PERSPECTIVES 

Biological psychology makes the undeniable point that psychological processes rest upon a biological substrate. Psychological phenomena occur within the context of our physical embodiment, so biological structures and processes clearly play a role in behaviour and cognition. (This is clearly illustrated by alterations in behaviour and emotional state produced by ingestion of drugs, exercise, brain damage etc.). Biological psychology therefore explores the potential roles biology can play in attempts at psychological explanation.\nThere are two main types of psychological explanation coming from biological perspectives. Causal explanations focus on the immediate precursors or causes (e.g. physiological processes) of a behaviour or characteristic; essentially, how a particular behaviour has occurred. These will be explored further in the rest of this section. Functional explanations, in contrast, look at why a particular behaviour or characteristic has evolved, i.e. the possible adaptive value of the behaviour seen within the context of neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory. This is examined in the section on evolutionary psychology. A central debate within psychology is the relative influence of social and biological factors. Relatively few psychologists would take the position that biology alone determines psychology, i.e. can fully explain all psychological phenomena. Psychological phenomena are usually seen by many biological psychologists as the result of a complex interdependence between biological and social processes. This is fully in line with the emphasis in modern genetics on gene-environment interaction, rather than seeing genes alone as a causal influence. For example, the same biological influences can have different effects in different social contexts. Social context can in turn affect biology (such as stress affecting the functioning of the heart). \nThe central focus of biological psychology looks at how the workings of the central nervous system (which includes the brain) affects behaviour and cognition. There may also be an emphasis on lessons that can be learned from the study of non-human nervous systems, looking at commonalities between different animals as well as those aspects in which humans are quite distinct from non-human animals. Although differences between people are examined in biological terms (e.g. in terms of brain damage or reactions to drugs), it is not concerned with what makes each human being unique. It is more concerned with documenting biological universals than with making individuals themselves the unit of analysis, offering a clear distinction here from perspectives like humanistic psychology. A key distinction between biological psychologists and psychologists from other traditions lies in the kinds of questions they ask. For example, a biological psychologist might look at depression in terms of neurotransmitter levels, or a particular genetic inheritance. A social psychologist might examine the depressed person's social networks and relationships. A more sociologically-influenced psychologist from a feminist background might in turn see the problem in terms not of the individual or their immediate social surroundings, but as a consequence of wider societal structures, e.g. oppressive gender relations within marriage as an institution. These different 'diagnoses' would lead to quite different courses of action in these three cases: respectively, recommending a course of anti-depressants; suggesting counselling; engaging in wider socio-political transformation. A psychologist taking a holistic viewpoint might conceivably regard all three as potentially useful actions to take.\nIn terms of methodology, biological psychology draws on a wide range of methods developed in disciplines such as neurophysiology, physics and chemistry, often involving study of the brain. For example, recording the electric activity of single neurons to see how they react for example to light stimulation, or studying the effects of stimulating neurons electrically. Biochemical analyses can also be used to monitor the activity of chemical neurotransmitters in the brain. Some relatively recent techniques include brain imaging techniques (e.g. positron emission tomography, or PET) and making use of data from the recent decoding of the human genome. In addition to these specialized techniques, biological psychologists also use the experimental method to compare the performance of different groups of people (e.g. with or without brain damage) on various psychological tasks. All the methods discussed above predominantly use an outsider viewpoint – although some recent brain imaging techniques do make use of insider accounts since researchers ask people questions about their experiences as they record brain activity, looking for correlations between the two. 

Behaviourism was a highly influential school of psychology founded by JB Watson in the early part of the twentieth century (though with earlier roots in the work of Thorndike and Pavlov). Its primary feature was a rejection of many methods used by psychologists up to that date, in particular the value of 'introspection': the idea that psychologists could gain useful insights by looking within their own minds. As explored by Wilhelm Wundt and his followers, introspection led to serious problems of reliability and validity, with disagreements among observers who were reporting responses to the same stimulus. Watson's solution to this methodological impasse was radical – he proposed that if psychology was to be properly 'scientific' (in the manner of the natural sciences, such as physics, chemistry and biology) then it must reject the study of mental events entirely, and confine itself to the study of externally observable behaviour (hence the name behaviourism). The basic idea was that behaviour can be understood entirely without reference to the concept of mind or consciousness, simply by looking at connections between the stimuli applied to a particular organism, and the resulting responses. Behaviourism's insistence on rigorous scientific methodology is still influential in many fields of psychology today, even though its original denial of mental representations has been largely discarded.\nAnother feature of Watson's approach was to look for parallels between humans and other animals in terms of common features involved in learning processes. In particular, the laboratory rat occupied pride of place in many a psychological laboratory, providing insight into issues such as conditioning and reinforcement. Another key aspect of Watson's critique was on the previous importance given by many psychologists to 'innate' factors (i.e. those present at birth, governing behaviour by instinct rather than through learning of some kind). While Watson did not deny the existence of such aspects (suggesting that learning builds on innate factors), he argued that innate factors had been overemphasized, and that psychologists had underestimated the role of environmental factors. If true, this clearly has major implications well beyond psychology – for example, for debates about selection for secondary schooling. It is interesting even today to look at the debates between politicians of different hue, depending on whether they see crime as primarily caused by environmental factors, or by the innate criminality of the individual. Depending on which one is thought to be the more correct, very different social policy responses would be suggested.\nBehaviourism takes a deterministic stance, largely (or entirely) denying possibilities of human agency. Humans aren't seen as having the capacity for exerting conscious choice, but either react to stimuli or emit behaviour according to how they have been conditioned. A simple early study of classical conditioning involved Pavlov's famous work with dogs, who were trained to salivate on hearing a bell, sounded at the times they were fed. Eventually they would salivate at the sound of the bell alone, even without the presence of actual food. Humans may have much more complex 'contingencies of reinforcement' (and other types of conditioning, such as operant conditioning, where reinforcement is only given if the organism produces a specific response), but were seen by behaviourists as essentially similar in that they could be conditioned to react to stimuli (or emit behaviour). \nBehaviourism can be defined in two primary ways: • The weak definition, or methodological behaviourism, simply says the best strategy pragmatically for psychology as a discipline is to confine study to observable events: external behaviours. This approach doesn't necessarily deny that mental events are real, just that they can't be successfully studied scientifically. • The strong definition, or radical behaviourism, goes further, in actually rejecting the very concept of mental events. For example, Watson argued that thinking is just silent speech, i.e. not a private, internal process, but a behaviour that could be observed in principle (if the observer could pick up the very soft speech the thinker says to him or her self). Consciousness is seen as either just a brain by-product, with no causal effect on behaviour, or even completely non-existent. This approach to behaviourism originated with Watson, and was subsequently adopted and modified by Skinner. Some of the consequences of a strict, radical behaviourist viewpoint (such as the lack of conscious choice) have been explored by Skinner in his novel Walden Two. Although such a viewpoint has a limited following among contemporary psychologists, the pragmatic emphasis of methodological behaviourism still carries quite a strong resonance for many experimental psychologists, with externally-observable actions seen as central to psychological research, even if interpreted within a quite different theoretical context to that of behaviourism. 

