way that can be understood.[22]
Forensic psychologists may be appointed by the court to conduct competency to stand trial evaluations, competency to be executed evaluations, sanity evaluations, involuntary commitment evaluations, provide sentencing recommendations, sex offender evaluation and treatment evaluations, and provide recommendations to the court through written reports and testimony.
Industrial and organizational psychology
Industrial and organizational psychology (I/O) applies psychological concepts and methods to optimize human potential in the workplace. Industrial organizational psychologists look at questions regarding things such as who to hire, how to define and measure successful job performance, how to prepare people to be more successful in their jobs, how to create and change jobs so that they are safer and make people happier, and how to structure the organization to allow people to achieve their potential.[23]
Industrial Psychology focuses on improving, evaluating, and predicting job performance while Organizational Psychology focuses on how organizations impact and interact with individuals. I/O psychologists are employed by academic institutions, consulting firms, internal human resources in industries, and governmental institutions.[23]
Research methods
Research in psychology is conducted in broad accord with the standards of the scientific method, encompassing both qualitative ethological and quantitative statistical modalities to generate and evaluate explanatory hypotheses with regard to psychological phenomena. Where research ethics and the state of development in a given research domain permits, investigation may be pursued by experimental protocols. Psychology tends to be eclectic, drawing on scientific knowledge from other fields to help explain and understand psychological phenomena. Qualitative psychological research utilizes a broad spectrum of observational methods, including action research, ethnography, exploratory statistics, structured interviews, and participant observation, to enable the gathering of rich information unattainable by classical experimentation. Research in humanistic psychology is more typically pursued by ethnographic, historical, and historiographic methods.
The testing of different aspects of psychological function is a significant area of contemporary psychology. Psychometric and statistical methods predominate, including various well-known standardized tests as well as those created ad hoc as the situation or experiment requires.
Academic psychologists may focus purely on research and psychological theory, aiming to further psychological understanding in a particular area, while other psychologists may work in applied psychology to deploy such knowledge for immediate and practical benefit. However, these approaches are not mutually exclusive and most psychologists will be involved in both researching and applying psychology at some point during their career. Clinical psychology, among many of the various disciplines of psychology, aims at developing in practicing psychologists knowledge of and experience with research and experimental methods which they will continue to build up as well as employ as they treat individuals with psychological issues or use psychology to help others.
When an area of interest requires specific training and specialist knowledge, especially in applied areas, psychological associations normally establish a governing body to manage training requirements. Similarly, requirements may be laid down for university degrees in psychology, so that students acquire an adequate knowledge in a number of areas. Additionally, areas of practical psychology, where psychologists offer treatment to others, may require that psychologists be licensed by government regulatory bodies as well.
Controlled experiments
Experimental psychological research is conducted in a laboratory under controlled conditions. This method of research relies on the application of the scientific method to understand behavior. Experiments use several types of measurements, including rate of response, reaction time, and various psychometric measurements. Experiments are designed to test specific hypotheses (deductive approach) or evaluate functional relationships (inductive approach). They are important for psychological research because they allow researchers to establish causal relationships between different aspects of behavior and the environment. Importantly, in an experiment, one or more variables of interest are controlled by the experimenter (independent variable) and another variable is measured in response to different conditions (dependent variable). (See also hypothesis testing.) Experiments are one of the primary research methodologies in many areas of psychology, particularly cognitive/psychonomics, mathematical psychology, psychophysiology and biological psychology/cognitive neuroscience.
As an example, suppose an experimenter wanted to answer the following question: does talking on a phone affect one's ability to stop quickly while driving? To answer this, the experimenter would want to show that a subject's stopping time is different when they are talking on a phone versus when they are not. If the experiment is properly conducted in a controlled environment and a difference between the two conditions is found, the experimenter would be able to show a causal relationship between phone use and stopping time. In addition to potential practical benefits, this type of experiment may have important theoretical results, such as helping to explain the processes that underlie attention in humans.
Experiments on humans have been put under some controls; namely informed and voluntary consent. After WWII, the Nuremberg Code was established, because of Nazi abuses of experimental subjects. Later, most countries (and scientific journals) adopted the Declaration of Helsinki. In the US, the NIH established the IRB in 1966. And in 1974, adopted the National Research Act (HR 7724). All of which cover informed consent of human participants in experimental studies. There were a number of influential studies which lead to the establishment of these rules, including the MIT & Fernald School radioisotope studies, the Thalidomide Tragedy, Willowbrook hepatitis study, Milgram's obedience to authority studies.
