Major Psychological Theories Essay Example

wishes. This translation from need to wish is called the primary process. The id works in keeping with the pleasure principle, which can be understood as a demand to take care of needs immediately.

Just picture the hungry infant, screaming itself blue. It doesn't "know" what it wants in any adult sense; it just knows that it wants it and it wants it now.The infant, in the Freudian view, is pure or nearly pure id. And the id is nothing if not the psychic representative of biology. Unfortunately, although a wish for food, such as the image of a juicy steak, might be enough to satisfy the id, it isn't enough to satisfy the organism.

The need only gets stronger, and the wishes just keep coming. You may have noticed that, when you haven't satisfied some need, such as the need for food, it begins to demand more and more of your attention, until there comes a point where you can't think of anything else.This is the wish or drive breaking into consciousness. Luckily for the organism, there is that small portion of the mind we discussed before, the conscious, which is hooked up to the world through the senses.

Around this little bit of consciousness, during the first year of a child's life, some of the "it" becomes "I," some of the id becomes ego. The ego relates the organism to reality by means of its consciousness, and it searches for objects to satisfy the wishes that id creates to represent the organism’s needs. This problem-solving activity is called the secondary process.The ego, unlike the id, functions according to the reality principle, which says "take care of

a need as soon as an appropriate object is found. " It represents reality and, to a considerable extent, reason.

However, as the ego struggles to keep the id (and, ultimately, the organism) happy, it meets with obstacles in the world. It occasionally meets with objects that actually assist it in attaining its goals. And it keeps a record of these obstacles and aides. In particular, it keeps track of the rewards and punishments meted out by two of the most influential objects in the world of the child - mom and dad.

This record of things to avoid and strategies to take becomes the superego. It is not completed until about seven years of age. In some people, it never is completed. There are two aspects to the superego: One is the conscience, which is an internalization of punishments and warnings.

The other is called the ego ideal. It derives from rewards and positive models presented to the child. The conscience and ego ideal communicate their requirements to the ego with feelings like pride, shame, and guilt. It is as if we acquired, in childhood, a new set of needs and accompanying wishes, this time of social ather than biological origins. Unfortunately, these new wishes can easily conflict with the ones from the id.

You see, the superego represents society, and society often wants nothing better than to have you never satisfy your needs at all! Freud noted that, at different times in our lives, different parts of our skin give us greatest pleasure. Later theorists would call these areas erogenous zones. It appeared to Freud that the infant found its greatest pleasure in sucking, especially at the

breast. In fact, babies have a penchant for bringing nearly everything in their environment into contact with their mouths.A bit later in life, the child focuses on the anal pleasures of holding it in and letting go.

By three or four, the child may have discovered the pleasure of touching or rubbing against his or her genitalia. Only later, in our sexual maturity, do we find our greatest pleasure in sexual intercourse. In these observations, Freud had the makings of a psychosexual stage theory. The oral stage lasts from birth to about 18 months. The focus of pleasure is, of course, the mouth. Sucking and biting are favorite activities.

The anal stage lasts from about 18 months to three or four years old. The focus of pleasure is the anus. Holding it in and letting it go are greatly enjoyed. The phallic stage lasts from three or four to five, six, or seven years old. The focus of pleasure is the genitalia.

Masturbation is common. The latent stage lasts from five, six, or seven to puberty, that is, somewhere around 12 years old. During this stage, Freud believed that the sexual impulse was suppressed in the service of learning. I must note that, while most children seem to be fairly calm, sexually, during their grammar school years, perhaps up to a quarter of them are quite busy masturbating and playing "doctor. In Freud's repressive era, these children were, at least, quieter than their modern counterparts.

The genital stage begins at puberty, and represents the resurgence of the sex drive in adolescence, and the more specific focusing of pleasure in sexual intercourse. Freud felt that masturbation, oral sex, homosexuality, and

many other things we find acceptable in adulthood today, were immature. This is a true stage theory, meaning that Freudians believe that we all go through these stages, in this order, and pretty close to these ages.Behaviorism Behaviorism is a learning theory that only focuses on objectively observable behaviors and discounts any independent activities of the mind.

Behavior theorists define learning as nothing more than the acquisition of new behavior based on environmental conditions. Experiments by behaviorists identify conditioning as a universal learning process. There are two different types of conditioning, each yielding a different behavioral pattern:

Classic conditioning occurs when a natural reflex responds to a stimulus.We are biologically “wired” so that a certain stimulus will produce a specific response.

One of the more common examples of classical conditioning in the educational environment is in situations where students exhibit irrational fears and anxieties like fear of failure, fear of public speaking and general school phobia.

