Definition of Psychology

• Psychology is the science of human behavior

• Goals of psychology?– same as for any other science– To build an organized body of knowledge of

its subject matter– develop valid, reliable explanations for the

phenomenon in its domain.

Ways of knowing

• Science is but one way of understanding the world– other ways?

• Common Sense– Wear a coat and hat or catch a cold?

• Many common sense notions are contradictory– absence makes the heart grow fonder – out of sight out of mind

– birds of a feather flock together – opposites attract

Magical view of the world

• Two broad classes– imitative magic (law of similarity)

• make yourself like what you want to achieve– Malaysian woman gathering rice

• or imitate the action– Rain dance

– contagious magic (law of contact)• Wotjobaluk tribe of Victoria Australia

– opossum rug

similarities between magical and scientific views

• causal reasoning• seismologist • palm readers

• Manipulation of antecedent conditions to achieve desired effects

• change clothes to affect rice crop• heat rug to make someone sick• treat nuclear material to make abundant energy or cause mass

destruction

• Increased opportunities• Those that practice science and magic have high status in their

societies

The rational method

• knowledge is gained by reason – not by experiencing the world

• human reason as the only reliable guide to knowledge– Why? Because human senses are not trustworthy

• Philosophy often employs a rationalist or (logical) approach.– Rene’ Descartes (17th century philosopher)

• did not trust the human senses• How do I know that the world exists at all? Do I even exist?

– to solve this Descartes relied on what he called self-evident truths.• Assumption 1: Something that thinks must exist• Assumption 2: I am thinking• Conclusion: I must exist

– Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am)

• Rationalism is an important technique for understanding things that are outside the realm of science– what is the meaning of life

• Rationalism is also important to scientists– our approach to science must always follow a logical

progression.– However scientists remain empiricists

• rely on observations obtained by the human senses• we have rules, though, to attempt to eliminate the

hallucination or brain in the jar problems– we will get to these later.

• Also - rationalism can be an important first step in the development of scientific hypotheses and theories– Einstein’s Gedankens (thought experiments)

Religion

• relies on forces superior to one’s own as the basis of knowledge– Rather than relying on human reason or human observation– Knowledge comes through faith

• For many religions it is not up to humans to learn the nature of the world

• Keep in mind the big religious questions are often outside the realm of science– We cannot run studies that will show that god does not exist, or

support that god does exist

Science

• Science is another way of knowing about the world.

• There are some basic characteristics that all sciences share

All sciences make a few basic assumptions

All sciences make a few basic assumptions1. Order– Events happen in regular patterns

• not chaotic

– Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947)“faith in an organized universe is essential to science. If there were no inherent order, there would be no point in looking for one. Therefore there would be no need to develop methods for doing so.”

Determinism

• 2. Determinism– highly related to the assumption of order– Determinism means that events are caused

by prior events (antecedent conditions).

• Determinism is often easier for people to accept when they are thinking about the other sciences (like physics and biology).– why do I stick to the ground (law of gravity)

Belief in determinism

• Belief in determinism?• It can be more difficult when dealing with

human behavior– Humans tend to believe in free will.– But we are also often determinists

• Implications for taking a free will viewpoint?• implications for taking a determinist

viewpoint?

Discoverability

• 3) Discoverability– Assumption that we will eventually find the

answers to all scientific questions.

• B.F. Skinner was not much for the brain sciences– Lack of technology to study the brain

• He thought we would fully understand how the brain works in the future though.

Restrictions on how we ask questions (or rules for hypothesis testing)

• 4) Restriction on how we ask questions– All sciences agree that there are restrictions on

how we try to answer questions

• Our hypotheses and methods must be– empirical (empiricism)– falsifiable– Public– Parsimonious– Replicable– considered tentative

• empirical questions– empiricism = the study of observable events in nature in an effort

to solve problems– in contrast to rationalism

• how many teeth does a horse have?

• This is why psychology is the study of human behavior, rather than the study of the human mind– we can directly observe behavior.

• Scientists do, however, often make inferences about things we cannot directly observe through the observation of an observable event– Do children attend more to a television show if there is

something going on that is directly relevant to the plot• Keep in mind we cannot directly observe gravity either

• falsifiable questions– if not falsifiable – not science

• oedipal complex • evolution

– goes out on a limb– 600 million rabbit skeleton would be a problem

public

• Public questions– near death experience– Long term therapy vs. short term therapy

• Scientists also prefer parsimonious explanations that can be replicated and recognize that those explanations are tentative

• principle of parsimony– scientists prefer explanations that make the

fewest assumptions– in short they prefer simpler theories.

• Why?

• Replication – very important to ensure findings are legit– cold fusion– Woo Suk Hwang

• cloning human stem cells

– why is replication so important?• mistakes• fraud

• tentative explanations– Scientists understand that their ideas may not

hold up– our findings are not proof– we know we could be wrong

• Newton vs. Einstein• flat, round, oblong, triangular earth

– we move toward a better understanding

• converging evidence

• Pulling things together• Why is a scientific approach necessary?

• Clever Hans

• Facilitated Communication• http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31388323/vp/341

11007#34111007

• Dr Nancy link

levels of analysis

• description

• prediction

• explanation

• Different research methods are required.