IndexThe behaviourist approachPsychodynamic perspectiveHumanistic approachIn this assignment I will explain the main psychological perspectives and evaluate the different psychological approaches to study. The main psychological perspective An approach is a perspective that involves specific norms of human behavior, how they work, what aspects of them are worthy of study, and what research methods are appropriate for undertaking this study. There may be several theories within one approach, but they all share these common assumptions. Sometimes people wonder why there are so many different psychological perspectives and whether one approach is right and others wrong. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay The psychological perspective is the result of a synthesis of cognitive and behavioral psychology theories. In this research tradition, three strategies are clear: (1) adopting attitude change as the most interesting dependent variable, (2) modeling communication (i.e., persuasion) as a special case of behavioral learning theory , and (3 ) the use of experimental social psychology for conceptual and methodological research strategies. The Behaviorist Approach Behaviorism is an approach to psychology that emerged in the early 20th century as a reaction to the psychoanalytic theory of the time. Psychoanalytic theory often had difficulty making predictions that could be tested using rigorous experimental methods. The behaviorist school of thought argues that behaviors can be described scientifically without resorting to either internal physiological events or hypothetical constructs such as thoughts and beliefs. Rather than focusing on underlying conflicts, behaviorism focuses on observable and evident behaviors that are learned from the environment. Its application to the treatment of mental problems is known as behavior modification. Learning is seen as a change in behavior shaped by experience; it is accomplished largely through classical or operant conditioning. In the second half of the 20th century, behaviorism was expanded through advances in cognitive theories. Although behaviorism and cognitive schools of psychological thought may not agree theoretically, they have complemented each other in practical therapeutic applications such as cognitive-behavioral therapy, which has been widely used in the treatment of many different mental disorders, such as phobias and addictions. . Some behavioral therapies use Skinner's theories of operant conditioning: by not reinforcing certain behaviors, these behaviors can be extinguished. Skinner's radical behaviorism advanced a “triple contingency” model, which explored the links between the environment, behavior, and mind. This later gave rise to applied behavior analysis (ABA), in which operant conditioning techniques are used to reinforce positive behaviors and punish unwanted behaviors. In social learning theory, Albert Bandura (1977) states that behavior is learned from the environment through the process of observational learning. . Children observe the people around them behave in various ways. The observed individuals are called models. In society, children are surrounded by many influential role models, such as parents within the family, children's TV characters, friends within the peer group, and teachers at school. Children pay attention to some of these people (models) andthey codify their behavior. They might later imitate the behavior they observed. First, the child is more likely to pay attention to and imitate people he perceives as similar to him. As a result, it is more likely to imitate behaviors modeled by people of the same sex. Second, people around the child will respond to the behavior he imitates with reinforcement or punishment. If a child imitates a role model's behavior and the consequences are rewarding, he or she is likely to continue performing the behavior. If a parent sees a little girl comforting her teddy bear and saying “what a nice girl you are,” this is rewarding for the child and makes him more likely to repeat the behavior. His behavior was reinforced. Reinforcement can be external or internal and can be positive or negative. If a child wants parental or peer approval, this approval is an external reinforcer, but feeling happy about being approved is an internal reinforcer. A child will behave in a way that he believes will gain approval because he wants approval. Psychodynamic Perspective In psychology, a psychodynamic theory is a view that explains personality in terms of conscious and unconscious forces, such as unconscious desires and beliefs. At the beginning of the 20th century, Sigmund Freud proposed a psychodynamic theory according to which the personality is made up of the id (responsible for instincts and the search for pleasure), the superego (which attempts to obey the rules of parents and society ) and by the Ego (which mediates between them according to the needs of reality). Psychodynamic theories commonly argue that childhood experiences shape personality. Such theories are associated with psychoanalysis, a type of therapy that attempts to reveal unconscious thoughts and desires. All behaviors have a cause (usually unconscious), even verbal slips. Therefore every behavior is