...Abstract This essay briefly describes behaviorism, gestalt, and structuralism. Brief examples of each approach are outlined under each topic. The common threads of behaviorism, gestalt, and structuralism are contrasted and compared in basic terms, and their influence on present-day psychology is discussed. Unit 1 – Individual Project This paper discusses three methods in the evolution of psychology: structuralism, behaviorism, and gestalt. To better understand the concepts of each, it’s important to list examples of each method, as well as compare and contrast the differences of each and how each impact modern-day psychology. Structuralism The structural approach to psychology sought to quantify the human experience, the human mind, in a scientific way (Reed, 2010). Simply put, structuralism is the study of how people respond to stimuli; it’s the study of human perception (Education Portal, 2012). It was thought that, through the process of Introspection, surface behavior held clues to deeply buried issues that could only be identified by the therapist (Narrative Therapy Chicago, 2012). An example of structuralism, with regard to therapy, was the use of Introspection, wherein the therapist would, for example, play a sound, or ask the patient to jump in the air. He would then observe the reaction to the stimuli, and ask, “How does that make you feel?” Between the unconscious reaction and introspective response of the patient, the therapist believed he could uncover clues...
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...Diversity, Evolutionary, Functionalism, Gestalt, Humanistic, Physiological, Psychodynamic, and Structuralism (Editorial Board). Throughout his paper I will discuss and compare three of these theories which are: Behaviorism, Structuralism and Functionalism. Behaviorism was founded by a man named Ivan Pavlov who was a psychologist that was researching dogs digestion (Editorial Board). Through his research he was able to prove that learning results from rewards or punishment that are associated with a specific behavior his theory was called the behaviorist approach (Editorial Board). John B. Watson and B.F. Skinner continued to research the behaviorist approach in shaping behavior. It is based on the belief that individuals behaviors can be measured, trained and changed (Cherry). In simple terms the Behaviorism theory believes that all behaviors are learned. To be more specific Behaviorism is a theory of learning that all behaviors are acquired through conditioning. Conditioning occurs through interaction with the environment (Cherry). There are two major types of conditioning: Classic Conditioning and Operant Conditioning. "Classic conditioning is a technique where a naturally occurring stimulant is occurred with a response. Next, a previously neutral stimulant is paired with the naturally occurring stimulus. Eventually, the previously neutral stimulus comes to evoke the response without the presence of the naturally occurring stimulus (Cherry)." These two parts are then...
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...COMPARE AND CONTRAST STRUCTURALISM AND FUNCTIONALISM In my opinion both of the theories structuralism and functionalism involved the study of the human mind and how it works and they were both concerned with the mind at the conscious level. Personally, my feel of the two is that functionalism is more important than structuralism. I believe that functionalism is far better school than structuralism as it is more flexible and scientific in nature which I can relate myself with. I happen to think that functionalism is an object that is designed to determine solely by its function. These are a few of the similarities between structuralism and functionalism. Throughout this paper I will further explore some of the differences between these two systems of psychology. I support the idea that consciousness has to be studied as a whole and that sciences of other field can help to do so. In my opinion the very use of introspection in structuralism is definitely an unreliable form of studying conscience and my personal believe is that consciousness is a too complex subject that cannot be explained in such a way. (Read more about it at) http://courses.nus.edu.sg/course/elljwp/structuralism.htm My second believe is that functionalism can be found in contemporary psychology and it is the evidence that strengthens the fact that structuralism’s assumptions were invalid. The fact that there have been schools and applications of psychology which emerged from functionalism, some of them...
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...Foundation of Psychology Paper Psychology is the deep study of the human mind and their behavior. The roots of psychology can be traced to both philosophy and physiology. Philosophy provides how interesting the study oft the mine is. Physiology refers to the scientific method or the tools used to explain mind and behavior. Psychology is used for the following; understanding the behavior of people, their thoughts, and feelings. In the world of psychology there are several schools that make up psychology, they are referring to the theories or thoughts of psychology. In this paper, the author will address the most important schools of psychology and their importance. These include structuralism/functionalism, Gestalt psychology, behaviorism, psychoanalysis, human psychology, and cognitive psychology. In addition, the author will briefly discuss primary biological foundations of psychology linked to behavior and what drives people. In order to understand the different schools of psychology, it is important to consider analyzing the brain and understand its terms that it serves as a function. The first school of psychology is structuralism. Structuralism is a theory came from the ideas of Edward Titchner, “his theory that the mind's functions -- action, affection, association, attention, imagination, memory, perception, recognition, sensation, and thought -- could be categorized as systematically as an elemental chart in chemistry.” ("NNDB Edward Titchner", 2014) This mean...
