Psychological Approaches Of Modern Psychology - Research Paper Example

Topic: Approaches To Contemporary Psychology Introduction There are various different approaches to contemporary psychology and at the end psychologist settle for the seven major perspectives namely psychoanalytic, behaviorist, humanist, cognitive, neuroscientific/biopsychological, evolutionary, and socio-cultural.An approach is basically a perspective or view that involves particular assumptions based on certain beliefs regarding the behavior of humans, the study of some of their aspects and the research methods which are appropriate for undertaking the study.

According to most psychologists none of the perspective is more correct than the other since each of the perspective brings out a different understanding of human behavior.Behaviorism which is different from the other approaches views people and animals as well as controlled by their environment and the approach suggests that we are the results of what we have learned from our environment since the environmental factors called the stimuli affect the observable behavior referred to as the response.

There two main processes whereby people learn from their environment as per this approach namely the classical conditioning and operant conditioning; classical conditioning involves learning by association whereas the operant conditioning involves learning from the consequences of behavior.This approach also believes in scientific methodology which are controlled experiments and that study should only be of observable behavior since it is what can be objectively measured; people do not have the free will since the environment is what determines their behavior, the study of the observable behavior is on the basis that behavior can be reduces to learned Stimulus-Response units (S-R).

The principles of Classical conditioning applied in many therapies include systematic desensitization for phobias and aversion therapy and a Russian psychologist Ivan Pavlov who studied this conditioning looking through natursl reflexes and natural reflexes and natural stimuli managed to condition dogs to salivate to the sound of a bell through a repeated associated of the sound of the bell and food.The operant conditioning of voluntary and involuntary behavior investigated by B.F Skinner revealed that some behavior could be explained by the persons motive and that behavior occurs for a reason.

Positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement and punishment are the three main behavior shaping techniques as on the other hand critics of this study claim that it under-estimates the complexity of human behavior since many studies use animals which makes it hard to generalize to humans and this cannot explain for instance the speed in which humans puck up language thus the need to involve biological factors.Comparison to other approachesPsychoanalytical approach explains that the events in our childhood have significant impact on our behavior as adults and that people have minimum free will to make choices in life as we are unconscious mind govern our behavior as well as childhood experiences.

This approach is mainly theoretical and also involves a bit of therapy as opposed to the behavioral which also involves experiments and according to this theory the stimulation of different areas of the body is important as the child progresses through the important development stages.This approach however is not scientific and thus cannot be proved. It also emphasizes importance of sexuality while underestimating the role of social relationships which is different in each country, (McLeod, 2007)Humanistic approach emphasizes the study of the whole person known as holism by looking at through the eyes of the person behaving due to the believe that an individual’s behavior is connected to his inner feelings and self image.

This perspective centers on the view that ech person is unique and has the free will to change at any time ,contrary to the psychoanalytical and behavioral approaches and it further emphasizes that individuals have innate capacity for self-actualization which is our unique desire to achieve our highest potential as possible. This however doe not account for the factors affecting an individual which are beyond his control. It is thus least appropriate approach towards the study of human behavior.

Cognitive psychology revolves round figuring out the processes going on in the minds of people to know what makes them tick and is concerned with mental functions such as memory, perception attention; it views people being similar to computers in the manner they process information.Neuroscientific/biopsychological reduces humans to asset of mechanisms and physical structures controlled by their genes but fails to account for consciousness and the impact of the environment on the behavior. ConclusionThe different types of psychology sometimes contradict one another, overlap with each other or build upon one another and thus a healthy solution is one that feature most of them as each of them reperesents the richness and complexity of human and animal behavior.

ReferencesMcLeod, S. A. (2007)Psychology PerspectivesApproaches in Psychology