INTRODUCTION

TO
PSYCHOLOGY
*Psychology is derived from two Greek words,
'psyche' and 'logos. 'Psyche' means 'mind, soul or
spirit' and 'logos' means the study of or 'knowledge-
study of soul.
*William James used the term 'mind, which replaced
'soul.
*they could neither see it(mind) nor understand it.
Seeing what it did meant they had to study the
activities of human beings.
*Wilhelm Wundt of Germany define psychology as the
study of consciousness.
*current definition of psychology as the systematic
study of human and animal 'behavior came to be
accepted.
DEFINITIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY
*Psychology is a science which aims to give us better
understanding and control of the behavior of the
organism as awhole-William McDoughall
*Psychology is the science of human and animal
behavior. It includes the application of behavioral
science to human problems.Psychology is the science
of human behavior.-Walter Bowers Pillsbury (1911)

MEANING OF BEHAVIOUR
*The term behaviour includes:
Motor or conative activities (walking,swimming,
dancing, etc.)
*Cognitive activities (thinking, reasoning,imagining)
* Affective activities (feeling happy, sad, angry, etc.)
*Behavior includes not only the conscious behavior
and activities of the human mind but also the
subconscious and unconscious. It covers not only the
overt behavior but also the covert behavior involving
all the inner experiences and mental processes.
DEVELOPMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY
*In 1879, the first psychological laboratory was
established at the University of Leipzig by the
German philosopher and psychologist Wilhelm
Wundt (1832-1920).
*Wundt was the first to measure human behavior
accurately and is known as the 'Father of
Psychology:
*SCHOOLS OF PSYCHOLOGY
*William James, Wilhelm Wundt and other psychologists
of the time thought of psychology as the study of mind. In
the first decades of the twentieth century, psychologists
came to hold quite different views about the nature of
mind and the best way to study it. Schools of thought
formed around these psychologists. These schools of
thought are known as the schools of psychology.
STRUCTURALISM
*established by one of Wundt's students, Edward B
Titchener (1867-1927).
*The goal of the structuralist was to find the units or
elements which make up the mind.
*Main methodused-introspection method.
GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY
This school of psychology was founded in Germany
around 1912 by Max Wertheimer (1880-1943) and his
colleagues.
*These psychologists felt that structuralists were wrong
in thinking of the mind as being made up of elements.
They argued that mind could be thought of as resulting
from the whole pattern of sensory activity and the
relationships and organizations within this pattern.
FUNCTIONALISM
*Functionalists such as John Dewey (1873- 1954),
James R Angell (1869-1949) and Harvey Carr (1873-
1954) .
*proposed that psychology should do 'what mind and
behavior do! The functionalists performed experiments on
the ways in which learning, memory, problem solving and
motivation help people and animals adapt to their
environments.
BEHAVIOURISM
*This school of psychology originated with John B
Watson (1879-1958). He insisted that psychology should
be restricted to the study of the activities of people and
animals-their behavior.
PSYCHOANALYSIS
*Psychoanalysis was founded by Sigmund Freud
(1856-1938).
* He developed a theory of behavior and mind which
said that much of what we do and think results from
urges or drives which seek expression in behavior and
thought.
MAJOR PERSPECTIVES OF
PSYCHOLOGY
*Psychologists with a behavioral perspective view
behavior as learned from the environment through
conditioning.
* Psychologists with a biological perspective try to
relate people's behavior and mental events to their
nervous and glandular systems.
*From a cognitive perspective, behavior and mind are to
be understood as ways in which information from the
environment received through the senses is processed.
*Psychologists with a social perspective are interested
in the interactions between and among people that
influence mind and behavior.
*Developmental perspective is concerned with
characteristic changes that occur in people as they
mature and change the way they think.
*Humanistic perspective emphasizes a person's sense
of self and each individual's attempts to achieve personal
competence and self-esteem.
*Psychoanalytic (psychodynamic) perspective
focuses on the unconscious motives and defence
mechanisms which manifest themselves in mental life
and behavior.

NATURE OF PSYCHOLOGY
*The nature of subject psychology is scientific.
*Psychology is factual.
*The laws of psychology are universal.
*The laws of psychology are verifiable.
*Psychology discovers the cause-effect relationship in
human behavior.
*Psychology predicts human behavior.

SCOPES OF PSYCHOLOGY
*Limits of its operations and applications. *Branches,
topics and subject matter with which it deals.
* It studies, describes and explains the behavior of living
organisms.
*It describes all types of life activities and experiences.
*It studies not only human behavior but also human
experience, language and other forms of
communication.
*It is applicable to all the living creatures created by the
almighty irrespective of their species, caste, color, age,
sex, mental or physical state.
*It also studies the behavior of animals, insects, birds
and plant life.
BRANCHES OF
PSYCHOLOGY
EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

*Apply psychological principles, theories and techniques to human

behaviour in educational settings.
*This branch helps in improving all aspects of learning and teaching
process and increase efficiency of learning in schools .

CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY
*Largest subfield of psychology.
*Describes causes of mental illness, abnormal behaviour of
patients and suggest treatment and adjustment of affected person
in society.
 INDUSTRIAL PSYCHOLOGY

*Apply psychological principles for the study of human behaviour in industrial environment.
*Industrial psychologists apply psychological principles to assist public and private organisations
with their hiring and placement programs.
*They councel employees who need help with personal problems .

MILITARY PSYCHOLOGY
*This branch of psychology helps to keep confidence of soldiers during war time.
*Also helps to secure better recruitment of the soldiers for fighting capacity .
 SPORTS PSYCHOLOGY
*It study behaviour of players and sports personnel in relation to activities,
experiences, situations and environment.

DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
*This branch describes the process and factors that influence the growth
and development at all stages of life.
*The sub branches include child psychology (useful for nurses in pediatric
setup), adolescent psychology ,adult and old age psychology.
 EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY
*Studies ways and means of carrying out psychological experiments using
scientific methods.
*They do basic research to know the fundamental causes of behaviour.
*eg:-Tried to asses speed of thought by measuring how long it took to test
subjects to make a judgement.(Wundt’s experiment)

CRIMINAL PSYCHOLOGY
*Studies behaviour of criminals-situations and causes leading to
criminal behaviour.
*Adopts behaviour modification devices for reform and
rehabilitation.
COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY
*Studies growth and development of cognitive abilities and capacities
of human beings-learning, problem solving, creative out, dreaming
etc..
COMMUNITY PSYCHOLOGY
*Particular community or group is known to possess it’s own psychology
of thinking, feeling and doing.
*They have unique style of living and behaviour, coping, maintaining
inter personal and intra personal relationship.
*Community psychologist works for welfare of communities.
METHODS OF PSYCHOLOGY
Special tools and procedures help us in gathering and organizing its
subject matter or essential facts about behavior. These procedures are
termed as method.
INTROSPECTION METHOD/SELF OBSERVATION
*Oldest method of psychology.
*Introspection means ‘to look within’.
*It is not possible to understand the inner feelings and experiences of other
persons .
*Here the subject is asked to systematically observe his own behavior and
report the same , which is later analyzed to understand behavior.
*This information will help for better treatment.
 MERITS
1)Introspection is the fundamental method of Psychology.Obseravation and
experimentation are based on introspection.
2)It does not involve any expenditure as it does not need any laboratory or apparatus.
3)We get a direct knowledge of the mental experience of the individual.

DEMERITS
1)This method cannot be used by children or animal or mental deficiency patients because
they cannot introspect.
2)It cannot be verified by other observer because it is purely private affair.
3)In many cases the patients may not have the insight to know about their conditions or
language to describe them accurately.
4)State of mental process is continuously changing.
 OBSERVATION
METHOD
*Observation is the objective method of studying the behavior of individuals.
*It consists of collection of data of an individual behavior by the other individual.
Eg;-when a nurse is
assessed to make an observational report on a patient with an undiagnosed illness the
and nurse reports her observation such as patient’s TPR, color, facial expression,
restlessness etc.
*It is widely used in studying behavior of children and animals.
*Steps in observation method are:
1.Observation of behavior.
2.Noting of behavior.
3.Interpretation & analysis of behavior.
4.Generalization
 MERITS
7
2.Results can be verified & re
1)It is economical, natural & flexible.
2)Results can be verified & relied.
habit &interest.
3)Observation method is suitable for observing developmental characteristics of
children’s habit &interest.
4)The data which is studied through observation can be analyzed, measured, classified
and interpreted.

DEMERITS
1)By Observation method we can observe only external behavior but not the things that
happening the mind.
2)Sometimes to observe the natural behavior the observer have to spend more time , money
and energy.
3)It lacks repeatability as each natural situation can occur only once.
4)Not being able to establish a proper cause and effect relationship.
EXPERIMENTAL METHOD

