Four Main Perspectives in Psychology

There are four main perspectives in psychology. These are known as; behaviourism, humanism, psychodynamic and cognitive. Each of them explain some aspects of human behaviour well, but one perspective cannot explain all human behaviour.
Behaviourism is primarily concerned with observable behaviour; the behaviour which can be watched and seen by others. It does not focus on any internal events, such as thinking, memory or the mind. It suggests that all behaviours are the result of some sort of stimulus, which triggers a response. Behaviourists believe that no matter how complicated the behaviour, it can be reduced down to a simple stimulus and response association. Watson described the purpose of psychology as “To predict, given the stimulus, what reaction will take place; or, given the reaction, state what the situation or stimulus is that has caused the reaction.” (1930, p11)
Behaviourism suggests that people have no personal agency and that the environment alone determines behaviour. We are assumed to be born Tabula Rasa and the behaviourism perspective believes we learn new behaviour through classical and operant conditioning. Watson believed that classical conditioning explained all aspects of psychology, that the way we behave is just patterns of stimulus and responses. It involves learning behaviour via association.
In the ethically dubious experiment Little Albert Watson and Raynor showed the way in which humans and animals could both learn by classical conditioning. Little Albert was a nine month old infant, Watson and Raynor used classical conditioning to make Little Albert afraid of a white rat which he previously had no fear of. Thus proving classical conditioning can be used to create a phobia. (Cited from Watson & Raynor 1920, pp. 1 – 14). “Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select - doctor,

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