# History and Scientific Method of Psychology ## Emergence - Psychology will never be born unless we think of ourselves in another way -- ==spiritual element follows natural laws, too==. - ==Philosophy + Biology => Psychology== ### Philosophy - This trend starts with Rene Descartes -- ==Cartesian Dualism== - Human body is mechanistic - However, "soul" can intervene and control the machine - John Locke -- maybe the mind is also mechanical? - James Mill -- "materialism" ### Biology - Luigi Galvani and his frogs. - Paul Broca anatomy -- Broca's area in the brain for producing speech, localism in the brain. ==High level functionality is also mechanistic!== ## Before Freud - Psychology was born in Germany - Hermann von Helmholtz - Measuring the speed of the neural signal - 25 - 38 meters per sec. - Ernst Weber - the difference threshold Just Noticeable Difference (JND) - Weber fractions: $\Delta I/I = k$ - The stronger the initial stimuli, the harder it is to detect the difference - Wilhelm Wundt -- the 1st Psychologist, ==the Father of modern psychology== - The founding of the first psychological lab - Train observers to perform _Introspection_ - Structuralism of conscious experience - William James - Functionalism, inspired by Charles Darwin - "Why" the features exist? What they're good for? - Publishing psychological topics ## Freud - See [[freud]] for more info. - Id, Super-Ego, and Ego - Clinical Psychology (what works works) - Scientifically untestable? ## After Freud - Behaviorism - SR psychology - only observable stimuli and response - **Little Albert Experiment** - Furry rabbit and a baby - Clanging the hammer when the baby approaches the critter - The baby is now scared of anything furry. - New trends over time - Cognitive Psychology - information processing system of our mind - Social Psychology - Individual Differences - Cross Cultural Psychology - Clinical Psychology (including Positive Psychology) - Biological Revolution ## Truth Seeking - Rationalism, knowing by thinking vs. Empiricism, knowing by senses - Seeking questions - Observational Research - Correlational Research - Seeking answers - Experiments and Contrasts - Manipulating the independent variables and examine the dependent ones ## Knowledge Association - Intervening variable = influenced by independent variable, and influences dependent variable (no direct causality between the vars we're interested in) - There could be a 3rd var, though ## Knowledge by Contrast - T-Test - Measures between group and within group differences to determine if the difference is significant - Inferential statistics -- make predictions > [!tip] What Makes Good Science? > > - Interesting and relevant > - Replicable > - Generalizable