determined. The personality is made up of three parts, the id, the ego and the superego. Behavior is motivated by two instinctive drives: Eros (sexual drive and life instinct) and Thanatos (aggressive drive and death instinct). Both of these drives come from the “id”. Parts of the unconscious mind are in constant conflict with the conscious part of the mind (the ego). The biological approach believes that we are a consequence of our genetics and physiology. It is the only approach in psychology that examines thoughts, feelings and behaviors from a biological and therefore physical point of view. Therefore, everything psychological is first and foremost physiological. All thoughts, feelings and behaviors ultimately have a biological cause. A biological perspective is relevant to the study of psychology in three ways: Comparative method: Different species of animals can be studied and compared. This can help in the quest to understand human behavior. Physiology: how the nervous system and hormones work, how the brain works, how changes in structure and/or function can influence behavior. For example, we might ask how medications prescribed to treat depression affect behavior through their interaction with the nervous system. Investigation of heredity: what an animal inherits from its parents, mechanisms of inheritance (genetics). For example, we may want to know whether high intelligence is inherited from one generation to the next. Each of these biological aspects, comparative, physiological, and genetic, can help explain human behavior. Twin studies provide geneticists with a kind of natural experiment in which the behavioral similarity of identical twins can be compared with the similarity of dizygotic twins (whose genetic relatedness is 0.5). In other words, if heredity influences agiven trait or behavior, then identical twins should show greater similarity for that trait than fraternal twins. Research using twin studies looks for the degree of concordance (or similarity) between identical and fraternal (i.e., non-identical) twins. Twins are concordant for a trait if both or neither twin has the trait. Twins are said to be trait discordant if one shows it and the other does not. Identical twins have the same genetic makeup, while fraternal twins share only 50% of their genes. Therefore, if concordance rates (which can range from 0 to 100) are significantly higher for identical twins than for fraternal twins, then this is evidence that genetics plays an important role in the expression of that particular behavior. Humanistic Approach Humanistic psychology, also often referred to as humanism, emerged in the 1950s as a reaction to the psychoanalysis and behaviorism that dominated psychology at the time. Psychoanalysis focused on understanding the unconscious motivations that drive behavior while behaviorism studied the conditioning processes that produce behavior. Humanist thinkers believed that both psychoanalysis and behaviorism were too pessimistic, focusing on the most tragic emotions or failing to take into account the role of personal choice. The strengths of the behaviorist approach are that behaviorism is based on observable behaviors, so it is easier to quantify and collect data and information when conducting research. Since research and experiment are a very powerful tool in providing clear explanations and evidence about a certain phenomenon, early theorists and advocates of behaviorism took pride in initiating studies on observable behaviors rather than those that cannot be observed and measured. Another strength of the approach is that it is scientific, for example, Pavlov's work has been used to create an objective and therefore scientific approach to psychology. The approach aims to study observable and directly measurable behavior. This is done so that thoughts and opinions are made operational, so that behaviors can be analyzed and compared. The weakness of the behaviorist approach is that a lot of emphasis is placed on culture as it focuses on how the environment influences and shapes behavior. This means that the role of nature is ignored, as behaviorists usually ignore that genetic constitution could have an impact on how we behave. Many internal factors govern behavior; an example of this is the role of motivation and emotion which are not taken into account in the behaviorist approach. Social learning theory has many strengths, but one of its key strengths is the fact that Bandura verified the first concept. His findings were that children copy aggression; this was confirmed in his 1961 case study. This study revolved around indirect reinforcement as he would have a child watch an adult party and play aggressively with the Bobo Doll/inflatable doll. Subsequently the child also repeated the same thing that had been shown to him as long as the model was not punished for his actions. Another weakness of this theory is that it does not emphasize the actual cognitive development of the child. Although there are some cognitive insights into SLT, this is not emphasized. A child is seen as a sponge, absorbing information through modeling. The child's actual contribution to how such patterns are absorbed, processed, and processed over time is largely missing from the theory. Modeling is.