Notes: Psychology Research

Throughout this semester of Psychology 150 I have learned a great deal about several different concepts that I consciously, and sometimes unconsciously, find myself applying to my life. There are five different psychology topics I found that held the most relevance to my life. Some of these topics do not deal with myself exclusively, but they do affect the people I hold dear to me. The topics range from disorders to personality differences, and they all affect me in some way, both indirectly and directly.

After checking some of the websites about psychobabble and its meaning, I have learned that there is a lot of words used today by ordinary people, and Psychologist. Some Psychologist or Doctors will diagnose children with ADHD, but they have not tested these children properly to prove their diagnosis. Sometimes these children may be just bored or they need something to do that stimulates their interest in the subject that they are studying or they just have built-up energy and they may need more exercise in their daily routine, than other children.

Lots of research forms an put together biopsychosocial approach which realizes the biological, psychological, and sociocultural factors

In the video titled Learned helplessness (PsychYogi, 2014), Martin Seligman conducted a study in which he took three groups of dogs and put them in harnesses. He gave each group a lever that would either stop a charge that electrocuted the dogs, or do nothing. Group one was the control group and did not get electrocuted. The dogs in groups two and three were the experimental groups. Group two had control over the electric shocks and could stop them with the lever. Group three also received the shocks every time group two did, except group three had no control over their own lever. Every time group two pushed their lever to stop the shocks, group three’s shocks also stopped. Group three never knew when their shocks would stop. The dogs in group two learned that the lever would stop the shocks, so the more times they were shocked, the less time it took them to push the lever. Group three was the only group to have symptoms of depression due to learned helplessness (Psychyogi, 2014).

In Psychology 101, you learn about a personal fable; something that I have not lost. I have always wanted to change the world that I was destined for greatness and teaching elementary school students gives me that power. In the words of Nelson Mandela, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

Facts are statements that are indisputably true. Truthful statements are authentic because they are widely accepted to be accurate and fit reality. When answering the question “given access to the same facts , how is it possible that there can be disagreements between experts in a discipline?”, one must consider the definition of an expert. For the sake of this paper I am defining an expert as someone who excels in their field , and constantly evolves their knowledge as their field progresses. I believe that disagreements between experts when presented with the same facts, occur because of bias. Bias is a sway towards one side or view of a situation or statement. Therefore I ask , how does someone’s personal bias affect their interpretation

There is typically an underlying social force causing the individual to act or think in that specific way. (Cox, 1986)

Lorraine Hansberry once said “It’s simple. You read books--to learn facts--to get good grades--to pass the course--to get a degree. It has nothing to do with thoughts.” Of course it as to do with thoughts, but there’s more meaning behind this quote that may seem a little off to others who don’t study in the depths of psychology. Psychology is the study of the overall human brain and mind. There are many types of Psychology, but this quote relates to Behavioral Psychology which is studying observable behaviors rather than mental processes. Furthermore, the father of behaviorism, or B.F. Skinner, looked into operant conditioning. That is, operant conditioning is the process by which people make responses because they have

* Predict: Offering predictions (or hypotheses) about how a given condition or set of conditions will affect

Bias plays a part in scientific research because different scientists have differing opinions about the same data. For example, scientists can disagree on the collecting of the data, the interpretation of the data, and the significance of the data.

A debate rages in psychology. It is not one of the usual kind, dwelling on a specific aspect of the mind or a new drug, but a controversy dealing with the very foundations of psychology. The issue is determining how psychologists should treat patients and on what psychologists base their choices. Some feel that they must be empirically-supported treatments, treatments backed by hard data and scientifically supported. Others feel that this standard for treatments is much too confining for the complex field of psychology and that many good treatments cannot be backed by hard data. The American Psychological Association President Task Force on Evidence-Based Treatment came out with a plan for psychology that effectively maintains a high

In the future, I ultimately intend to be a psychologist. With being a psychologist, I am taking on the responsibility on how to lead people into having an overall better life and promote positive change for them. Psychologists often specialize in studying and examining the brain and human behavior. That being said, psychology is a very important branch of science that attempts to help us stay sane!

There has been a long-going development of a public image of scientists, one that has recently begun to change. Due to factors such as the internet and the media, science is something that is able to been seen and looked into simultaneously by numerous people. When a scientist intentionally fudges their data, it is not small news. Problems of this sort have birthed various concerns about science, and about science’s authority and reliability in specific. This speculation of dishonest scientists not only will effect the reliability of science in the eyes of the public, but also the realm in which scientists are producing truly credible knowledge. “Our technical knowledge is only as secure as the moral economy in which it is produced” (Shapin, ?). As of now, the way in which scientists come to agree or settle disputes, is an issue that we cannot fully grasp.

Normative influence primarily occurs in situations where an individual, when amidst others in a crowd, tend to go along with them primarily in order to be liked and accepted by them as part of their fraternity. Research has identified that normative inference normally occurs as an inborn human nature as human beings tends to associate themselves with others in order to maintain a good social contact and relationship with them. Ideally, normative influence is normally furthered by the need for an individual to increase their chances of surviving especially during adverse conditions. This entails that people may at times seem to agree with others just in order for them to appease themselves to them and avoid potential conflict of standing alone and standing out. In some situations normative influence may occur where individuals associate with complete strangers. In such cases, due to mutual fear for each other, an individual may naturally try to agree with the rest in order to avoid appearing as contradictory or controversial.

This research article was taken from the Association for Psychological Science (APS) Journal. This specific issue had a total of ten articles, and while they are covering different topics and studies, some of them do focus on similar ideas. Psychology is all about the study of the mind, and how it has different parts intended for unique functions. It seems like a good portion of the articles for this specific journal deal with emotions and how the body interprets them. One article deals with the stress of different generations, while another deals with an individual’s willpower against sugar. There is an article about self-esteem and how that varies during a lifetime, as well as an article on cooperation. The article that will be specifically discussed in this research paper also has to deal with how the body interprets things when it comes to a stressful situation, such as a crime. It looks at how reliable eyewitness testimony is after traumatic events, specifically in regards to lineups.