First, the definition of psychology
1, psychology is the study of behavior and psychological activities. At the end of 19, psychology became an independent discipline, and it was not until the middle of the 20th century that psychology had a relatively unified definition.
2. Psychology as a science began in 1879. At that time, influenced by natural science, German scholar Feng Te established a psychology laboratory, which broke away from speculative philosophy and became an independent discipline.
3. From 65438 to 0879, influenced by natural science, German scholar Feng Te established the first psychology laboratory in Leipzig University, which marked the birth of scientific psychology.
Second, the application of psychology
1, describe what happened.
The first task of psychology is to observe behavior accurately. Psychologists generally refer to this observation as their data. Behavior data (behavior? Data? ) is a behavior observation report about the body and environment when the behavior occurs. When researchers collect data, they must choose an appropriate level of analysis and design a method to measure behavior that can ensure objectivity.
Step 2 explain what happened
Description must be faithful to perceptible information, while explanation carefully transcends observable phenomena. In many fields of psychology, the central goal is to find the laws of behavior and psychological process. Psychologists want to find out how behavior works.
Psychological explanations usually admit that most behaviors are influenced by some factors. Some factors play a role within the individual, such as genetic composition, intelligence level or self-esteem. The internal determinants of these behaviors are called organic variables (organic? Variable? )。 They are some special contents about the body. As far as human beings are concerned, these decisive factors are the so-called temperament variables (negative? Variable? )。 There are some external factors. The external influence on behavior is environmental variable or situational variable.
A trained psychologist can use his or her insight into human experience and the fact that previous researchers have found the same phenomenon to explain the observed phenomenon. Many psychologists try to determine which of several explanations can explain a particular behavior pattern most accurately.
3. predict what will happen
Prediction in psychology is a statement of the possibility of a specific behavior and the possibility of a specific relationship being discovered. An accurate explanation of the reasons hidden in specific behavior forms can often enable researchers to make accurate predictions about future behavior.
Control what happens.
Control is the core and the most inspiring goal. Control means making behavior happen or not-initiating it, maintaining it, stopping it, affecting its form, intensity or incidence. If the explanation of behavior causes can create conditions for controlling behavior, then this explanation is convincing.
The ability to control behavior is very important, because it provides a way for psychology to help people improve their quality of life.
Psychologists use scientific methods to draw conclusions about individual behavior and psychological process. Psychologists have several goals: objectively describe behavior at an appropriate level, explain the reasons for behavior, predict when behavior will happen, and control behavior to improve the quality of life.
Third, the development of modern psychology.
As Hao Bin, a famous psychologist in China, said, "Two hundred years ago, there was no scientific psychology as a way to explore the inner world, but the journey of exploring the spiritual world has already set sail! It is unknown in what form mankind will continue this journey after 200 years, but I firmly believe that as long as we exist for one day, this pace will never stop. " The development of scientific psychology has gone through more than one hundred years. In the process of development, on the one hand, people argued about the research object and theoretical system of psychology for decades, forming various theoretical schools, and finally reached a basic understanding in the 1950 s, which made psychology prosperous. Cao, a researcher of psychology and hypnosis in China, put forward the theory of brain operation, which brought a good theoretical model for psychological display logic. On the other hand, with the deepening and expansion of psychological research, psychology itself has been constantly divided, and many branches of psychology have been derived, making psychology more and more important.
Fourthly, the research field of psychology.
1, application field
Psychological research involves many fields such as perception, cognition, emotion, personality, behavior, interpersonal relationship and social relationship, as well as many fields of daily life-family, education, health and so on. On the one hand, psychology tries to explain the basic behavior and psychological function of individuals with brain operation, and at the same time, psychology also tries to explain the role of individual psychological function in social behavior and social motivation; At the same time, it is also related to neuroscience, medicine, biology and other sciences, because the physiological functions discussed in these sciences will affect the mind of individuals. [ 1]?
2. Research field
Developmental psychology: the study of the whole growth and development process of human beings from fetal birth to old age and death.
Learning psychology: exploring how people developed into today's state. Study the process and reasons of human and animal learning.
Personality psychology: Focus includes personality characteristics, motivation and individual differences.
Sensory and perceptual psychology: the study of how humans perceive the world around them, such as how humans recognize faces.
Comparative psychology: the study and comparison of animal behaviors of different species.
Physiological psychology: the study of the relationship between behavior and physiological processes, especially the activities of the nervous system.
Cognitive psychology: mainly studies thinking problems, trying to understand the relationship between psychological processes such as reasoning, problem solving and memory and human behavior.
Gender psychology: study the differences between men and women, and explore the influence of physiological factors, child rearing process, education, social impression and other factors on gender differences.
Social psychology: research involves attitude, persuasion, riots, obedience, leadership behavior, racial discrimination, friendship, marriage and love.
