PSİKOLOJİ - Deneme Sınavı - 1

Psychology separated from philosophy and became a discipline on its own right in the late nineteenth century.

According to empiricism, humans gain more complex understandings of themselves and their environment by associating their perceptions, observations, and ideas.

Idealism is a philosophical approach about the nature of human knowledge. While questioning how humans acquire knowledge, idealism not only emphasized the role of the senses as in empiricism, but also the role of the mind. It suggested that by combining and integrating the sensations, perceptions and observations, humans’ mind plays an active role in the development of knowledge.

Materialism is a philosophical approach, which rejected the idea of mind and body as separate entities. According to materialism, the mind is not something spiritual or nonphysical. The mind is just a part of the body. That is, the roots of the mind can be found in the body. This implied that working of the mind can be explained through the working of the body. This also implied that internal psychological processes are understood by exploring the physical principles of the body.

Beginning of modern psychology dates back to the late nineteenth century, when Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920) founded first psychology laboratory in Leipzig, Germany.

In a frame of functionalism, in order to understand the behavior, researchers in
psychology should focus on how adaptive it is in the relevant environment. This was in contrast with the approach of structuralism, which focused on what
constituents the behavior internally or mentally.

Approach of psychoanalysis, founded by Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), suggests that psychology should study human mind by discovering the unconscious processes.

Approach of behaviorism, emerged in the USA, suggested that psychology should study the observable behavior. Behaviorism was influenced by functionalism and empiricism. It emphasized the relationship between behavior and environment. It suggested that psychology should question what happens in people’s environment and how they behave accordingly. That is, how the environment shapes the behavior.

Developmental psychology studies human behavior in the context of aging. It aims to understand how human behavior changes with aging across life.