Developmental psychology focuses on how our psychological characteristics change and develop throughout life, from birth (or, indeed, conception) to old age. Developmental characteristics studied include personality, development of relationships with others, cognitive capacities, and biological changes. All these characteristics are seen as interacting: for example the level of biological development influences our cognitive capacity; this will in turn have consequences for social interaction and so on. Two of the research designs used in developmental psychology are: • longitudinal studies, Where the same people are followed over time, and their changes in behaviour plotted. • Cross-sectional studies – which look at different people in different age groups, examing their different capacities in terms of cognition, capacity for social relationships etc. One of the first major influences on developmental psychology was Darwin, whose theory of evolution prompted a radical re-examination of the way people thought about human development. The first idea that developmental psychology inherited from Darwin's theory was a functionalist perspective, arguing that if a behaviour is functional it increases the organism's chances for survival. Darwin examined the high degree of similarity between adults and children within any one species, as well as degrees of difference, suggesting that some actions must be innate reflexes rather than learned behaviours. An individual is the result of a gradual sequence of prior changes, both in a broad evolutionary sense and within that individual's own lifetime. Throughout, an individual's life further development and change lies ahead. This emphasis on gradual and continual change forms the basis of modern lifespan psychology. At the beginning of the 20th Century developmental psychologists were particularly concerned with charting the ages at which certain changes in behaviour 'normally' occur (e.g. when does a child talk for the first time). This developed into an approach to studying human development that is known as the organismic approach. That is, the individual (or 'organism') is its main focus. Changes in behaviour throughout life are typically presented as a natural sequence of changes that occur sequentially, in a fixed order, so that an individual has to pass through an earlier stage before reaching a later one. This is referred to as a stage theory. It should also be noted that there are distinct 'developmental lines' which tend to develop in parallel, for example cognitive development (cf Piaget) and psychosexual development (cf Freud). One of the assumptions of an organismic stage theory is that environmental influences, while important, can only affect the speed of development. They may slow development down, or accelerate it, or even stop it, but they cannot alter the nature of the stages themselves or the sequence in which they occur.\nAn early influential example of such an approach to human development was Freud's theory of psychosexual stages, which a child had to pass through, seen as central to the emotional development of that child. If a crisis occurred during any developmental stage, then it would be reflected in that person's personality. Like many earlier developmental theories, it tended to conceive of adulthood as a relatively static 'product' of childhood development, rather than seeing it as having its own unique developmental stages. Another developmental approach in the organismic tradition was produced by Piaget, who focused on cognitive development rather than emotional development. Although Freud and Piaget both took an organismic approach, their research methods and psychological traditions are very different. Freud's ideas were based on the clinical data of psychoanalysis, whereas Piaget's theorizing was based, initially, on observation of his own children - informed by biological, evolutionary and psychometric perspectives.\nIn contrast to the organismic approach, the mechanistic approach to representing human development focuses not on the individual, but on his or her behaviour. Development is primarily seen as the product of environmental influences (external factors), with genetic inheritance and cognitive processes (internal factors) seen as less significant. This approach draws on behaviourism and its principles, where development is characterised as a sequence of behavioural responses to environmental stimuli. However, behaviour analysis attempts to address the full context and complexity of human responses to his or her environment, and differs from behaviourism is in its greater acknowledgement of biological influences and constraints on development. \nInitially, developmental psychology focussed primarily on changes during childhood; however, 'lifespan' theories (such as Erik Erikson's) attempt to look at possible developmental challenges occurring throughout adult life also. This represents the beginnings of attempts to overcome the rather pessimistic view implied by traditional approaches, which viewed adulthood as a relatively static 'end-point' of childhood development, with the only change perceived as the physical and psychological decline of old age.\nErik Erikson's lifespan psychology was pioneering in several ways: firstly, in explicitly recognising that psychological development continues during later life, and trying to map some of the key transitions. Secondly, because of its emphasis on the relationship between the individual and society in affecting personal development. Erikson's model of later life is essentially person-centred. Another approach is function-centred: looking at just one type of behaviour (e.g. memory) and measuring variation in it across the lifespan. This approach focuses on changes in ability with age. These changes can include both losses and gains (e.g. loss of processing speed compared to a young adult, but potentially balanced by increase in experience and knowledge). Modern developmental psychologists increasingly conceive development is as a transaction between the individual and their environment, with each influencing the other and in turn affecting the developmental path followed. This acknowledgement of the role a person plays in determining their own environment (and vice-versa) means that the 'nature-nurture' distinction is seen as overly simplistic in developmental psychology. Modern theories also conceive development as the outcome of interactions between age-related factors (e.g. biological maturation, social events such as attending school), historically-related factors (e.g. evolution, the occurrence of war), and 'random' biological and environmental occurrences that only relate to one individual. This approach to lifespan development is known as 'contextualism', drawing on a wide range of perspectives in addition to psychology, such as neuroscience, sociology, history and anthropology. The basic idea behind developmental contextualism is that development does not occur in isolation, it is affected by the context of a person's life. It is suggested that internal influences on development like an individual's biology and psychology interact with external factors such as their cultural influences, interpersonal relationships etc. It is this interaction between influences that results in human development. With this approach, development is seen as clearly embedded within society, its cultures and history. 