*The word experiment is derived from a Latin word meaning ‘to try’.
*This method became popular by Wundt.
*In this method the psychologist studies the effects of dependent variables on
changes in independent variables.
• eg .Effect of anxiety on the behavior. Here the psychologists use objective
observations under controlled environment/conditions to observe
the behavior performed by the individuals. (based on cause and effect
relationship)
• eg. Effect of noise on learning. From these observations certain
conclusions are drawn and theories, principles or laws established.
* Many experiments are being conducted on people & animals dealing with
learning, forgetting any many other mental activities.
STEPS IN
EXPERIMENTATION
1)Stating the problem.
2)Formulation of hypothesis.
3)Identifying study subjects.
4)Allotting the subjects to treatment and control groups.
5)Measuring the dependent variable.
6)Compare the results of the two groups.
 MERITS
1)Experiments are objective.
2)Experiments can be repeated for result confirmation.
3)Establish cause and effect relationship.
DEMERITS
1)It cannot always be used due to difficulties such as dangerous to subjects.
2)All problems of psychology cannot be studied by this method as we cannot
perform experiments for all the programs.
3)It is costly and time consuming method.
4)Experimental method fails to study behavior in in naturalistic conditions.
 CASE HISTORY METHOD
*It is a research method that involves a thorough, in-depth analysis of an individual, group,
institution or other social units.
*It uses case histories, interviews, home visits and psychological tests.
*It aims at studying the causes and basis of people anxieties, fears and personnel
maladjustments.
*It is scientific biography consisting of collecting all the information about the individuals
past.
*This can be done by collecting data from individual
himself and/his family members, friends. Classmates, teachers and others who know him an
d who can provide information about his past. Documents like treatment records, personal
diaries and articles directly or indirectly can be used.
*This method is also known as clinical method because it is widely used in hospitals by
Nurses, Doctors and other health team members to collect complete data from the patient
 MERITS
1)It will give an insight into the causes of the problems and suggest solutions.
2)It can be productive source of idea for further investigation by other methods.

DEMERITS

1)The case history method depends largely on memory of incidents which may
have been observed inaccurately.
 SURVEY METHOD
*All problems in psychology cannot b studied by the experimental and other methods.
*Some problems like study of opinions , attitudes , healthcare needs etc can be
studied by survey method.
*It involves collection or gathering of information from a large number of people by
using questionnaire or interview method. It is commonly employed in
social psychology.
*Survey is done by means of self report,
personal interviews and telephonic interviews by using
questionnaires, checklist, rating scales, ranking and inventories.
* It assesses different aspects of behavior , emotional experience, aptitudes,
knowledge, opinions, attitudes and values.
 MERITS
1)A large amount of data can be collected in a short period of time.

DEMERITS
1)The behavior is not observed directly.
 GENETIC/DEVELOPMENTAL METHOD
*It studies growth and changes in behavior in terms of its development from birth till
death and influence of heredity and environment in the development of the person’s
behavior and conditions favorable & unfavorable for normal development and
abnormality.
*EG;-To understand the learning behavior of an adult , the study will start from the
childhood and adolescence.
MERITS
*Useful to understand the behavior from point of view of hereditary and environmental
influences.
DEMERITS
*This method requires more time and energy.
 RELATIONSHIP OF PSYCHOLOGY WITH OTHER
SUBJECTS
PSYCHOLOGY AND PHYSIOLOGY
*Psychology is a science of experience. Experiences of an individual are intimately connected
with physiological processes, especially of the nervous system. Hence, psychology studies
these physiological processes in order to adequately account for mental processes

*It does not study those physiological processes which are not related to mental processes,
because it is primarily concer­ned with mental processes and behavior.

*Psychology is not to be confounded with physiology. Psychology deals with experiences,

knowing, feeling and willing. These are connected with physiological processes which are,
therefore, studied by psychology. Psychology also deals with behavior which is an expression
of experience.
 PSYCHOLOGY AND SOCIOLOGY
*Sociology is primarily concerned with the study of the inter­relationships between
human personalities in social groups. It is concerned with the study of the bonds which
inter-relate individuals in society. The nature of inter-personal relationships has become
quite intelligible through investigations in the field of psychology.

*That there is considerable overlapping between the provinces of psychology and

sociology. However, in spite of the fact that there is close relation between psychology
and sociology there are certain points of difference between the two.

*Psychology is primarily concerned with the experience and behavior of an individual.

Sociology, on the other hand, is concerned with the role that an individual plays in
society.
 PSYCHOLOGY AND PHYSICAL SCIENCES
*Psychology is a science of experience of an individual. But experience presupposes the
duality of subject and object, both of which are real.

*Psychology deals with mental processes such as knowing, feeling and willing, and in
order to account for them adequately it must study the nature of physical stimuli in
relation to knowing and willing.

*But there is a difference between psychology and physical sciences in the treatment of
physical objects. Physical sciences investigate the nature of physical stimuli apart from
their relation to an individual.

*But psychology studies the nature of the interaction between an individual with physical
stimuli.
APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY TO SOLVE EVERYDAY ISSUES
*Helpful in the development of self.
*Helpful in our learning and getting education.
*Helpful in our seeking guidance and counselling .
*Helpful in our adjustment and mental health.
*Helpful in maintaining proper interpersonal relationships.
*Helpful I seeking better treatment and cure.
*Helpful us in the proper running of our business and industry.
THANK YOU