Sub-fields
Organizational/Industrial Psychology
Clinical Psychology
Social Psychology
Developmental Psychology
Educational Psychology
Experimental Psychology
Cognitive Psychology
Evolutionary Psychology
Forensic Psychology
Sport Psychology
Cross-cultural Psychology
Positive Psychology
Psychology 1
1. Introduction to Psychology
2. Basic Psychological Processes: Perception, learning, memory
3. Thinking & Decision Making
4. Intrapersonal Processes: Motivation, Emotion, Personality,
individual differences, Intelligence
1. Johnson, J. G., Weber, A. L., & Filter, K. J. (Eds.). (2006). Introduction to psychology (2nd ed.). HarperCollins
Publishers.
2. Ciccarelli, S. K., & White, J. N. (2017). Psychology: An exploration (5th ed.). Pearson Education India.
3. Morgan, C. T., King, R. A., Weisz, J. R., & Schopler, J. (2008). Introduction to psychology (7th ed.). McGraw-
Hill.
4. Baron, R. A., & Mishra, S. (2016). Psychology (5th ed.). Pearson.
Psychological Research: Scientific Nature
Experimental Vs
Non-experimental
Experiment
Effect of manipulation of independent variable(s) on
measurement of dependent variable(s) in a controlled
condition
Operationalization of variables
Randomization
Cause-effect relationships
Experiment
Study of effect of manipulation of independent variable(s) on
measurement of dependent variable(s) in a controlled
condition.
•By sample : Between group design
•By conditions : Within group design
Experiment
Study of effect of manipulation of independent
variable(s) on measurement of dependent variable(s)
in a controlled condition.
Unit of measurement
•Ceiling effect
•Floor effect
•Discrimination index
Experiment
Study of effect of manipulation of independent variable(s) on
measurement of dependent variable(s) in a controlled
condition.
•Confounding of variables
•Matched conditions
•Counterbalanced
•Elimination
Lab & Field experiments
•Validity : External vs Internal
•Realism : Mundane vs Experimental
•Biases :
• Subject effect
• Demand characteristics – social desirability & evaluation apprehension
• Experimenter effect
•Double-blinded experiments
Non-experimental Methods
Study how changes in one variable(s) is/are associated or link with
changes in another variable(s)in the naturalistic setting.
•Correlational Relationships
•Large scale sample
•Randomized sampling
•Multivariate research
Non-experimental Methods
•Archival Research : assembly & analysis of secondary data
•Case studies : in depth analysis of single case
•Survey research :
• Structured / semi structured interviews
• Questionnaires
• Open ended / close ended
• Rating scales / binary responses
• Generalization
Non-experimental Methods
•Field Studies : observation, recording and coding of behavior belief
and feeling as it occur.
•Ethnography
•Observation
•Narratives
✓Qualitative in nature
✓Subjectivity bias
Data Analysis
• Statistics
• Statistical software
• Interpretation
• Power & Significance of the study
Research Ethics
• Ethical approval
• Respect of privacy
• Use of deception
• Informed consent
• Debriefing
Schools of Psychology
The Story so far…
Wilhelm Wundt
• Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1920), a German
professor of philosophy, founded the first
laboratory for the scientific study of
psychology at the University of Leipzig in
1879.
• Father of Experimental Psychology
• The “scientific” technique Wundt
employed was introspection (literally,
“looking within”)
Structuralism
• The structuralist perspective assumes that
psychological experience is better
understood only when the content of that
experience has been analysed and
identified. These elements would include
ideas like sensations, emotions, and images.
• These investigations were based on
introspection by trained subjects.
• Introspection – careful, systematic self-
observation of one’s own conscious experience.
Edward Tichner
G. Stanley Hall
• Wundt’s student, G. Stanley Hall played
vital role in bringing the science of
psychology to America.
• Founded the American Psychological
Association (APA) and became its first
president, he started America’s first
research laboratory at John’s Hopkins
University in 1883, he began the first
journal of psychology in America.
