BRIEFED PSYCHOLOGY NOTES
CHAPTER ONE
ESSENCE OF PSYCHOLOGY
Chapter Overview
This chapter tries to acquaint students with the concept of psychology. The specific contents addressed
in the chapter are definition of psychology and related concepts, goals of psychology, historical
background and major perspectives in psychology, branches/subfields of psychology, and research
methods in psychology.
Learning Appetizers
A psychologist once asked a group of university freshmen to tell him who they think a psychologist is.
Some say „someone who reads the palm of an individual and tells the behavior of a person‟, others said
„someone who is a fortune teller‟, the rest said, „a person who can understand what someone is thinking
about at a certain time.‟ What about you? You just explore these views as you proceed through the
discussions in this chapter.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of this chapter, you will be able to:
• Define psychology
• Show historical roots of psychology as a science
• Point out the goals of psychology
• Identify early schools and modern perspectives of psychology
• Discuss the basis of differences among perspectives of psychology
• Identify subfields of psychology
• Differentiate the major research methods in psychology
• Explore the major steps of scientific research in psychology
1.1. Definition of Psychology and Related Concepts
Brainstorming Questions
What comes to your mind when you hear about the word psychology?
Have you ever heard about, read or listened to anything related to psychology?
What was its content about?
Did you appreciate it? Why?
What do you expect from the course in psychology?
1
,The word "psychology" is derived from two Greek words 'psyche' and ‗logos‟. Psyche refers to mind,
soul or sprit while logos means study, knowledge or discourse. Therefore, by combining the two Greek
words the term "psychology" epistemologically refers to the study of the mind, soul, or sprit and it is
often represented by the Greek letter ᴪ (psi) which is read as ("sy"). Psychologists define psychology
differently based on their intentions, research findings, and background experiences. Nowadays, most of
them agree on the following scientific definition of psychology.
• Psychology is the scientific study of human behavior and the underlying mental
In the above definition, there are three aspects; science, behavior and mental processes:
• Science: psychology uses scientific methods to study behavior and mental processes in both
humans and animals. This means psychologists do not study behavior with commonsense rather
they follow scientific procedures and use empirical data to study behavior and mental processes.
• Behavior: refers to all of our outward or overt actions and reactions, such as talking, facial
expressions, movement, etc. There is also covert behavior which is hidden, nonobservable and
generally considered as a mental process
• Mental processes: refer to all the internal, covert activities of our minds, such as thinking,
feeling, remembering, etc.
Reflection
Dear student, how did you compare the definition of psychology above with your previous
conception?
1.2. Goals of Psychology
Brainstorming Questions
Dear student, why do you think is psychology important? What do you think a psychologist is
doing when studying behavior and mental processes?
Have you listed some? Fine, let us see the goals together below.
As a science, psychology has four goals; description, explanation, prediction, and control.
Description: Description involves observing the behavior and noticing everything about it. It is a search
for answers for questions like ‗What is happening?‘ ‗Where does it happen?‘ ‗To whom does it happen?‘
And ‗under what circumstances does it seem to happen?. For example, a teacher might notice that a
young freshman girl in his/her general psychology classroom is behaving oddly. She is not turning to her
2
, homework, her results are slipping badly, and she seems to have a very negative attitude toward the
course.
Explanation: Why is it happening? Explanation is about trying to find reasons for the observed
behavior. This helps in the process of forming theories of behavior (A theory is a general explanation of a
set of observations or facts). For instance in the above example, to find out why the girl is doing all those
things, the teacher would most likely ask her parents about her home background, her friends and the
like and may come to an understanding that this girl was behaving the way she did because she was given
attention (in a way reward) by other people when she used to behave oddly
Prediction: prediction is about determining what will happen in the future. In the above example, the
case of the freshman girl, the psychologist or counselor would predict (based on previous research into
similar situations) that this girl may never be able to reach her full learning potential.
Control: How can it be changed? Control or modify or change the behavior from undesirable one (such
as failing in school) to a desirable one (such as academic success). In the example above, certain learning
strategies can be used to help the girl so that she will be successful in her academic endeavor. Control can
also be used in the sense that a psychologist tries to check out the effects of certain undesirable factors in
examining the relationship between two or more behaviors. For example, in studying the relationship
between intelligence and academic performance in freshman courses, a psychologist needs to control the
effect of socio-economic status of the family.
Reflection
Dear student, can you please reflect on the relationship and difference between the four goals
of psychology?
1.3. Historical Background and Major Perspectives in Psychology
Brainstorming Questions
[[
Dear student, can you imagine how long has psychology been around and where did it begin?