Behavioral or operant conditioning occurs when a response to a stimulus is reinforced. Basically, operant conditioning is a simple feedback system: If a reward or reinforcement follows the response to a stimulus, then the response becomes more probable in the future.

For example, leading behaviorist B. F. Skinner used reinforcement techniques to teach pigeons to dance and bowl a ball in a mini-alley. There have been many criticisms of behaviorism, including the following:

• Behaviorism does not account for all kinds of learning, since it disregards the activities of the mind.
• Behaviorism does not explain some learning–such as the recognition of new language patterns by young children–for which there is no reinforcement mechanism.
• Research has shown that animals adapt their reinforced patterns to new
  

information.

For instance, a rat can shift its behavior to respond to changes in the layout of a maze it had previously mastered through reinforcements. Behaviorism impacts learning and the theory is relatively simple to understand because it relies only on observable behavior and describes several universal laws of behavior. Its positive and negative reinforcement techniques can be very effective– such as in treatments for human disorders including autism, anxiety disorders and antisocial behavior.

Behaviorism is often used by teachers who reward or punish student behaviors.Behaviorism is often seen in contrast to constructivism. Constructivists are more likely to allow for experimentation and exploration in the classroom and place a greater emphasis on the experience of the learner. In contrast to behaviorists, they feel that an understanding of the brain informs teaching Structuralism The psychological perspective of structuralism was developed by Wilhelm Wundt but advanced more predominantly by Edward Titchener, and it is often seen as the first attempt at a scientific psychological perspective as it developed the use of controlled experiments in laboratories.Structuralism conducted itself similarly to chemistry, but whereas the chemist studies the breakdown of chemicals and atoms the structuralists is concerned with the breakdown of the mind and consciousness.

The structuralists aimed to find patterns and groupings of consciousness and to make connections between the elements of consciousness and their underlying physiological conditions. The method used to study and quantify consciousness was an observatory method known as introspection.To conduct introspective studies a trained experimenter would be given stimulus, in the form of words, and would observe the mental processes that unfolded, such as the stimulation of emotions or other words etc. and the aim was to

locate patterns in the mind that related to stimuli. It was believed by structuralists that patterns of consciousness could be found and quantified through introspection and that the same patterns would be discovered by every experimenter, revealing the scientific structure of consciousness.The idea was to find regular patterns in all human psyches and quantify these into global laws of the mind where all behavior could be explained and analyses via these set scientific laws.

Criticism of Structuralism Structuralism relied on the method of introspection but this method was subject to one of the fundamental flaws of observation methods; that it is possible for two people to observe the same scene at the same time but interpret what they see differently. With many experimenters all relying solely on observation to back up an entire theory this problem was a crucial one.Structuralists believed that every experimenter who performed introspection would find the same patterns in metal processes but this was not the case as different people had different responses to stimuli and experimenters interpreted their responses differently. Thus by relying solely on observation no scientific structures of mind could be found and every experimenter was arriving at different observations and different conclusions.

Humanism Humanistic psychology theories began to grow in popularity during the 1950s.While earlier theories often focused on abnormal behavior and psychological problems, humanist theories instead emphasized the basic goodness of human beings. Some of the major humanist theorists include Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow. During the 1950s, humanistic psychology began as a reaction to psychoanalysis and behaviorism, which dominated psychology at the time.

Psychoanalysis was focused on understanding the unconscious motivations that drove behavior while behaviorism studied the

conditioning processes that produced behavior.Humanist thinkers felt that both psychoanalysis and behaviorism were too pessimistic, either focusing on the most tragic of emotions or failing to take the role of personal choice into account. Humanistic psychology was instead focused on each individual’s potential and stressed the importance of growth and self-actualization. The fundamental belief of humanistic psychology was that people are innately good, with mental and social problems resulting from deviations from this natural tendency.In 1962, Abraham Maslow published Toward a Psychology of Being, in which he described humanistic psychology as the "third force" in psychology.

The first and second forces were behaviorism and psychoanalysis respectively. Psychologist Abraham Maslow first introduced his concept of a hierarchy of needs in his 1943 paper "A Theory of Human Motivation" and his subsequent book, Motivation and Personality. 2 This hierarchy suggests that people are motivated to fulfill basic needs before moving on to other needs. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is most often displayed as a pyramid.The lowest levels of the pyramid are made up of the most basic needs, while the more complex needs are located at the top of the pyramid.

Needs at the bottom of the pyramid are basic physical requirements including the need for food, water, sleep and warmth. Once these lower-level needs have been met, people can move on to the next level of needs, which are for safety and security. As people progress up the pyramid, needs become increasingly psychological and social. Soon, the need for love, friendship and intimacy become important. Further up the pyramid, the need for personal esteem and feelings of accomplishment take priority.