Animal studies
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Animal learning experiments are important in many aspects of psychology such as investigating the biological basis of learning, memory and behavior. In the 1890s, Ivan Pavlov famously used dogs to describe classical conditioning. The original and most famous example of a classical conditioning study. Non-human primates, cats, dogs, rats and other rodents are often used in psychological experiments. Controlled experiments involve introducing only one variable at a time, which is why animals used for experiments are housed in laboratory settings. In contrast, human environments and genetic backgrounds vary widely, which makes it difficult to control important variables for human subjects. [1]
Qualitative and descriptive research
Observation in natural settings
In the same way Jane Goodall studied the role of chimpanzee social and family life, psychologists conduct similar observational studies in human social, professional and family lives. Sometimes the participants are aware they are being observed and other times it is covert, the participants do not know they are being observed. Ethical guidelines need to be taken into consideration when covert observation is being carried out.
Survey questionnaires
Online surveys are used in psychology for measuring attitudes and traits, monitoring changes in mood, or checking the validity of experimental manipulations. Most commonly, psychologists use paper-and-pencil surveys. However, surveys are also conducted over the phone or through e-mail. Increasingly, web-based surveys are being used in research. Similar methodology is also used in applied setting, such as clinical assessment and personnel assessment.
Longitudinal studies
A longitudinal study is a research method which observes a particular population over time. For example, one might wish to study specific language impairment (SLI) by observing a group of individuals with the condition over a period of time. This method has the advantage of seeing how a condition can affect individuals over long time scales. However, such studies can suffer from attrition due to drop-out or death of subjects. In addition, since individual differences between members of the group are not controlled, it may be difficult to draw conclusions about the populations. Longitudinal study is a developmental research strategy that involves testing an age group repeatedly over many years.Longitudinal studies answer vital questions about how people develop.This developmental research follows people over years and the outcome has been an incredible array of findings, especially relating to psychological problems.
Neuropsychological methods
Neuropsychology involves the study of both healthy individuals and patients, typically who have suffered either brain injury or mental illness.
Cognitive neuropsychology and cognitive neuropsychiatry study neurological or mental impairment in an attempt to infer theories of normal mind and brain function. This typically involves looking for differences in patterns of remaining ability (known as 'functional disassociation's') which can give clues as to whether abilities are comprised of smaller functions, or are controlled by a single cognitive mechanism.
In addition, experimental techniques are often used which also apply to studying the neuropsychology of healthy individuals. These include behavioral experiments, brain-scanning or functional neuroimaging - used to examine the activity of the brain during task performance, and techniques such as transcranial magnetic stimulation, which can safely alter the function of small brain areas to investigate their importance in mental operations.
Computational modeling
Computational modeling is a tool often used in mathematical psychology and cognitive psychology to simulate a particular behavior using a computer. This method has several advantages. Since modern computers process extremely quickly, many simulations can be run in a short time, allowing for a great deal of statistical power. Modeling also allows psychologists to visualize hypotheses about the functional organization of mental events that couldn't be directly observed in a human.
Several different types of modeling are used to study behavior. Connectionism uses neural nets to simulate the brain. Another method is symbolic modeling, which represents many different mental objects using variables and rules. Other types of modeling include dynamic systems and stochastic modeling.
Criticism and controversies
Controversy as a science
A common criticism of psychology concerns its fuzziness as a science. Philosopher Thomas Kuhn suggested in 1962 that psychology is in a pre-paradigmatic state, lacking the agreement on facts found in mature sciences such as chemistry and physics. Because some areas of psychology rely on "soft" research methods such as surveys and questionnaires, critics have claimed that psychology is not as scientific as psychologists assume. Methods such as introspection and psychoanalysis, used by some psychologists, are inherently subjective. Objectivity, validity, and rigor are key attributes in science, and some approaches to psychology have fallen short on these criteria. On the other hand, greater use of statistical controls and increasingly sophisticated research design, analysis, and statistical methods, as well as a decline (at least within academic psychology departments) in the use of less scientific methods, have lessened the impact of this criticism to some degree.
Debates continue, however, such as the questioned effectiveness of probability testing as a valid research tool. The concern is that this statistical method may promote trivial findings as meaningful, especially when large samples are used.[24] Psychologists have responded with an increased use of effect size statistics, rather than sole reliance on the traditional p<.05 decision rule.
In recent years and particularly in the U.S., there has been increasing debate about the nature of therapeutic effectiveness and the relevance of empirical examination for psychotherapy.[25] One argument states that some therapies are based on discredited theories and are unsupported by empirical evidence of their effectiveness. The other side points to recent research suggesting that all mainstream therapies are of about equal effectiveness, while also arguing that controlled studies often do not take into consideration real-world conditions (e.g. the high co-morbidity rate or the experience of clinicians), that research is heavily biased towards CBT methodologies, and that it typically under-represents minority groups.
Notes
- ↑ Christopher Shields, "Aristotle's Psychology", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.). Retrieved December 3, 2011.