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...Cognitive Psychology Definition Paper | Kyle GrossoPSY/360December 21, 2014 | Cognitive Psychology is a branch of psychology that is concerned with our mental processes, such as perception, thinking, learning, and memory. It is also specifically concerned with the relationship between sensory stimulation and the overt expression of behavior (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, n.d.). There are many disciplines in psychology that helped in the development of cognitive psychology, such as Structuralism, Functionalism, Behaviorism, and Gestalt psychology (Galotti, 2014). Structuralism is a discipline of psychology developed by Wilhelm Wundt that established a “science of mind” to determine the laws and principles that explain our conscious experiences. Wundt wanted to identify the different parts of the brain and study how all these parts work together to make up the human brain as a whole (Galotti, 2014). Functionalism was another discipline of psychology that aided in the development of cognitive psychology. Functionalism was developed by William James who, like Wundt, was also concerned with our conscious experiences. But contrary to Wundt, James was more concerned about why the mind works the way that it does (Galotti, 2014). Both functionalism and structuralism had a major impact in the development of many different disciplines of psychology. Structuralism was considered the first school of thought in psychology and influenced experimental psychology. Functionalism...
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...FUNCTIONALISM V. STRUCTURALISM Myrna Davis WashingtonUniversity of the Rockies Abstract In this paper, we compare and contrast the theories of Structuralism, which was structuralismdeveloped out of early attempts to establish psychology as a separate discipline from philosophyand biology, and Functionalism, which was developed by American psychologists in response tothe theory of Structuralism. Additionally, this discussion includes the contributions andrelevance of these theories to contemporary psychology. The theories of structuralism and functionalism (“America’s psychology”) were psychology’s first theoretical approaches. Both “structural” psychology and “functional” psychology were the “mind-children” of E. B. Titchener, a former graduate student of Wilhelm Wundt who had only been in the United States for six years when he wrote an article entitled “The Postulates of a Structural Psychology” which appeared in an 1898 issue of the journalPsychological Review (Goodwin, 2008). In the article, Titchener presented an approach he named “structural” psychology and contrasted it with what he called “functional psychology”, the psychology he saw being taught at American universities (Goodwin, 2008). Structural psychology, he postulated, was analogous to anatomy in that its purpose was to analyze thehuman mind and organize into its basic units or conscious elements (thoughts). Structuralism, or experimental psychology , used self-reflective introspection to explore the relationship...
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...FUNCTIONALISM V. STRUCTURALISM Myrna Davis WashingtonUniversity of the Rockies Abstract In this paper, we compare and contrast the theories of Structuralism, which was structuralismdeveloped out of early attempts to establish psychology as a separate discipline from philosophyand biology, and Functionalism, which was developed by American psychologists in response tothe theory of Structuralism. Additionally, this discussion includes the contributions andrelevance of these theories to contemporary psychology. The theories of structuralism and functionalism (“America’s psychology”) were psychology’s first theoretical approaches. Both “structural” psychology and “functional” psychology were the “mind-children” of E. B. Titchener, a former graduate student of Wilhelm Wundt who had only been in the United States for six years when he wrote an article entitled “The Postulates of a Structural Psychology” which appeared in an 1898 issue of the journalPsychological Review (Goodwin, 2008). In the article, Titchener presented an approach he named “structural” psychology and contrasted it with what he called “functional psychology”, the psychology he saw being taught at American universities (Goodwin, 2008). Structural psychology, he postulated, was analogous to anatomy in that its purpose was to analyze thehuman mind and organize into its basic units or conscious elements (thoughts). Structuralism, or experimental psychology , used self-reflective introspection to explore the relationship...
