Psychology Throughout Its History, Psychology Has Undergone

¶ … Psychology

Throughout its history, psychology has undergone a number of evolutions. As the study of mind, the discipline has necessarily been subject to change as new research revealed information about the functions of the mind and its effect upon behavior. Relatively simple conclusions drawn by those who are currently considered the founding fathers of psychology have been challenged and modified to become the various subdisciplines in psychology that we know today. Along with what can be considered the "mental" trends in psychology such as the behaviorist, psychoanalytic, the cognitive, and the evolutionary approaches, it has also been recognized that psychology has a firm basis in physiology.

In about 1913, the focus of psychology up-to-date profoundly changed as a result of work by the American psychologist John B. Watson. In an effort to bring more scientific merit to psychology, Watson advocated that the study of behavior should be used to draw conclusions regarding psychological processes. As such behaviorism focused on the assumption that behavior was the result of automatic responses to environmental stimuli (ThinkQuest, 2011). After Watson, B.F. Skinner became the leader of behaviorism. It was also Skinner who developed the view that operant conditioning was the mechanism for learning.

Psychoanalytic theory had its basis in Europe. It was developed by probably the most well-known psychologist in history, Sigmund Freud. For Freud, behavior was not at the heart of psychology, but rather the result of the inner workings of the mind. If the latter were not the focus of therapy, behavior would not be modified. Freud was one of the first psychologists who recognized the effect of the subconscious on human behavior. Because this idea was very far removed from what has been accepted as psychological theory to date, it was also very controversial (ThinkQuest, 2011). For behaviorists, this theory invalidated the work they did in an attempt to bring psychological study to the domain of science.

Cognitive theory is the most recent major approach to psychology. This approach arose during the 1970s. While it is, to some degree, a return to objectivity in psychology, it is not as simple as behaviorism. Indeed, it relies greatly on the function of inner mental processes to explain human behavior. At the basis of this theory is the fact that human beings internalize environmental information by means of their senses. This information is then processed mentally by means of organizing, manipulating, storing, and relating it to previously stored information.

Evolutionary theory, as the name suggests focuses on evolutionary developments in human psychology. According to the Journal of Evolutionary Psychology (2006), Charles Darwin was the first scientist to recognize that not only the physiology of humanity, but psychology has also developed in response to the challenges that historical human beings have faced. One example of this is the common human responses to emotionally charged situations such as hair standing on end and an adrenaline rush when we feel threatened.

This led Darwin to believe that facial expressions, such as smiling and frowning, could be cultural responses rather than instinctive ones. While physiological responses to danger could be the result of ancient evolution, some of the responses we display today could be the result of cultural evolution rather than instinct. While Darwin never had the opportunity to gather enough evidence to support his view, his work was continued by other psychologists. Only in the 1970s were psychologists able to establish that the facial expressions and even posture triggered by certain emotional states were indeed instinctive across the human race, regardless of culture or personal history.

Evolutionary psychology plays a role when the individual learns to override inappropriate instinctual responses by means of control mechanisms. Not all emotional responses are appropriate to all cultures. While instinctive response is therefore universal, the control mechanisms that are learned by means of cultural conditioning are not. Cultural rules are then learned by a type of short-term evolutionary learning process. As a child grows, for example, the local culture is learned in much the same way as learning language. The growing child learns through experience what sounds and gestures satisfy the local culture. This is internalized to become part of the instinctive process of living in a particular culture.

Investigators into the psychological discipline have also recognized that there is a direct physical basis in psychology. Even Sigmund Freud, with his almost exclusive focus on the inner mental processes, recognized that these processes have their origin in the human brain. Indeed, a damaged brain generally also means a diminished ability to function in a psychologically complex world.