Have you tried? Very good,
Psychology is a relatively new field in the realm of the sciences, only about 125 years old. It began as a
science of its own in 1879 in Leipzig, Germany, with the establishment of a psychology laboratory in the
University of Leipzig by Wilhelm Wundt. Wundt developed the technique of objective introspection to
scientifically examine mental experiences. With such newer orientation to the study of human subjective
experiences that were previously under the field of philosophy alone, psychology then begun as an
independent field of study and with Wundt as its founder or "father of modern psychology.‖ Once
psychology begun to use the scientific method, it then went through successive developments in which
3
, different schools of thought emerged at different times. These schools of thought can be categorized as old
and modern as described below.
1.3.1. Early schools of psychology
Brainstorming Questions
Dear student, what do you think is a school of thought? Do you think we have
schools of thought in psychology? If yes, like what, for example?
A school of thought is a system of thinking about a certain issue, say, for example, about human behavior
or mind. You may, for example, think that human behavior is all the result of inheritance, or you, may,
instead, say it is all the result of interaction with the environment. The first system of thinking takes a
biological approach and the later takes an environmental approach. But, what is common in both is there
is a tendency to give general, systematized approach of explaining phenomena.
Surly, psychology, as a discipline, is embedded in different systems of thought from its inception. These
systems of thought were very broad in the early years of psychology and, therefore, we call them
‗schools of thought‘.
There are five such early schools of psychology.
Structuralism- structuralism views psychology as a study of structure of mind. It is an expansion of
Wundt‘s ideas by his student named Edward Titchener (1867-1927). Titchener is the founder of
structuralism. The goal of structuralists was to find out the units or elements, which make up the mind
such as; sensations, images, and feelings. The best-known method used by them was introspection
―looking inward into our consciousness‖. It is a procedure aimed at analyzing the mental experience into
three basic mental elements: images, feelings, and sensations.
Analyzing mental structure alone was found to serve little purpose in helping humans deal with the
environment. Hence, a new school of thought emerged to study this functional value of human mind-
functionalism.
Functionalism- functionalism views psychology as a study of function of the mind. The founder of this
school of thought is William James (1848-1910), who was the first American psychologist and the author
of the first psychology textbook. Unlike Wundt and Titchener, James focused on how the mind allows
people to function in the real world; how people work, play, and adapt to their surroundings, a viewpoint
he called functionalism. He developed many research methods other than introspection including
questionnaires, mental tests and objective descriptions of behavior. Generally, according to
functionalists, psychological processes are adaptive. They allow humans to survive and to adapt
successfully to their surroundings.
Examining human mind in terms of its structural elements and functions were, however, found to be
simplistic to understand the complex human being. It was believed that human mind is more than the
4
CHAPTER ONE
ESSENCE OF PSYCHOLOGY
Chapter Overview
This chapter tries to acquaint students with the concept of psychology. The specific contents addressed
in the chapter are definition of psychology and related concepts, goals of psychology, historical
background and major perspectives in psychology, branches/subfields of psychology, and research
methods in psychology.
Learning Appetizers
A psychologist once asked a group of university freshmen to tell him who they think a psychologist is.
Some say „someone who reads the palm of an individual and tells the behavior of a person‟, others said
„someone who is a fortune teller‟, the rest said, „a person who can understand what someone is thinking
about at a certain time.‟ What about you? You just explore these views as you proceed through the
discussions in this chapter.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of this chapter, you will be able to:
• Define psychology
• Show historical roots of psychology as a science
• Point out the goals of psychology
• Identify early schools and modern perspectives of psychology
• Discuss the basis of differences among perspectives of psychology
• Identify subfields of psychology
• Differentiate the major research methods in psychology
• Explore the major steps of scientific research in psychology
1.1. Definition of Psychology and Related Concepts
Brainstorming Questions
What comes to your mind when you hear about the word psychology?
Have you ever heard about, read or listened to anything related to psychology?
What was its content about?
Did you appreciate it? Why?
What do you expect from the course in psychology?
1
,The word "psychology" is derived from two Greek words 'psyche' and ‗logos‟. Psyche refers to mind,
soul or sprit while logos means study, knowledge or discourse. Therefore, by combining the two Greek
words the term "psychology" epistemologically refers to the study of the mind, soul, or sprit and it is
often represented by the Greek letter ᴪ (psi) which is read as ("sy"). Psychologists define psychology
differently based on their intentions, research findings, and background experiences. Nowadays, most of
them agree on the following scientific definition of psychology.
• Psychology is the scientific study of human behavior and the underlying mental
In the above definition, there are three aspects; science, behavior and mental processes:
• Science: psychology uses scientific methods to study behavior and mental processes in both
humans and animals. This means psychologists do not study behavior with commonsense rather
they follow scientific procedures and use empirical data to study behavior and mental processes.
• Behavior: refers to all of our outward or overt actions and reactions, such as talking, facial
expressions, movement, etc. There is also covert behavior which is hidden, nonobservable and
generally considered as a mental process
• Mental processes: refer to all the internal, covert activities of our minds, such as thinking,
feeling, remembering, etc.