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...Foundations of Psychology Robert Irvine PSY/300 November 29, 2010 Robert J. Martinez Foundations of Psychology Psychology and all its complex schools of thoughts, developed by numerous individuals involved in breaking down the human mind and how it functions and operates, will be explained in this paper. Along with the schools of thought, and their underlying assumptions, this paper will also attempt to identify the primary foundations of psychology, and how they are linked to behavior. Edward Titchener initiated his own school of thought known as structuralism. A student of Wilhelm Wundt, often described as “the father of psychology,” Titchener adopted the use of Wundt’s introspection in experiments, with the hope of devising a periodic table of elements of human consciousness. He believed that his experimentation was the only appropriate method to achieve results scientifically, and that Wundt’s concepts of attention implied too much free will to be useful for scientific research. Structuralism was one school of thought that was dominant in the early years, the other was functionalism. Functionalism is the thought that emphasizes the role of psychological processes that help individuals adapt to their environment, rather than focusing on the contents of the mind. One of the founders of functionalism was William James. A psychologist from Harvard University, he penned the first textbook in 1890. He believed the knowledge of Human psychology could come from many sources...
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...Scotland’s independence Scotland is changing the “norms” by trying to get more leisure to their policies to eventually get more freedom in their state, and, if possible, become totally independent. The question to ask now is, what is England's response to this movement. Will they follow in somewhat of the same tracks, or take another path. I think that England will not follow in the same tracks as Scotland, but I do think that sometime in the near future, Scotland can become independent. On September 19th, scotland had polled a 55%45% vote, (which is not its first time trying to gain independence) keeping its connection and staying with the United Kingdom. In this, scotland wants to have the freedom to be able to create and or change its policies. The main two theories that will be addressed throughout this paper are; structuralism and culturalism. Scotland for many decades has been trying to gain its independence. February 1989 was arguably Scotland's biggest starting point for independence. There was a big outrage on if scotland was an independent country, would it be better off. While the optimistic bunch had thought that it would, it ended up losing a poll, 24% to 76%. In a Scottish poll on television, when the people were asked whether or not they wanted to stay with Europe or break away, the majority of them wanted to stay connected to Europe. But, when the poll asked the same people if they wanted to have an Independent Scotland country within Europe...
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...in an ever-changing world, responding to things and events and other people. If you know what man is, if you know the full answer to the question about the nature of man, then you know what human nature is and what psychology comprises” (Chapter 1, Para. 1). Many varying thoughts have changed over time to the study of psychology. These thoughts include functionalism, behaviorism, structuralism, psychoanalysis, and humanistic. According to Kowalski, R., & Westen, D. (2009), structuralism was introduced by Edward Titchener because of his interest in the study of structure in consciousness. He believed that with experimenting in psychology to be the best attempt for science to understand psychology. Titchener states that “attention implied too much free will” to be an accurate and useful. Later, psychologists continued to study the consciousness with feelings and sensations that could only be told by only the person reporting them. This was one of the thoughts that were most prominent in the early years of psychology. The other thought that was also prominent was functionalism. Unlike structuralism that focused on the mind, the work of functionalism looked at the function, or role, that psychological actions can help people adjust to the environment. A functionalist would react to what is learned, but not to say the idea of an action. They would tend to focus on the behavior and purpose of their reactions. One of the initial founders is William James, who wrote a textbook of...
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...New College Humanities Programme Handbook. • Check and double-check for inaccuracies and inconsistencies in spelling, punctuation and spacing • Include as wide a range of types of information sources on your topic as you can find. The main ones are books, journal articles, electronic journal articles, conferences, theses, websites, and newspaper articles, reports and government publications (though the last two types are unlikely for the subject of this sample bibliography) • Choose references that are up to date, unless your topic has a historical slant, in which case older material will be appropriate • Select from good quality resources with academic validity THE BIBLIOGRAPHY The subject chosen is Post-structuralism. Search strategy: The topic has a lot of material. To reduce this and to ensure that references will be up to date, only items published between 1998 and 2003 in English have been used. A wide range of information sources has been consulted to ensure a balance...
