Chapter 1 Introduction Define psychology Psychology is the scientific study of affect feelings cognition mental processes such as thoughts and behavior Psychology is the science of understanding human individuals affect behavior and cognition Define the following theories and use each to explain any given behavior e g why do humans shave hair from their bodies Why do some humans bow when meeting other humans Why do humans apply makeup and scented liquid to their bodies Founded on patterns that on average maximized the reproductive potential of our species Sociobiological Theory Genetic chaos mutations Thought and behavior can be inherited Nature Life is hard resources are limited Fittest survive or reproduce has to be one of those keeps individual alive or their genes Much of what exists is was adaptive Human behavior what was advantageous to us a long time ago Example People like sweeter foods because many years ago when there wasn t a lot of food sweeter foods provided more calories o Sociocultural Theory Our thought and behavior is shaped by the culture we grow up in and the group s norms Right vs Wrong Different cultures have distinct ways of showing attractiveness Example Why do people wear uggs People in our society have developed this belief that uggs are attractive and very stylish People wear uggs to follow the social and group norm Learning Theory Social Cognitive Theory Behavior Attitude is determined by experience of positive and negative outcomes Organisms are designated to seek pleasure or avoid pain Example Not planning to wear uggs but then one day you randomly do Based on if you were rewarded compliment or punished insult about wearing the uggs determines whether you will keep wearing them Thoughts feelings and behaviors are determined by beliefs attitudes affect expectations goals and memories Going through a mental process and thinking of the outcome Explain how sociobiology can be applied to explain differences in sexual behavior between males and females In the sociobiological theory one of the main goals of individuals is to reproduce and continue their genetic gene Men and women will do things to their body to be more sexually attractive to other people to reproduce and accomplish their goal of passing on genes For example women will wear perfume or wear make up to seem more sexually attractive to men and men will shave their chest Describe Watson s study on learning fear and Bandura s study on learning aggression and explain how each provide evidence of learning Watson s Little Albert Experiment was done to prove that our thought and behaviors are not based solely on genetics but on our environment and experiences Watson performs an experiment where a baby is normally not afraid of furry objects learns to be afraid of all furry objects after a white rat is presented to him with a loud noise The learning theory is seen in this experiment because the rat was presented in a negative way which caused baby Albert to react by crying and being frightened Bandura s belief was that people could learn through observation He showed a group of children a Bobo doll and had someone violently abuse the doll When children were put in the room with the doll Bandura found that the children reacted the same way as the demonstrator and even found new ways to violently hit the doll Learning theory can be seen here because children saw what was being presented and saw it as being positive so when they were in the room with the doll they did exactly what they thought was expected and right Chapter 2 Research Methods For each research method listed in Appendix A provide the definition and example and explain the advantages and disadvantages of that theory method Method Example Advantage Disadvantage Naturalistic Observation A researcher unobtrusively collects information without the Research Psychologists for the National Highway Traffic Administration conduct seatbelt The researcher does not influence the participants behavior so it may be more Not everything can be observed in its natural environment Generally time consuming participant s awareness Structured Observation Researchers can set up a situation and observe the participant s behavior observations to determine whether use varies by age sex race geographic location and type of vehicle Knowing this helps design programs that focus on those groups and areas with the lowest observed use Developmental psychologists create a situation in which a mother leaves her child in a room with a stranger for a few minutes The way the child responds when she leave and returns tells the researcher something about the child s attachment style representative than if people knew they were being watched Can provide interesting descriptive data and expensive Behavior has to be interpreted by the researcher and two researcher might see things differently The researcher generally knows very little about the participants Individuals do not have the opportunity to decide whether or not they want to participate The researcher has more control of the situation and can keep most variables under control The researcher can collect other information from the participants The participant is aware of the researcher and may be influenced by the artificial situation or his her beliefs about what the researcher expects to find The researcher may still need to interpret the behavior Self Report Participants are asked to provide information or responses to questions on a survey or structure assessment Controlled Experiment Researchers create a controlled environment in which they can carefully manipulate one variable to test its effect on another Educational psychologists can ask students to report their grade point average and what if anything they eat for breakfast on an average day A healthy breakfast has been associated with better academic performance Digangi s 1999 Surveys are inexpensive and efficient ways to collect a lot of data They are easy to create and score Computers allow data collection from participants all over the world Clinical psychologists can test a new pharmaceutical treatment for depression by giving some patients the new pill and others an already tested one to see which is the more effective treatment The researcher can be relatively sure that any difference observed was caused by whatever is being studied e g the drug administered and not something else There are often differences between what people really think and do and what
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