Reflection
Dear student, how did you compare the definition of psychology above with your previous
conception?
1.2. Goals of Psychology
Brainstorming Questions
Dear student, why do you think is psychology important? What do you think a psychologist is
doing when studying behavior and mental processes?
Have you listed some? Fine, let us see the goals together below.
As a science, psychology has four goals; description, explanation, prediction, and control.
Description: Description involves observing the behavior and noticing everything about it. It is a search
for answers for questions like ‗What is happening?‘ ‗Where does it happen?‘ ‗To whom does it happen?‘
And ‗under what circumstances does it seem to happen?. For example, a teacher might notice that a
young freshman girl in his/her general psychology classroom is behaving oddly. She is not turning to her
2
, homework, her results are slipping badly, and she seems to have a very negative attitude toward the
course.
Explanation: Why is it happening? Explanation is about trying to find reasons for the observed
behavior. This helps in the process of forming theories of behavior (A theory is a general explanation of a
set of observations or facts). For instance in the above example, to find out why the girl is doing all those
things, the teacher would most likely ask her parents about her home background, her friends and the
like and may come to an understanding that this girl was behaving the way she did because she was given
attention (in a way reward) by other people when she used to behave oddly
Prediction: prediction is about determining what will happen in the future. In the above example, the
case of the freshman girl, the psychologist or counselor would predict (based on previous research into
similar situations) that this girl may never be able to reach her full learning potential.
Control: How can it be changed? Control or modify or change the behavior from undesirable one (such
as failing in school) to a desirable one (such as academic success). In the example above, certain learning
strategies can be used to help the girl so that she will be successful in her academic endeavor. Control can
also be used in the sense that a psychologist tries to check out the effects of certain undesirable factors in
examining the relationship between two or more behaviors. For example, in studying the relationship
between intelligence and academic performance in freshman courses, a psychologist needs to control the
effect of socio-economic status of the family.
Reflection
Dear student, can you please reflect on the relationship and difference between the four goals
of psychology?
1.3. Historical Background and Major Perspectives in Psychology
Brainstorming Questions
[[
Dear student, can you imagine how long has psychology been around and where did it begin?
Have you tried? Very good,
Psychology is a relatively new field in the realm of the sciences, only about 125 years old. It began as a
science of its own in 1879 in Leipzig, Germany, with the establishment of a psychology laboratory in the
University of Leipzig by Wilhelm Wundt. Wundt developed the technique of objective introspection to
scientifically examine mental experiences. With such newer orientation to the study of human subjective
experiences that were previously under the field of philosophy alone, psychology then begun as an
independent field of study and with Wundt as its founder or "father of modern psychology.‖ Once
psychology begun to use the scientific method, it then went through successive developments in which
3
, different schools of thought emerged at different times. These schools of thought can be categorized as old
and modern as described below.
1.3.1. Early schools of psychology
Brainstorming Questions
Dear student, what do you think is a school of thought? Do you think we have
schools of thought in psychology? If yes, like what, for example?
A school of thought is a system of thinking about a certain issue, say, for example, about human behavior
or mind. You may, for example, think that human behavior is all the result of inheritance, or you, may,
instead, say it is all the result of interaction with the environment. The first system of thinking takes a
biological approach and the later takes an environmental approach. But, what is common in both is there
is a tendency to give general, systematized approach of explaining phenomena.
Surly, psychology, as a discipline, is embedded in different systems of thought from its inception. These
systems of thought were very broad in the early years of psychology and, therefore, we call them
‗schools of thought‘.
There are five such early schools of psychology.
Structuralism- structuralism views psychology as a study of structure of mind. It is an expansion of
Wundt‘s ideas by his student named Edward Titchener (1867-1927). Titchener is the founder of
structuralism. The goal of structuralists was to find out the units or elements, which make up the mind
such as; sensations, images, and feelings. The best-known method used by them was introspection
―looking inward into our consciousness‖. It is a procedure aimed at analyzing the mental experience into
three basic mental elements: images, feelings, and sensations.
Analyzing mental structure alone was found to serve little purpose in helping humans deal with the
environment. Hence, a new school of thought emerged to study this functional value of human mind-
functionalism.
Functionalism- functionalism views psychology as a study of function of the mind. The founder of this
school of thought is William James (1848-1910), who was the first American psychologist and the author
of the first psychology textbook. Unlike Wundt and Titchener, James focused on how the mind allows
people to function in the real world; how people work, play, and adapt to their surroundings, a viewpoint
he called functionalism. He developed many research methods other than introspection including
questionnaires, mental tests and objective descriptions of behavior. Generally, according to
functionalists, psychological processes are adaptive. They allow humans to survive and to adapt
successfully to their surroundings.
Examining human mind in terms of its structural elements and functions were, however, found to be
simplistic to understand the complex human being. It was believed that human mind is more than the
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