Evolutionary. As the name suggests, evolutionary psychology tries to make sense of behaviours by looking at their possible evolutionary basis, i.e. how a particular behaviour might have helped humans adapt to their original prehistoric environments. This is an example of a functional explanation, as it seeks to understand a behaviour by seeing the possible function it may have played, within the evolutionary framework of Darwinian theory. The central idea is that modern humans will have brain structures, behaviours and motivations that evolved in prehistoric times but still exist today as genetically-transmitted, biologically based predispositions, passed down because of their adaptive value. A key point to understand is that evolutionary adaption (at least for humans) acts on long timescales, typically over tens or hundreds of thousands of years, or even longer. However, human culture changes dramatically over much shorter timescales – think of the changes over just the last century or so. In fact, it is only a few thousand years since most humans were still living essentially 'prehistoric' hunter-gather lifestyles. So although the environment humans live in is dramatically different in practically every way from our original prehistoric one, our brains and nervous systems will not have had time to adapt to any great extent, if at all. The extent to which our behaviours have changed is the crucial empirical question for which evidence has to be collected.\n\nThis perspective is multidisciplinary as it draws on a mixture of existing data, evidence and methods from psychological disciplines such as cognitive psychology, neuropsychology and group behaviour, as well as disciplines outside psychology, for example: • genetics • social anthropology: observations of current-day tribes living in hunter-gatherer groups • paleoanthropology: the collecting and documenting of ancient artefacts and tools, also prehistoric cave pictures and other art • primatology • ethology. Although it is clearly not possible to devise experiments to study the behaviours and social organisation of prehistoric humanity, evolutionary psychologists draw on data from the above disciplines to formulate possible hypotheses about different aspects of human behaviour. It may then be possible to examine actual human behaviour, to see if it fits in with the prediction, for example on the kinds of gender differences that would be expected to be found in male and female experiences of jealousy, based on Darwinian ideas about reproductive strategy. \n\nAnother area to which evolutionary psychology has been applied is in-group and out-group differences, i.e. the strong tendency to favour members of the 'in-group' to which one belongs, while being indifferent or even hostile to outsiders from an 'out-group'. This can be explained in evolutionary terms by seeing the potential 'adaptive value' this could have had for our ancestors living in small tribal groups. Group members who supported and co-operated with others within their group but were prepared to compete with outsiders for resources could plausibly be argued to have a survival advantage. Their superior access to resources would have enhanced their chances of survival, and hence reproduction. This would therefore have meant they had a greater chance of passing on their genes to future generations. So those genetic combinations which led to greater in-group/out-group differentiation would have been more likely to have been perpetuated (this is essentially what the 'adaptive value' of a particular behaviour refers to). While such behaviour towards in-groups and out-groups may well have been 'adaptive' for prehistoric hunter-gatherer communities, it is likely to be a good deal less fruitful under modern day conditions. For example, an evolutionary psychologist might try to analyze the conflict in Northern Ireland between Nationalists and Unionists in 'tribal' terms, as an expression of in-group/out-group behaviour. This might help understand some of the (to outsiders) apparently irrational and self-destructive aspects of many of the social interactions involved, If such social behaviours are indeed at least partly rooted in our evolutionary past, this understanding may suggest some contributions evolutionary psychology could make towards possible solutions. Explanations of social behaviour in evolutionary terms tend to be opposed by those psychologists who are influenced more by sociological viewpoints than biological, such as SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISTS (see the section on this). The latter argue that the major reasons for such conflicts are better seen in terms of socio-cultural forces, and the kinds of language in which they are framed. Unfortunately, there is rarely much attempt made in psychology to integrate such differing viewpoints. It is on the one hand important to be on guard against the kind of 'theoretical laziness' which ignores the profound conceptual and methodological conflict between such perspectives, in pursuit of a superficial eclecticism. However, it is perhaps another kind of 'laziness' which prevents proponents of one approach from even trying to get deeply inside alternative perspectives, with the aim of developing a genuinely multiple perspective viewpoint (even if this involves acknowledging some unresolved contradictions and disagreements). Humans are complex creatures, rarely explainable in terms of a single type of influence. This arguably requires psychologists to draw together as many perspectives as possible. 

Anthropology. Literally, anthropology means 'the study of mankind'. It is usually divided into two quite distinct disciplines: Social (or cultural) anthropology: the study of the wide range of different cultures and social systems found across the planet. It has obvious conceptual overlaps with sociology, although the latter tended to focus on Western societies; social anthropology was initially more concerned with non-Western, so-called 'primitive' societies. (In this context, it is perhaps relevant to note Gandhi's reply when questioned as to what he thought of 'Western civilization': “I think it would be a good idea”). However, these two disciplines of sociology and social anthropology have developed quite different methodologies and theoretical approaches to understanding their subject matter. ETHNOGRAPHY [see 'methods'] is a key method used by anthropologists. Physical anthropology: a biological, evolutionary approach to measuring, classifying and analysing different human groupings (e.g. based on ethnicity, geography, or 'race' – though the latter term is now considered problematic, in perpetuating what has been called 'biological racism'). 