Cultural psychology: the study of the role of culture in human behavior.
Evolutionary psychology: studying the influence of various evolutionary ways on human behavior in the long history. For example, men and women choose their spouses.
Clinical psychology: mainly studies mental health and mental illness.
Preschool child psychology: Preschool child psychology is a science that studies the psychological development law of children from birth to school.
Behavioral psychology: the study of the combination of various physical reactions used by organisms to adapt to environmental changes.
Criminal psychology: the study of prisoners' will, thoughts, intentions and reactions.
3. Research type
(1) is divided from the continuity of research time.
A. longitudinal study
"longitudinal? Methods ",also called follow-up study, is a systematic and regular study of people's psychological development for a long time. American psychologist N.Bayley takes 6 1 newborn babies as the object and takes intellectual development as the research theme. From 1929, he followed up for 36 years and achieved many important achievements in the development of human intelligence, namely the famous Berkeley Growth Research (Berkeley? Grow up? Research) is one of the longest longitudinal studies.
Longitudinal research repeatedly examines the psychological activities and characteristics of the same object in a specific period, so it can understand its development and change process in detail and has high continuity. However, due to the long cycle, it is easy to be affected by changes in social environment, and the number of samples is also easy to decrease. Moreover, the measured data is easy to affect the mood of the subjects because of repeated measurements, resulting in a decline in accuracy.
B, horizontal research
Cross section? Methods, also called cross-sectional study, is a study to test and compare the psychological development of subjects of different age groups at the same time. For example, to understand the memory development characteristics of children aged 10- 16, we can test and compare individuals of four age groups: 10, 12, 14 and 16. This type of research saves time, but it is rough and not systematic enough to fully reflect the problem.
Vertical and horizontal research
Some people call it "dynamic" research, which is a flexible combination of horizontal research and vertical research.
2. From the choice of research objects.
A. Case studies
Case? Study? Method is the study of one or several topics, and it often adopts the method of longitudinal tracking. For example, Chen Heqin, an early psychologist in China, tracked the psychological development of his children 808 days after birth. Some case studies do not use tracking methods, such as the experimental study of Piaget, a famous psychologist. We can make a detailed, in-depth and comprehensive investigation on the topic, but there are too few topics, which affects the representativeness and typicality of the research.
B. Group study
Group? Study? The method is to study a group of topics. From a statistical point of view, the lower limit is generally a small sample group of 30 subjects. This study has a large number of samples, which can be statistically processed. It is scientific and representative, but it is not convenient for individuals to study in depth.
Case group study
This is a study that combines the above two studies.
research method
Psychological research methods are various specific methods and means to study psychological problems, including the use of instruments and tools. There are many research methods of psychology, such as natural observation, experiment, investigation, test and case study.
Natural observation method
Natural observation is a process in which researchers collect all kinds of information about people's behavior in social life purposefully and systematically through senses or with the help of certain scientific instruments under natural conditions.
From the time of observation, it can be divided into long-term observation and regular observation; From the content of observation, it can be divided into comprehensive observation and key observation. The former is to observe all the psychological performance of the subjects in a certain period, and the latter is to focus on one aspect of the psychological performance of the subjects. From the observer's identity, it can be divided into participatory observation and non-participatory observation. The former is that the observer actively participates in the activities of the subject and observes as the subject, while the latter is that the observer does not participate in the activities of the subject and observes as a bystander. From the observation place, it can be divided into on-site observation in natural places and situational observation in artificial places.
The advantage of observation method is that it keeps the naturalness and objectivity of people's psychological activities, and the information obtained is more real. The disadvantage is that observers are often in a passive position and belong to the passive type. In addition, the observed results may sometimes be superficial phenomena, and the reasons for psychological activities cannot be accurately judged. In order to overcome the weakness of observation method, control observation method, that is, experiment method, appeared.
experimental method
Refers to the research method of manipulating a variable under control conditions and investigating its influence on other variables. It is a method of purposefully controlling certain conditions or creating certain situations to arouse some psychological activities of the research object.
1. Laboratory experiment
This refers to a method of research in the laboratory by using certain facilities and controlling certain conditions with the help of special experimental instruments. A method to explore the relationship between independent variables and dependent variables. Laboratory experiment method is convenient to strictly control various factors, and it is generally reliable to test and record experimental data through special instruments. It is usually used to study the psychological process and the physiological mechanism of some psychological activities.
2. Natural experimental methods
This is a method to create and control certain conditions purposefully and systematically under natural conditions such as daily life.
Natural experiment method is close to people's real life, easy to implement, and has the advantages of experimental method and observation method, so this method is widely used to study a large number of courses in educational psychology, child psychology and social psychology.
Identification method
Investigation method refers to the method of understanding the psychological activities of the respondents by answering questions in writing or orally.