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...processes. Psychology seeks to understand through research and application, the behaviors and emotions of human beings. Through this paper, the writer will examine the foundations of the study of psychology, the major schools of thought, and will identify the fundamental biological links to behavior. As a subject of study, psychology was established by Wilhelm Wundt, who in the late 1800s “founded the first psychology laboratory in Leipzig, Germany” (Kowalski & Westen, 2009, p.8). Wundt paved the path for psychology to emerge from what had been simply philosophical debate into scientific investigation. His main method of investigation was introspection, he trained observers to relay information of their mental reactions when presented with several objects, by recording this information, he was able to conclude that “the basic elements of consciousness are sensations (…) and feelings” (Kowalski, et al., 2009, p. 9), although he believed that experimentation was important to understand the basic elements, he knew that it was not the only way to understand psychology. Structuralism One of Wundt’s students, Edward Titchener, did believe that experimentation was not only useful, but that it was the only method of scientific investigation appropriate for psychology. Titchener established what became known as the structuralism school of thought; structuralism catalogued feelings and sensations as not scientifically useful, because they could not be perceived by anyone other than by the...
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...Cognitive Psychology Definition Paper Judith Reitz University of Phoenix PSY360 Abstract Since one major branch in psychology cannot contribute strongly enough to the greater understanding of human kind, there came many others that were developed and had to follow. However, each of these specific disciplines has had their own purpose and area that uses its tools and knowledge that can properly explain their many different actions. In taking into consideration all these aspects and views from each individual discipline can help one to grasp many different behaviors better including the causes of an action. Take for instance, an action say as a thought grants to seeing something as a whole instead of only from one perspective. Being able to perform this way leads to an overall better comprehension of one’s world, which is significant to the quality of life. While understanding requires thinking, the occurrence of cognitive psychology was never one of a doubt but more one of a timely fashion. Cognitive Psychology Definition Foundation of Cognitive Psychology As simple cognitive psychology might appear for many these days, the same cannot be applied to its...
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...Foundations of Psychology Paper xxx PSY/300 October 24, 2011 Dr. Wilson Foundations of Psychology Paper Since, “psychology was born from the womb of philosophy” (Kowalski & Westen, 2009), any philosophical questions about behavior thought, and feelings, came from using logic and argumentation. As the late ninetieth century came along, a new alternative approach in trying to understand the mind and behavior emerged. This new approach was to study the mind and behavior scientifically. William Wundt, “who founded the first psychological laboratory in Germany, and was also described as the father of psychology, use scientific methods to uncover the elementary units of human consciousness that combine to form more complex ideas” (Kowalski & Westen, 2009). The method Wundt and his students used was called introspection, where observers reported verbally what goes on in their minds when presented with a task to do. After recording his observers responses, Wundt conclusion was that “the basic elements of consciousness are sensations and feelings” (Kowalski & Westen, 2009), and can become a more complex idea if a person focuses attention, and mentally manipulates them. Wundt considered experimentation essential for studying the basic elements of the mind, while other methods, such as, the study of myths and religion requires higher mental process. However it was the next generation, (Wundt’s student) who took a different view of psychology. The student did...
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...Cognitive Psychology Definition Paper PSY/360 July 21, 20xx xxxx Cognitive Psychology Definition Paper Defining Cognitive Psychology Cognitive psychology focuses on the way human’s process information, looking at how we treat information that comes in to the person, better known as stimuli, and how this treatment leads to responses (McLeod, 2007). Cognitive psychologists study internal processes including perception, attention, language, memory and thinking. In ancient Greece, cognitive psychology created the need to understand how the mind works and what processes are involved in learning. Philosophers and early psychologists studied the mind, however the ancient Greeks knew little about the human mind and the mental process. Cognitive psychology is the field of psychology that emphasizes the study of mental processes (Galotti, 2014). These processes include thinking, language, problem solving, knowing, reasoning, judging and decision making. Cognitive psychology concluded that humans were not pushed or pulled by environmental factors. Cognitive psychology also studied how people view and understand the world. Subjects wanted to describe the patterns and irregularities during the operation of his or her mind. There were several key milestones in the development of cognitive psychology. Key Milestones in the Development of Cognitive Psychology Developmental milestones began in ancient Greek times have set a precedent in today’s views of cognitive psychology...
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