Cognitive psychology explores cognitive processes such as perception, problem solving, and memory, usually making use of behavioural data. Methodologically, cognitive psychology marked a clear break with behaviourism in once again making the mind a legitimate focus of study in psychology, instead of insisting on observing only external behaviours. Cognitive psychologists felt that higher cognitive processes such as language and thinking could not be given satisfactory explanations simply in terms of stimulus-response relationships (no matter how complex). Learning depends not just on the kind of experiences we have, but also on our own abilities to process the information we receive, and link it to previous knowledge. While attempting to keep the behaviourist insistence on careful, replicable experimental methodology, cognitive psychologists developed ingenious new methods of gathering data. Cognitive psychology can be seen as a subset of 'cognitive science', which comprises any discipline that studies cognition scientifically. This can include linguistics, psychology, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) as well as other disciplines. Cognitive science can be contrasted with neuroscience, in that cognitive science can be seen as essentially trying to map the brain's software (e.g. computer programs), with neuroscience examining the brain's hardware (e.g. the electronic circuitry in a computer). This computer metaphor is an appropriate one, as it is not an accident that cognitive psychology arose at about the same time as rapid developments in computing technology (and some associated theoretical developments in mathematics, such as Claude Shannon's pioneering work in information theory). Computers provided an irresistible metaphor for the workings of the mind (much as at-the-time cutting-edge technologies such as hydraulics had done for Freud 70 or more years earlier), helping introduce an information processing approach to studying psychology. Many researchers found their thinking greatly stimulated by the presence of this machine metaphor (and some of its associated mathematics). Some researchers, however, go a step further, arguing that people literally are machines of a certain sort. In the memorable phrase of the AI researcher Marvin Minsky, the brain can be seen as a 'computer made of meat'. In the cognitive perspective, information is assumed to be received via senses (such as sight, hearing, or touch). This information is further processed in various ways, with the resulting outputs used to guide future action and behaviour. Cognitive psychologists try to describe what is 'in the head' (i.e., what is called the mind) in terms of function (i.e. what the mind does) and process (how the mind does what it does) often without specifying in detail how these functions and processes are physically represented in terms of actual brain structure. For example, memory could be described in terms of what is (and what isn't) remembered, and factors influencing this. Perception could be described in terms of what people perceive, when they perceive it, and issues such as how prior knowledge influences what we perceive. Our everyday practical use and understanding of complex systems like computers, televisions and cars is mostly based at these levels of function and process. As I write this document now, I know exactly how to change the format or the typeface, but have little idea of how the underlying electronic pathways of the computer produce these functions. Nor do I need to know this, to operate the word-processing function effectively. Similarly, even a four year old child could know how to use the computer for certain purposes, but have virtually no understanding of how this function is physically achieved. This is not necessary, in order to be effective (though such knowledge may be very useful if the computer breaks down in some way! It is neuropsychology/neuropsychiatry that helps in the diagnosis, and sometimes the cure, of organic brain disorders, seen in this metaphor as 'hardware' problems. However, it should also be added that some cognitive psychologists are also interested in the underlying neural structures [e.g. the role of the hippocampus in episodic memory ). Cognitive psychology's strategy of trying to understand the mind in terms of its functions and processes is therefore not so far removed from our level of understanding of other complex systems. As well as studying processes such as perception and memory, at the level of the individual, some cognitive psychologists turned towards the study of social cognition(e.g. how human beings use cognitive processes to make sense of social situations). A particular impetus for this came from the work of the cognitive psychologist Ulric Neisser, who suggested that cognitive psychologists shouldn't just confine themselves to (possibly quite artificial) laboratory-based studies, but should 'understand cognition as it occurs in the ordinary environment and in the context of natural purposeful activity' (Neisser, 1976, 'Cognition and Reality' p 7). Neisser argued that cognitive psychologists should undertake research which had much higher 'ecological validity', i.e. was much more relevant to the everyday lives of people in the real world (and the kinds of information and cognitive processing that arose in such contexts). Such research now plays a much more central role within cognitive psychology. 

Humanistic. Psychologists such as Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers developed humanistic psychology in the late 1950's as a 'third force' in reaction to the then prevailing disciplines of behaviourism and psychoanalysis. Humanistic psychology shared the rejection by psychoanalysis of the behaviourist insistence on studying only those aspects of human psychology which were open to precise observation and measurement. Also like psychoanalysis, humanistic psychology wished to examine subtleties of what it feels like and means to be human which are difficult (if not impossible) to capture in experimental settings. However, unlike psychoanalysis, humanistic psychologists took a much more optimistic viewpoint on people's capacity to be consciously aware of themselves, and of their capacity for agency (i.e. to consciously initiate change in their lives). It also takes a holistic approach, attempting to study the 'whole person' – thoughts, feelings, and bodily awareness. Humanistic psychology has developed or influenced a wide range of methods for facilitating personal growth, such as: Bioenergetics, Rebirthing.; Rogerian counselling, Encounter groups, Gestalt therapy, Co-counselling, Personal Construct therapy, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Rational-emotive therapy; Psychosynthesis and many others. Research methods used by humanistic psychologists typically take an 'inside' viewpoint (in contrast to the 'outside' viewpoint of many other perspectives in psychology), using qualitative methods to try to understand people's subjective experience. They also take an 'idiographic' approach, in that they typically try, as much as possible, to understand people in terms of each person's unique way of viewing themselves and their world. So instead of experiments or psychometric measures, humanistic psychologists might use methods such as depth interviews. There is a considerable focus on helping people achieve their full potential, or self-actualization, in Abraham Maslow's term ('becoming all one is capable of becoming'). This is a quite different aim for psychology than, say, an experimental focus on eliciting reliable, 'scientific' data about cause-effect relationships. The best way to understand why different perspectives in psychology have such different methodologies, and focus on such different subject areas, is to ask, quite simply, what their aim is. There have been many critiques of humanistic psychology. As mentioned above, it is criticised for its lack of experimental methodology. Another criticism is that although it does acknowledge the existence of social influences, it arguably underplays the extent to which these construct many aspects of human experience (and, indeed, the way humanistic psychology itself can be seen as a product of postwar US culture, in its individualism and optimistic focus). It does not attempt to provide, as psychoanalysis does, a comprehensive theory of why we are as we are. Although, like the psychoanalytic perspective, humanistic psychology has had limited influence within academic psychology (because of its non-experimental focus), it has had a great influence in counselling and the various 'human potential' therapies. I has also had influence on teaching, and with aspects of work (e.g. some methods used in managementtraining and the development of interpersonal skills). At its best humanistic psychology provides conceptual frameworks and methods for encouraging personal growth that many people have found extremely valuable in their everyday lives. Ultimately, not unlike psychoanalysis, it takes an essentially pragmatic viewpoint in seeing the value of humanistic ideas and methods in their practical efficacy in helping human beings to lead more fulfilled lives. 