The main feature of the survey method is to ask the respondents to state the questions in the form of questions. According to the needs of research, we can investigate the respondents themselves or those who are familiar with the respondents. Survey methods can be divided into written survey and oral survey.
test method
That is, psychological test is a research method to measure the psychological quality of the subjects by using standardized psychological test scales or precise test instruments. For example, commonly used psychological tests include: ability test, personality test, intelligence test, individual test, group test and so on. In the research of management psychology, psychological tests are often used as tools for personnel evaluation, personnel selection and personnel placement.
Clinical methods
It is difficult or impossible to study mental disorders such as depression and insanity by experimental methods. In fact, many psychological experiments are morally unacceptable or operationally infeasible. In this case, it may be the best way to obtain information through case studies.
Case study is sometimes considered as a natural clinical test, that is, the test of accidental or natural events that can provide psychological data.
The lack of formal control group in case study limits the conclusions obtained from clinical observation. However, in the study of rare events, such as unusual psychological disorders and gifted children, clinical methods have special value (Harding? Fox & Meta, 2002). The case study of psychotherapy also provides many useful suggestions for treating emotional problems (Hessen? ,2004)。
Generally speaking, other research methods cannot study cases as deeply as clinical methods (Edwards,1998; Mirsky. et？ Al. ,2000)。
3. Research tasks
Describe psychological facts
In order to establish and develop a complete and scientific concept system of psychological phenomena, various psychological phenomena are scientifically defined from the perspective of scientific psychology. This involves the determination of the whole psychological phenomenon and the conceptual connotation and extension of a specific psychological phenomenon.
Reveal psychological laws
Scientific psychology should not be limited to describing psychological facts, but should transition from the description of phenomena to the explanation of phenomena, that is, to reveal the laws that some phenomena follow.
On the one hand, it studies the occurrence, development, interrelation, characteristics and functions of various psychological phenomena. On the other hand, it is to study the mechanism of the occurrence and performance of psychological phenomena. Including psychological mechanism and physiological mechanism. The former studies the changes in the relationship between psychological structural components involved in psychological phenomena; The latter studies the relationship and changes of physiological or biochemical components involved behind psychological phenomena.
Verb (abbreviation of verb) guides practical application.
Instruct people how to know, predict, control and adjust people's psychology in practice. For example, according to the performance of various psychological phenomena such as intelligence, personality, temperament, interest and attitude, various test scales can be formulated to understand the level and characteristics of people's psychological development, and provide a basis for teaching students in accordance with their aptitude and matching people with posts.
Employment situation of intransitive verbs
First, colleges and universities, which is the main destination of psychology graduate students after graduation. Colleges and universities pay more and more attention to students' mental health problems, and have set up public courses in psychology, with master of psychology as the teacher of public courses in psychology. This undoubtedly expanded the employment of psychology graduate students. One of the best employment directions for Master of Psychology is to enter the Department of Psychology and the Department of Education and become a psychology teacher. However, with the increase of doctoral graduates and the continuous expansion of graduate students, it will become more and more difficult to engage in this profession. Psychological counseling centers in colleges and universities also provide employment opportunities for masters of psychology. However, this generally requires the practice of psychological counseling during school, and girls are generally preferred. Postgraduates in psychology compete more fiercely for the position of counselor than students in other majors, but generally speaking, joining the party is a prerequisite. The salary of university work varies according to the specific position and region.
Second, civil servants. It is generally the public security system that recruits psychology graduate students as civil servants: public security bureau, reeducation-through-labor center, prison, border checkpoint, etc. Are all possible places. Some units have strict physical requirements for employees, while others need physical fitness tests.
Third, enterprises. Psychology graduate students go to enterprises that focus on headhunting (talent agency), enterprise consulting and human resource management. Postgraduates in psychology are different from students majoring in human resource management. Students majoring in psychology advocate humanized management, which is complementary to students majoring in human resource management. But because people don't know much about psychology, students in psychology department are not as competitive as those in human resource management. Graduate students of psychology department can also engage in market research, but the number is relatively small, generally more than undergraduate students.
Fourth, primary and secondary schools. Undergraduate students are generally recruited, and the psychological counseling department is mainly used as a "vase" to cope with the inspection of the education department, so the future is not optimistic and the income is low, so graduate students are generally disdainful, unless they can't find a job, they are generally not considered.
Fifth, psychological counseling workers. Judging from the current situation in China, the domestic industry simply engaged in psychological counseling may not be able to maintain a certain standard of living, and it needs to develop if it wants to have the wages of foreign counterparts.
Sixth, hospitals and clinics. Students who study clinical psychology and medical psychology can go to hospitals or psychological clinics to engage in psychological counseling and treatment. However, in view of the current demand for psychologists in China and the need for a medical license to go to a hospital, it is more difficult.