Functionalism
• William James (1842–1910), whose
1890 book on ‘Principles of Psychology’
is considered the first textbook in
psychology.
• James is usually referred to as the
father of American psychology.
• Functionalism is the idea that
psychology should focus on the
function or purpose of consciousness
rather than its structure.
Behaviourism
John B. Watson
• Behaviorism is a perspective in psychology
that emphasizes the need to study only
what is observable. Mental events are not
observable; behaviors are observable. One
cannot observe thought processes, but only
the resulting behaviors, the environment in
which they are embedded, and the
consequences of such behaviors. Thus, it is
argued, behavior and its consequences are
the appropriate foundation for scientific
psychology.
Ivan Pavlov
• Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist, began studying stimuli and
behaviour in animals in 1906.
• He succeed in replacing the sight of food with a bell as the
triggering stimuli causing the dog to salivate.
• This type of conditioning revealed much about the
relationship of stimuli and responses in organisms.
• S-R Approach
B.F. Skinner
• Behaviourism gained greater influence
in the 1950’s with the work of B.F.
Skinner.
• By using stimulus and response pairings,
he gave empirical support to
conditioning using animal experiments.
Gestalt Psychology
The belief that consciousness and
behaviour must be studied as a
whole rather than in separate
disciplines.
Cognitive Revolution
Noam Chomsky (born in 1928), a linguist at MIT, argued
that language cannot be explained through a stimulus-
response process as championed by behaviorists. He
directly challenged Skinner’s book on verbal behavior in
a 1959 issue of the journal Language. He illustrated the
complexity of language acquisition and production, and
he maintained that purely behavioral explanations
could not convincingly explain these complexities.
Cognitive Psychology
• Cognitive psychology has been officially recognised as a discipline for
forty years, dating back to Ulric Neisser’s (born in 1928) landmark
book, Cognitive Psychology, in 1967; and the introduction of the
field’s journal in 1970.
• Cognitive psychology—the study of the psychological processes
involved in cognitive functions—combines Gestalt principles of
perception with interest in information processing, the sequence of
cognitive operations whereby sensory experiences are meaningfully
interpreted and acted upon.
Cognitive Psychology
• Cognition – the mental processes
involved in acquiring knowledge.
• Renewed the belief that thinking is a
physical experience and need to be
studied even though it is
unobservable.
• Piaget – Children’s cognitive
development
• Chomsky – Language acquisition and
cognitive roots.
• Kahnman & Tversky – Decision making
& Thinking
Sigmund Freud
• An Austrian physician who founded
the psychoanalytic approach to
psychology.
• From his work with people with
psychological problems like phobias,
irrational fears and anxieties, Freud
developed a theory based on the
existence of the unconscious.
• Emphasized deterministic role of
unconscious in personal conflicts and
maladaptive behavior.
Humanists Psychology
• Humanism was a direct reaction to the stripping of
free will that psychoanalytic theory and
behaviourism entailed.
• Humanism is the approach that emphasizes the
unique qualities of humans, personal freedom, and
personal growth.
Carl Rogers Abraham Maslow
• Human behaviour is determined by an individual’s
“self-concept”, which animals presumably lack.
• Need hierarchy
• The self-concept seeks to grow, evolve and develop
and psychological disturbances arise when these
drives are blocked.
Cross-cultural Psychology
• Focus on cultural rooting and
variation in human behaviour and
mental processes
• G. Hofstede: Cultural sensitivity
theory
• J. Berry: Acculturation
• R. Nisbett: Holistic Vs Analytic
culture
• M. Schaller: Behavioural Immune
system , Evolutionary Approach
Indian Scenario
N.N. Sengupta
G. S. Bose
D. Sinha K. R. Rao R.C. Tripathi
Janak Pandey G. Mishra
R A Singh Sudhir Kakkar