Psychoanalytic approaches provide both a psychological theory and a therapeutic method. There is a particular focus on the emotional conditions of early childhood, with many emotional problems in adult life seen as relating to unresolved developmental conflicts from this period. A key assumption is that much of our motivation is driven by unconscious forces, with their origins in this early childhood emotional development. Although there are many different psychoanalytic approaches, such as neoFreudians, Jungians, Kleinians, Object Relations etc., they all hold the above assumptions in common. A number of other therapeutic approaches also draw heavily on psychoanalytic ideas, such as Gestalt therapy, Transactional Analysis, and many others. It is useful in getting an understanding of psychoanalytic approaches to study the key Freudian ideas, as his theories still provide the basis of much psychoanalytic thinking. Freud's developmental model focuses particularly on a series of psychosexual stages in the first five years or so of childhood. These stages relate to shifts in basic sources of pleasure and satisfaction, including the oral, anal and phallic stages. Too much frustration or over-gratification at any of these stages is seen as leading to fixation, and later neuroses. Each of these stages must be successfully completed for the development of a healthy personality. A key stage occurs in the resolution of the phallic stage in the Oedipus complex, where a jealous desire to kill the same sex parent and possess the opposite sex parent leads to fear of being punished for this desire. This fear is dealt with by identification with the same-sex parent, seen as crucial for successful development of the super-ego and gender identity. It is probably fair to say that Freud's descriptions of female gender identity have often been viewed as rather less convincing than the male equivalent. It should also be noted that post-Freudian theorists have often proposed significant revisions to this developmental model (e.g. Melanie Klein's much greater emphasis on the importance of infancy, or the Object Relations school seeing motivational drive more as connecting with people rather than just focused on satisfying instincts). Freud's basic model of the mind sees the instinctual driving forces of the id often battling against the internalised social demands (initially received via the parents) of the super-ego. The ego has the job of finding an acceptable compromise between the conflicting demands of the id and super-ego, and of the external world. The anxiety associated with these conflicts in early childhood can, if the ego is too weak to cope with them at that time, lead to repression, with 'defence mechanisms' shielding the conscious, rational mind from disturbing anxieties and urges towards forbidden impulses. This repressed material will then go into the unconscious (i.e. it will no longer be accessible by the rational conscious mind), potentially leading to neurotic behaviour patterns. Psychoanalytic therapy essentially tries to reverse this process, creating a hopefully safe environment where the skills of the therapist can help identify the defence mechanisms in operation and acknowledge and release the previously repressed material. The libido ('life energy') associated with these defence mechanisms is then redirected, so the ego can deal with the conflict in a way which is more in harmony with the different parts of the psyche, and with current reality. The idea that the conscious mind is unable to be aware of the main emotional driving forces of the psyche mean the psychoanalytic approaches are much more pessimistic than humanistic approaches, for example, about possibilities for human agency (i.e. capacity to make genuine, conscious choices). However, although the theory is essentially deterministic, the therapy is less so, as genuine change is seen as possible with the help of therapeutic alliance with the psychoanalyst. Therapeutic techniques used include (among others): free association: clients are encouraged to say whatever comes into their heads, bypassing conscious editing. Silences or abrupt changes of topic can act as a signal to the analyst of resistances to this process, indicating a defence mechanism linked to the material being talked about at that point. Dream interpretation: where the overt, or manifest content is seen as screening an underlying latent content relating to inner conflicts. Transference: the emotional feelings aroused in our early relationships can be unconsciously 'transferred' into relationships in adult life. In analysis, early childhood emotional conflicts (often with the parents) are relived through the analyst-client relationship, with the analyst helping the client bring them into conscious awareness. Psychoanalytic approaches in general have had very great influence on Western culture as a whole, and are particularly influential in the therapy world. However, their emphasis on qualitative, clinical data, and limited 'testability' have tended to limit their influence within academic psychology departments, which have generally emphasised more experimental approaches. Psychoanalysts in clinical practice are, nevertheless, in a position to collect a great deal of data of different kinds (behavioural, inner experiences and symbolic) over long periods of time with the same patient. Patient's responses to psychoanalytic interpretations, whether immediate or in terms of the long term clinical effectiveness of treatment provide evidence for their ideas. It is problematic, however, that much of this evidence is essentially private and necessarily involves the subjective experience of both patient and analyst. 

Psychiatry. The term psychiatry comes from the Greek words psyche, meaning mind or soul, and iatros, meaning doctor. Psychiatry is the branch of medicine concerned with the causes, diagnosis, classification and treatment of mental disorders. For example, presenting symptoms might involve disturbed emotion, thought, perception or behaviour. As a medical speciality, it is distinguished from neurology, the study of diseases of identifiable parts of the nervous system. However, there is a clear overlap between these two specialities, as both deal with brain function. In some countries, the two specialities are combined to form neuropsychiatry. Neuropsychiatry is also sometimes defined as that branch of psychiatry which looks at how neural processes involved in particular brain disorders (e.g. brain tumours, dementia) can produce psychiatric disorders, and how the resulting cognitive, emotional and behavioural effects can be diagnosed and treated. It is clear from the above description that psychiatrists follow quite a different educational route than psychologists – all psychiatrists must first qualify as doctors through full medical training, before specialising in psychiatry. Psychologists, of course, are not (generally) medically trained. However, clinical psychologists do treat mental disorders, but use more psychologically oriented therapies such as cognitive or behaviour therapy rather than medical interventions. \nAlthough psychiatrists do also make use of psychologically-based therapies at times, their different background and training predisposes them towards a 'medical model' of mental illness, not infrequently seeing more 'physical' methods of treatment as appropriate. Examples of these would be chemical intervention via drug therapies (e.g. affecting particular neurotransmitters in the brain), psychosurgery, and electro-convulsive therapy (ECT). \nPsychiatrists can also play a legal role in decisions involving enforced hospitalisation of individuals judged to be 'disturbed'. 

