The Different Basic School of Thoughts

STRUCTURALISM FUNCTONALISM PSYCHOANALYSIS BEHAVIORISM GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY HUMANISTIC/TRANSPERSONAL PSYCHOLOGY

Structuralism
It was developed by Wilhelm Wundt and his student, Edward B. Titchener in 1879. But it was only in 1898 got its name structuralism. The main concern was the study of what mad up consciousness.

Structuralism

Introspective analysis - the examination of ones own thoughts, sensation

Structuralisms major contribution to psychology need not to be emphasized: It gave psychology a great scientific impetus, getting the name psychology attached to it for the first time and clearly separated from its main parental field, physiology and philosophy.

Structuralism

It provided an extensive test of the introspective analysis as the only method for a complete psychology. It led to the formation of functional, psychoanalytic, behaviorist, and gestalt forces that organized their resistance against its orthodoxy.

Functionalism
It began at the University of Chicago with John Dewey and James Angell who both started it in 1894. Harvey Carr and Robert S. Woodworth were responsible for the maturation and further elaboration of the school.

A psychology that attempts to give an accurate and systematic answer to the questions, What do men do? and Why do they do it? is called a functional psychology. -Robert S. Woodworth

Functionalism

Pragmatism - the validation of knowledge in terms of its consequences, values, or utility.

The Reflex Arc Concept in Psychology - a written work by John Dewey that was an influential contribution in psychology. - it became a classic and was considered as the most significant landmark in the beginning of the functionalist movement. Application of pragmatism to education - the belief that educations life, learning is doing, and teaching should be student-centered rather than subject-centered.

Psychoanalysis
It was developed in Vienna, Austria by Sigmund Freud(1858-1939). It is a method of personality analysis and treatment.

Psychoanalysis

Interpretation of unconscious in one of Freuds Theories:

Basic but unacceptable (forbidden, punished) wishes of childhood get driven out of awareness. They become part of the active unconscious where, while out of awareness, they remain influential. The active unconscious presses to find the expression in dreams, slips of speech, unconscious mannerisms, as well as such socially approved behavior as artistic, literary, or scientific activity.

Psychoanalysis

Free Assocation - a way of helping unconscious wishes find verbal expression.

Psychoanalysis as a discipline began with the study of neurosis through the techniques of hypnosis, dream analysis, and free association and more an art, a philosophy, and a practice than a science.

Behaviorism
The development of this school was due primarily to one man John B. Watson (1878-1958). It was also became known as S-R psychology. According to this responses are elicited by stimuli.

Behaviorism

Stimulus - by this, Watson meant any object in the general environment or any change in the tissues themselves due to the physiological condition of the animal such as the change we get when we keep an animal from sex activity, from feeding, or from nest-building. Response - by this, he meant anything the animal does such as turning toward or away from light, jumping at a sound, and more highly complex and organized activities such as building a skyscraper, drawing plans, writing the book, and the like.

Behaviorism

Three other important characteristics of Behaviorism: Emphasis on conditioned reflexes as the building blocks of behavior. Emphasis on learned behavior. Emphasis on animal behavior.

Behaviorism denied the existence of instincts or of inborn tendencies.

Gestalt Psychology
It emphasizes the organization, the quality of wholeness, that inheres in both behavior and experience. It was born with Max Wertheimers (18801943) paper on apparent movement (phi phenomenon) which was a report of work along with Wolfgang Kohler (1887-1942), and Kurt Lewin (1886-1941), the co-founders of the school.

Gestalt Psychology

Gestalt - is a German word most properly translated as form, organization, or configuration.

Behavioral Genetics - a branch of psychology developed by Francis Galton, whereas Alfred Binet laid the foundations of the mental testing movement, the development of intelligence tests, personality tests, and tests of all types.

Transpersonal Psychology
It attends to the whole person; body, mind, and spirit and sees self-transcendence as the way to truth. It offers more inclusive vision of human potential, suggesting both a new image of the human potential, and a new world view. It focuses attention on the human capacity for self-transcendence as well as selfrealization and is concerned with the optimum development of consciousness.

SCHOOL Structuralism (Wundt, Titchener) Functionalism (Dewey, James, Cattell)

METHOD OF STUDY Introspection or analysis of content of consciousness. Objective observation and some use of introspection.

SUBJECT MATTER Experience through the senses as dependent on the sensing person. Study of the organism as a whole, functioning in its environment (no attempt to reduce mind into elements: rather, study of consciousness as an ongoing stream. The role of motivation, particularly the unconscious, in the determination of behavior.

BASIC QUESTIONS What are the elements of consciousness and how are these mental processes interrelated? What do individuals do? Why do they do it? What is consciousness for?

Psychoanalysi Free association s (Sigmund dream analysis, Freud) projective test.

What is the influence of anxiety and conflicting unconscious forces (id, ego, superego in the individuals adjustments to his environment?

SCHOOL Behaviorism (Watson, Skinner)

METHOD OF STUDY First, foremost, objective observation and a conditioned reflex method. The verbal report (a kind of introspection) only if its objective. Study of conscious experience phenological approach (studying phenomena as perceived by the subject). A variety of method but mostly interviews, literary writings, and other creative productions.

SUBJECT MATTER Stimuli and response, free of mentalistic concepts and subjective methods.

BASIC QUESTIONS Given the stimulus, what will be the response? Given the response, what does the antecedent stimulus?

Gestalt Psychology (Kohler, Koffka, Lewin)

Perceptual and learning phenomena with emphasis away from separate elements; stresses the wholeness and meaningfulness of behavior.

How can the principles of perception be applied to the understanding of motor behavior? What is the essence or unity of human behavior?

Humanistic and Transpersonal Psychology

Subjective What are the mans experiences rather potential for growth? than behavior How can we help man humanness, or achieve his potential. those qualities that distinguish man from the lower animals.