Like Carl Rogers, Maslow emphasized the importance of self-actualization,

which is a process of growing and developing as a person to achieve individual potential. Maslow believed that these needs are similar to instincts and play a major role in motivating behavior. Physiological, security, social, and esteem needs are deficiency needs (also known as D-needs), meaning that these needs arise due to deprivation. Satisfying these lower-level needs is important in order to avoid unpleasant feelings or consequences.

Maslow termed the highest-level of the pyramid as growth needs (also known as being needs or B-needs).Growth needs do not stem from a lack of something, but rather from a desire to grow as a person. Five Levels of the Hierarchy of Needs There are five different levels in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs:

Physiological Needs These include the most basic needs that are vital to survival, such as the need for water, air, food and sleep.

Maslow believed that these needs are the most basic and instinctive needs in the hierarchy because all needs become secondary until these physiological needs are met.

Security Needs These include needs for safety and security.Security needs are important for survival, but they are not as demanding as the physiological needs. Examples of security needs include a desire for steady employment, health insurance, safe neighborhoods and shelter from the environment.

Social Needs These include needs for belonging, love and affection. Maslow considered these needs to be less basic than physiological and security needs. Relationships such as friendships, romantic attachments and families help fulfill this need for companionship and acceptance, as does involvement in social, community or religious groups. .

Esteem Needs After the first three needs have been satisfied, esteem needs becomes increasingly important. These include the need

for things that reflect on self-esteem, personal worth, social recognition and accomplishment.

Self-actualizing Needs This is the highest level of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

Self-actualizing people are self-aware, concerned with personal growth, less concerned with the opinions of others and interested fulfilling their potential However, it is not necessary to think of these three schools of thought as competing lements. Each branch of psychology has contributed to our understanding of the human mind and behavior. Humanistic psychology added yet another dimension that took a more holistic view of the individual.

Criticisms of Humanistic Psychology

Often seen as too subjective; the importance of individual experience makes it difficult to objectively study and measure humanistic phenomena. How can we objectively tell if someone is self-actualized? The answer, of course, is that we cannot. We can only rely upon the individual's own assessment of their experience.

Observations are unverifiable—there is no accurate way to measure or quantify these qualities.

Strong Points of Humanistic Psychology

• Emphasizes the role of the individual; humanistic psychology gives more credit to the individual in controlling and determining their state of mental health.
• Takes environmental influence into account; rather than focusing solely on our internal thoughts and desires, humanistic psychology also credits the environment's influence on our experiences.
• Humanistic psychology continues to influence therapy, education, healthcare, and other areas.

Humanistic psychology helped remove some of the stigma attached to therapy, and made it more acceptable for normal, healthy individuals to explore their abilities and potential through therapy.

Cognitivism

Cognitive theory is concerned with the development of a person's thought processes. It also looks at how these thought processes influence how we understand and interact with the world. The foremost cognitive thinker was Jean

Piaget, who proposed an idea that seems obvious now, but helped revolutionize how we think about child development: Children think differently than adults.

Piaget then proposed a theory of cognitive development to account for the steps and sequence of children's intellectual development. Piaget's stage theory describes the cognitive development of children. Cognitive development involves changes in cognitive process and abilities. In Piaget’s view, early cognitive development involves processes based upon actions and later progresses into changes in mental operations. The key concepts are as follows: Schemas - A schema describes both the mental and physical actions involved in understanding and knowing.

Schemas are categories of knowledge that help us to interpret and understand the world.In Piaget's view, a schema includes both a category of knowledge and the process of obtaining that knowledge. As experiences happen, this new information is used to modify, add to, or change previously existing schemas. For example, a child may have a schema about a type of animal, such as a dog. If the child's sole experience has been with small dogs, a child might believe that all dogs are small, furry, and have four legs.

Suppose then that the child encounters a very large dog. The child will take in this new information, modifying the previously existing schema to include this new information.

Assimilation

The process of taking in new information into our previously existing schemas is known as assimilation. The process is somewhat subjective, because we tend to modify experience or information somewhat to fit in with our preexisting beliefs. In the example above, seeing a dog and labeling it "dog" is an example of assimilating the animal into the child's dog schema.

Accommodation

Another part

of adaptation involves changing or altering our existing schemas in light of new information, a process known as accommodation.

Accommodation involves altering existing schemas, or ideas, as a result of new information or new experiences. New schemas may also be developed during this process.

Equilibration

Piaget believed that all children try to strike a balance between assimilation and accommodation, which is achieved through a mechanism Piaget called equilibration. As children progress through the stages of cognitive development, it is important to maintain a balance between applying previous knowledge (assimilation) and changing behavior to account for new knowledge (accommodation).;