Philosophy as an academic discipline can be divided into a number of central topics, such as the origins and nature of human knowledge, language, logic, ethics, aesthetics etc..Many of these topics are of great importance to psychologists. Indeed, many of the debates within psychology (e.g. concerning fundamental issues on what should be considered appropriate methodologies, what counts as valid data, the relationships between theories and evidence etc.) are not just scientific, but philosophical questions, requiring the tools of philosophical analysis for a proper treatment. Historically, psychology itself was once a branch of philosophy, called 'mental philosophy'. It became a clearly-recognised discipline in its own right only towards the end of the nineteenth century, with researchers such as Wilhelm Wundt (in Germany), and William James (in the United States). There are still important aspects of psychological issues which can (and perhaps need) to be tackled using the tools of philosophy, in that they need rational argument rather than simply engaging in further experimental/empirical research. One example of this is the study of consciousness which brings up the so-called 'mind-body problem' – the problematic relationship between mental experiences and the physical world. Although neurosciences and other disciplines can try to throw some light on important aspects of this, much of the debate actually centres round questions of rational analysis, use of language and the precise meanings of words etc., which come within the remit of philosophy. 

Occupational This discipline is sometimes also called industrial psychology, though it actually has a broader focus, in that it involves researching ways of enhancing the optimum functioning and well-being of people in work organizations of any kind. Basically, it involves examining the psychology of how people work, and interact with their work environment, in order to help enhance staff satisfaction and efficiency. As well as looking at individuals in organizations like factories, hospitals, etc. occupational psychology can also look at behaviour of the organization as a whole. For example, this could involve researching ways of overcoming organizational problems, or helping instigate structural changes to the organization, from a psychological viewpoint.\nSome of the other functions performed by occupational psychologists involve personnel practices such as selection, appraisal, advising people on job choice, and redundancy counselling. Other aspects could involve helping improve teamwork and decision making, and training managers in psychological skills to enhance supervision and organizational/management strategy. Psychometric measurement through standardised tests is an important tool used in many of these functions.\nA sub branch of the discipline is sometimes known as ENGINEERING PSYCHOLOGY. This focuses on machine/operator interaction. For example, ensuring that machines are designed in such a way that takes into account the cognitive and physical capacity of the operator. It could also involve analysis of the methods used by people working with machines or other tools, to enhance efficiency and/or safety. 

Natural. A number of psychologists have been influenced by the natural sciences, either in terms of early training in one of these disciplines, or because the development of their ideas has been influenced by particular models and methodologies employed by these sciences. Major branches of the natural sciences are disciplines such as: • Physics - which studies the principles underlying energy, the structure of matter, and interactions between the fundamental constituents of matter (e.g. quarks). • Chemistry - the science studying the composition, study and properties of substances and their transformations. For example, chemistry discovered that water consists of a combination of the elements oxygen and hydrogen, expressed in the formula H2O. • Biology - the study of life, i.e. any organism to which the term living can be applied. Looks at animals, plants, bacteria and viruses, as well as their interactions. More specialized branches (that have influenced some of the eminent people represented on this CD-ROM, such as Darwin) include: • Botany: the branch of biology dealing with the study of plants, e.g. study of plant structure and function, their geographical distribution and how they can classified. • Natural History: a somewhat old fashioned term these days (though found in the name of the famous Natural History Museum in London), it refers to the study of natural objects (plants, animals, insects etc.), particularly in the field. • Entomology: the scientific study of insects (their classification, ecology, physiology etc.) • Geology: a branch of earth sciences, focusing on research into the structure, origin and composition of the solid part of the earth (e.g. rocks). • Ethology: studies animal societies in their natural surroundings, providing insights into animal social behaviour. Although caution is needed against overly simplistic explanations of the complexities of human social behaviour in terms of animal studies, it can be argued that there are genuine parallels between at least some aspects of human and animal social behaviour, particularly with chimpanzees and bonobos. 

Neuropsychology. Theories relating mental processes to particular parts of the body go back to the Ancient Greeks – e.g. philosophers such as Empedocles and Aristotle located the mind in the heart, whereas Hippocrates located it in the brain. Modern neuropsychology examines how neurological processes affect behaviour. Essentially, the study of relationships between brain and behaviour. This involves the study of brain function, for example by examining the structure of the brain and the corresponding neural activity within it. Another approach is to examine damaged brains, looking at the consequences of the damage for behaviour, perception, language etc.. Although correlation between a particular cognitive or behavioural deficit and damage to a specific brain region cannot be taken as conclusive evidence that this part of the brain is the 'source' of this cognitive function, it clearly demonstrates that this region plays some kind of an essential role in relation to this function. Examples of this in relation to language processing were discovered in early research performed by Broca and Wernicke, in the nineteenth century. However, it has sometimes proved remarkably difficult to localize certain mental processes, in particular memory, to specific regions of the brain. This has led to a shift of emphasis, from looking for particular locations (e.g. localisation of memory functions) towards examining brain processes involved in storage and retrieval of memories.\nIn addition to examining human brains, experiments upon animal brains are also carried out by neuropsychologists, in the hope of providing insight into human brain processes. For obvious ethical reasons, deliberate damage cannot be inflicted on human brains in order to study resulting psychological deficits from particular brain lesions, whereas current ethical/professional standards do allow this with animal studies (though not without strong disagreement from a number of quarters).\nOther methods involve electrical stimulation of human brains during surgery, performed under local anaesthetic, with the patient therefore conscious and able to report any resulting sensations (it should be noted that such research is only carried out as a by-product of necessary clinical intervention). The rate of blood flow to different regions can also shed light on neuropsychological questions, as can electrical recordings of brain activity. These techniques are 'non-invasive', such as magnetic resonance imaging.\n(see also NEUROPSYCHIATRY, under PSYCHIATRY) 