- ↑ Alan Kim, Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2006. Retrieved December 3, 2011.
- ↑ F. C. Keil and R. A. Wilson (eds.), The MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001, ISBN 978-0262731447).
- ↑ John B. Watson, "Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It" Retrieved December 3, 2011. First published in Psychological Review, 20, 158-177
- ↑ B. F. Skinner, Are Theories of Learning Necessary? Retrieved December 2, 2007. First published in Psychological Review, 57, 193-216.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 G. A. Miller, "The cognitive revolution: a historical perspective" Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7(3) (2003): 141-144.
- ↑ Jerome Bruner, Jacqueline Jarrett Goodnow, and George Austin, A Study of Thinking (1956; Transaction Publishers, 1986, ISBN 978-0887386565).
- ↑ Albert Bandura, Aggression: A Social Learning Analysis. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1973, ISBN 978-0130207432).
- ↑ John Rowan, Ordinary Ecstasy : The Dialectics of Humanistic Psychology. (London, UK: Brunner-Routledge, 2001, ISBN 0415236339).
- ↑ J. Bugental, "The Third Force in Psychology," Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 4(1) (1964): 19-25.
- ↑ William C. Compton, An Introduction to Positive Psychology (Wadsworth Publishing, 2004, ISBN 978-0534644536), 1–22
- ↑ Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Positive Psychology: An Introduction American Psychologist 55(1) (2000): 5–14. Retrieved December 7, 2011.
- ↑ Christopher Peterson, A Primer in Positive Psychology (Oxford University Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0195188332).
- ↑ John Pinel, Biopsychology (New York, NY: Prentice Hall, 2010, ISBN 978-0205832569).
- ↑ 15.0 15.1 Christine Brain, Advanced Psychology: Applications, Issues and Perspectives (Cheltenham : Nelson Thornes, 2002, ISBN 978-0174900580)
- ↑ Falk Leichsenring and Eric Leibing, "The effectiveness of psychodynamic therapy and cognitive behavior therapy in the treatment of personality disorders: A meta-analysis." The American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(7) (2003): 1223-1233.
- ↑ Andrew Reisner, "The common factors, empirically validated treatments, and recovery models of therapeutic change," The Psychological Record 55(3) (2005): 377-400.
- ↑ J.P. Jensen, A.E. Bergin, and D.W. Greaves, "The meaning of eclecticism: New survey and analysis of components" Professional Psychology: Research and Practice 21(2) (1990): 124–130.
- ↑ Lawrence Klusman, "Prescribing Psychologists and Patients' Medical Needs: Lessons From Clinical Psychiatry" Professional Psychology: Research and Practice 32(5) (2001): 496.
- ↑ Charles J. Gelso and Bruce R. Fretz, Counseling Psychology (Brooks Cole, 2000, ISBN 978-0155071568).
- ↑ National Association of School Psychologists, What is a School Psychologist? Retrieved December 8, 2011.
- ↑ Michael T. Nietzel and R.C. Dillehay, Psychological Consultation in the Courtroom (New York, NY: Pergamon Press, 1986, ISBN 978-0080309569).
- ↑ 23.0 23.1 Paul E. Spector Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Research and Practice (John Wiley & Sons, 2005, ISBN 978-0471690993)
- ↑ J. Cohen, (1994). The Earth is round, p < .05. American Psychologist, 49,.
- ↑ Robert Elliot, (1998). Editor's Introduction: A Guide to the Empirically Supported Treatments Controversy. Psychotherapy Research, 8(2), 115.
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- Koch, Sigmund, and David E. Leary (eds.). A Century of Psychology as Science. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 1992. ISBN 978-1557981714
- Krstic, K. "Marko Marulic—The Author of the Term "Psychology" Acta Instituti Psychologici Universitatis Zagrabiensis, 36 (1964): 7-13.Retrieved December 3, 2011.
- Nietzel, Michael T., and R.C. Dillehay. Psychological Consultation in the Courtroom. New York, NY: Pergamon Press, 1986. ISBN 978-0080309569
- Passer, Michael, and Ronald Smith. Psychology: The Science of Mind and Behavior. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2007. ISBN 978-0073382760
- Pinel, John. Biopsychology. New York, NY: Prentice Hall, 2010. ISBN 978-0205832569
- Rowan, John. Ordinary Ecstasy: The Dialectics of Humanistic Psychology. London, UK : Brunner-Routledge, 2001. ISBN 978-0415236331
- Spector, Paul E. Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Research and Practice. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2005. ISBN 978-0471690993
External links
All links retrieved December 3, 2011.
- Encyclopedia of Psychology
- American Psychological Association
- Association for Psychological Science
- British Psychological Society
- The Archives of the History of American Psychology
- Classics in the History of Psychology
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