Linguistics can be basically understood as the study of language, looking at factors such as the social interactions it is based upon, the origins of language, and the structure of language. The capacity to develop the use of highly complex language could be seen as one of the most significant factors which have made humanity the dominant species on the planet today (others are the closely related capacity for abstract thought, and our remarkable ability to make use of tools that require the fine manipulation we achieve because we can oppose our thumb and fingers). Given the complexity of this subject, it is perhaps not surprising that significant contributions to the study of language are also provided by philosophy, psychology, anthropology and sociology. In particular, since the pioneering work of Noam Chomsky in the 1960's, parts of cognitive psychology and linguistics have become closely entwined, sometimes referred to as psycholinguistics. Another field, sociolinguistics, focuses on the socio-cultural functions played by language, and the ways in which language is socially constructed. Chomsky's theories criticized the behaviourist model which saw language as simply another behaviour, acquired like other behaviours through learning via reinforcement. Chomsky argued that this model was unable to explain many of the complexities of language; for example, how virtually all humans seem to acquire quite impressive language skills, despite an enormous range in the quality of the linguistic environment they are exposed to. Chomsky saw a general capacity for language, an 'innate linguistic competence', as 'hard-wired' into the brain, though of course the particular language spoken would vary according to the linguistic environment a child was exposed to. 

Sociology. Although the origins of sociology can be traced back to the nineteenth century with the work of pioneers such as Max Weber, Emile Durkheim and Auguste Comte, it has been one of the more recent of the social sciences to establish itself as a discipline of university study within the Anglo-American tradition. Sociology could be defined very broadly as 'the study of society'; for example, researching into structures, change, and conflict within society. However, as with psychology, there are many disagreements about what should be the appropriate subject matter, aims, and methodology of sociology. Sociologists such as Marx and Parsons focus on social structures and institutions (e.g. capitalism, or the nuclear family); other sociologists such as Weber study social interactions on a much smaller scale (e.g. how individuals and groups develop social relationships). A third approach takes as its focus the study of collective representations: looking at how many of the ways in which we make sense of the world are constructed at societal levels (e.g. representations of political parties such as Labour and the Conservatives). Like psychology, modern sociology has given birth to a number of closely-related fields, such as cultural studies.\nSome branches of psychology have been heavily influenced by sociology, for example the broad approach to studying social psychology called 'sociological social psychology' (SSP). Instead of tackling social psychology by establishing the principles governing the individual, and then seeing how these are modified in a social setting, SSP approaches make the social central and view it as inseparable from individual processes. Instead of seeing the social context as simply another 'variable', they ask questions such as 'in a particular social setting, how do the social and cultural practices actually act to construct the individual, as he or she develops from childhood?'. 

Experimental Social Psychology. A classic definition of experimental social psychology was given by Gordon Allport, as the perspective which 'attempts to understand and explain how the thought, feeling or behaviour of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined or implied presence of others.'\nIn the same way that psychology overall can be seen as a fragmented discipline, there are at least two distinct approaches to social psychology. There is very limited mutual recognition between these two approaches, as their fundamental assumptions are so different. The key is how the relationship between the self and the social context is approached. Experimental social psychologists tend to come from the broad approach of Psychological Social Psychology (PSP), where social psychology is seen as a branch of general psychology, and comprises the study of how basic aspects of individual's psychological functioning are modified in a social context. Essentially, the social context is seen as an additional variable. This can be contrasted with Sociological Social Psychology, which sees the relationship between the social and the self as inextricably linked and mutually influencing each other (see SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISM and SOCIOLOGY). Experimental social psychology frames its questions so that that they can be studied using carefully controlled experimental methods. Like all experimental approaches, it is looking for looking for reliable information about cause-effect relationships. It is possible to do 'field experiments' in a natural setting, and important work of this kind has been done (e.g. on inter-group relations). However, in order to maintain careful control of variables the topics quite often have to be simplified and taken out of 'real life' into the psychologists' laboratory in order to obtain reliable data. Not only does this move into the laboratory necessarily reduce the complexity of what can be studied, but it also can produce different results from those gained in natural settings. Although this can be a problem even with research into cognitive topics like perception and memory, this is likely to be a particular challenge for social psychology, as the social context provided in a laboratory experiment is necessarily different in non-trivial ways from social contexts in the outside world. However, for the experimentalist, the increase in control that the laboratory can offer provides a good trade-off, as long as the potential errors in generalizing the results to the 'real world' are kept in mind. \n\nWhile cognitive psychologists began with perception and moved towards inclusion of the social world, social psychologists began in the social environment, with perception of 'social objects' such as people, events, and social issues. The first social psychologists used people's attitudes - made up of their beliefs and feelings - about other people and social issues so as to understand social behaviour. What we believe or know and how we think (our cognitions) have also always been at the centre of theories about how we perceive people – hence much experimental social psychology is concerned with social cognition. The roots of social cognition can be traced back to the contributions of Fritz Heider, an Austrian born psychologist who moved to the USA in 1930, about the same time as many European academics of his generation who managed to avoid Nazi persecution in the Second World War.\nSocial psychologists like Fritz Heider argued that in order to understand social behaviour we must pay attention to how people perceive and struggle to understand their social world. A crucial notion is the idea that people operate like 'intuitive scientists', trying to make sense of their world in terms of regularity and predictability. This will involve building models of cause and effect, so as to control what happens in their lives. Heider applied these ideas to how we perceive other people and their actions, and our attributions of cause and effect, leading to the topic of 'attribution theory'. \nOther social psychologists in this tradition have built upon the research of pioneers such as Heider to apply experimental approaches to the study of topics like: intergroup relations group performance social influence in small groups aggression conflict and cooperation social relationships interpersonal communication social cognition. 

Social Constructionist. The basic idea underlying all social constructionist theories is that the ways in which we understand the world and the things we consider true are not just 'natural' ways of understanding reality, but are actively constructed between people as they go about their everyday lives and interact with each other. These 'ways of knowing', therefore, are inextricably part of a social process. This perspective suggests that all human knowledge – even knowledge that seems to be just an objective description of 'reality', such as physics or chemistry – is in fact constructed by people within their own particular historical and social contexts. Social constructionism falls within the broad approach to studying social psychology called 'sociological social psychology' (SSP). This fundamentally disagrees with the approach taken by experimental social psychology, which tackles social psychology by establishing the principles governing individual behaviour, and then seeing how these are modified in a social setting, a position called 'psychological social psychology' (PSP). (See EXPERIMENTAL SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY). SSP approaches have quite a different focus. Instead of seeing the social context as simply another 'variable', they ask questions such as 'in a particular social setting, how do the social and cultural practices actually act to construct the individual, as he or she develops from childhood?'. The social worlds we live in are seen as 'interpretive networks', continually being constructed and reconstructed by individuals, groups, and institutions in interaction with each other. \n\nSocial constructionists are interested in how individual behaviour is inextricably linked with its social context, and in fact frequently emerges from that context. Most of human action is seen as social interaction, modifying even those of our activities which we may think we have created at a purely individual level, or which arise from 'biological instincts'. This viewpoint tends to make social constructionists critical of perspectives such as humanistic, with its much greater emphasis on the individual's capacity to create and modify their own world view. However, it would be a mistake to see social constructionism as taking a position of 'sociological determinism', seeing people as simple pawns of their social context. People are indeed seen by social constructionists as making active choices – however, the range of choices available, and how they are conceptualised, is seen as structured by the social materials available (although these 'social materials' are themselves seen as subject to a continual process of renegotiation and change).\nSocial constructionists argue that what is accepted as knowledge at any level – scientific, cultural or social – and in any area, is a social process. Knowledge is therefore seen as an expression of the particular social and historical context in which it is produced - what is taken to be 'true' or 'real' is always produced and sustained by social processes. This is applied especially to current taken-for-granted knowledge that seems most 'obvious', e.g. the 'natural' distinctions between different genders. Social constructionists would not, of course, deny the existence of clear physiological differences – but what they would be particularly interested in was how these differences are made sense of in different societies, and the implications for people's identity and way of life. They would argue that what most frequently has the greatest impact on people's sense of self and social lives are not what 'exists', but how it is conceptualised in that particular society. Hence a particular emphasis is placed on the role of language in constructing agreed social 'realities'. For example, the experience of being gay within those societies that see it as immoral (and perhaps illegal), compared with those societies that are quite comfortable with gay lifestyles. Note that this doesn't just vary with geography, but also historical period (e.g. compare British laws against male homosexuality nowadays, compared to just forty years ago). Another example might be whether we call someone a 'freedom fighter' or a 'terrorist'. Although these two terms can refer to the same person, each constructs a totally different way of viewing that person and the world. The language we use justifies particular responses to people and to situations, and plays a major role in constructing 'power relations' between people. There is an interesting contrast between social constructionist and psychometric views of identity. Instead of seeing identity as relatively fixed, identities are seen as shifting over time and between different socio-cultural contexts. Identity is therefore seen as historically and culturally specific, and dynamic, in that it is seen as constantly in the process of being 'renegotiated' in social interaction.\nIn contrast to most experimental research, social constructionism tends to use qualitative data, taken from naturalistic settings (i.e. from people's everyday lives and social interactions). This can involve looking at social representations of everyday concepts, or analysis of people's 'discourses' (i.e. those ways of thinking and talking about issues which are currently available in an individual's particular culture). These discourses are seen as the processes by which people construct meanings, and their study is called discourse analysis. 

Psychometrics involves the measurement and representation of psychological variables (such as intelligence, aptitude or personality type). It is heavily based on statistics and mathematical analysis. Measurement of individual differences is done using tests designed to be highly reliable (i.e. giving consistent results) and valid (i.e. measuring what they are supposed to measure). With respect to the study of personality, the psychometric perspective measures personality, describes personality structure, and often tries to explain the origins of personality in terms of biology, asking whether it is individual differences in biology that cause individual differences in personality. Although approaches such as humanistic psychology are also particularly interested in individual differences, the underlying philosophy of the two approaches is totally different, and form an interesting contrast. Humanistic psychologists attempt to take an 'idiographic' approach, that is try to understand a person in terms of their own, unique, worldview; this tradition also usually focuses on qualitative data, and takes a holistic view of people. Psychometrics, in contrast, will focus on quantitative data, using categories applicable to everyone, devised by the psychologist, into which the 'individual differences' of the person examined must fit. The focus is on aspects of people – particular dimensions of their behaviour and feelings; the concern is not with 'whole people' and their inner experience; the aim is to make statements about people in general. These are often based on 'personality traits': adjectives that describe enduring characterisics of people, used as the basic 'building blocks' of theories about personality. In attempting to measure personality, psychometrics focuses on the ways in which humans are like each other, in terms of their positions on broad dimensions, rather than with the ways in which each person is unique. The psychometric tradition has also typically seen human beings as having relatively fixed personality traits, in contrast to the humanistic emphasis on possibilities for self-directed change and transformation. Psychometrics has a long tradition in psychology, going back to Galton (around 1884) and is usually associated with biologically-based theories of evolution and heritability. This association led to (in modern terms) some rather ethically dubious connections between psychometrics at that time and movements such as eugenics, the desire to improve humanity through 'selective breeding'. In judging the viewpoints of earlier generations we perhaps do need to take into account the changing moral climate produced by changing socio-political contexts – e.g. eugenics, post-Hitler, probably has quite different connotations to those it would have had in the nineteenth century. As a tradition, psychometrics and individual differences psychology – whether in relation to personality, intelligence or other aspects of psychological measurement – has tended to develop and use its methods for practical applications as well as pure research. Psychometric instruments play an important role in occupational psychology, i.e. psychology applied to a work setting. The use of psychometrics to examine individual differences has been a crucial part of the growth of psychology as an empirical and scientific discipline. Over the last century, at first driven by education policies, and then recruitment into the military in the Second World War, increasingly sophisticated psychometric techniques have helped to develop a wide variety of psychological tests and led to a highly profitable industry. There are now many established tests of aptitude, intelligence and personality which are used both for research and in applied settings such as education, occupational testing for job selection, career counselling and in forensic psychology and clinical practice.