Understand Psychology

by Nicky Hayes

Instead, we have to look at what people do from several different angles, to see how all the different factors and influences work together to produce

for instance, that you came across someone reading this book. If you wanted to understand what was going on there, you could look at it from a number of different

studying reading might use a very general level, such as looking at cultural influences on human

experiences, while others would seek to understand how the

what a cake is, you would have to know about these. But knowing about them wouldn’t tell you everything about

because a cake has properties which the single ingredients on their own don’t have. At the simplest

as many levels of explanation as possible,

any sense of the human mind. Table 1.1 shows some of the main levels of explanation which psychologists

in analysing problems. A professional...

why professional training as a psychologist takes so many years. Academic psychologists, though, use a more limited number of

the people around you a little better. Table 1.1 Levels of explanation. Areas of psychology Psychology, as we’ve seen, is about people. But people have complex

people are not, and each of us has our own special personality. We also differ in motivation:

And that is a large part of it. But, sometimes, what we do or how we think is also influenced by our physical state. If we are tired or stressed, for instance, we often don’t make decisions very well, or we can become irritable with the people around us. So

5 Psychology can

one level of analysis at a time. 6 There are emergent properties at higher levels which cannot be predicted

by studying lower ones. 7 Psychology has six major research areas: cognitive and social

in who we are. The first relationships All over the world, babies are brought up in different ways. The experience

of an Inuit child, living in a traditional community in the Arctic regions of northern Canada, are widely different from the everyday

oval shape with two dots in it for eyes; but as the baby grew older, more detail was needed until by four months the infant would smile only at a real human face, or a very realistic picture.

Smiling and responding to others are good ways of making sure that other people will get satisfaction from giving an infant the attention it needs. If looking after an infant is a satisfying, rewarding process, then it gives that infant the

can’t run for help itself, it needs to have a way of summoning help from its caretaker quickly. And it has. A baby’s crying can carry for a very long distance, and people quickly learn to recognize the sound of their own

that they are particularly likely to hurry to the baby and try to calm it down. It might also account for the intense degree of frustration on the part of parents who are living with a continuously crying child, and who may sometimes become so frustrated and upset that they injure the child. We don’t know whether this is really the case. We do know that people find baby cries extremely disturbing – that isn’t under question – but it is possible that they disturb us because they

with three different patterns of sound: one for pain, one for hunger, and one for

of people’s voices, they show pleasure when people are nearby and socializing with them, and they can summon help if they need it.

it to know what to do. But babies are even more sophisticated at interacting with other people than just communicating pleasure or discomfort. PARENT–INFANT INTERACTION As it grows older, the baby’s tendency towards sociability becomes even more apparent. Babies delight in even

on their own, such as with rattles or toys. Parents and other adults almost automatically seem to adapt themselves to these baby games. Psychologists have conducted many observations of parent–child interaction, and found that

of the things which parents and infants do when

for some time. It is

Moreover, they learn it very quickly: we are strongly predisposed to learn that kind of thing. Infants are also strongly predisposed to learn to communicate. They want to do it, and try to do it very hard. Again,

to the part of the language which the child learns to produce first. What all this adds up to is that other people are the most important thing in a child’s world.

Shaffer and Emerson found, as have many psychologists since, that it was the quality of social interaction between parent and child which affected the infant’s response. Babies become especially fond of parents (and other people)

would appear at about seven months. Then, the baby would cry if the person had to leave – although of course babies can usually be distracted quite quickly. This attachment forms the basis of the loving relationship

on the quality of the

children know, a relationship which begins later in life can be just as special. But a predisposition to interact with people, and to form relationships with the people who

we sometimes realize. Each of us has our own, personal idea of ourselves – something which is known as the self-concept. It’s our ideas about what we are like, what we are good or bad at

what we like. But when psychologists have studied the self-concept, they have found that actually, one of the most important factors in how we see ourselves is how other people see us. SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS As early as 1902, Cooley described the self-concept as the ‘looking-glass self’. What Cooley meant

students in the class took

Rosenthal and Jacobson

The self-concept is often thought

a descriptive part, which is just about what

people – affection, love, trust

and so on. Everyone, Rogers argued, needs positive regard of some kind. Even people who avoid close relationships find it important that other people should respect them. To have some kind of positive regard from other people is a very fundamental need, which has to be satisfied.

or skills, we can become

psychologically damaged. People self-actualize in many different ways. Many people have a hobby or an interest which takes up some of their leisure time, and this usually involves some kind

and treatments, Rogers concluded that these problems occurred because they were suppressing an important psychological need. When Rogers explored

had made their positive regard conditional on good behaviour. In other words, when

child who was never naughty. So they grew up believing that they had to be ideal and perfect, and that if they were not, nobody would like them.

see, had very low self-esteem.

and eventually neurotic. The solution which Rogers found was very simple. He argued that everyone needs some kind of secure psychological base from which they can develop. That base will be found in a relationship which gives

their 30s or 40s. The important thing is to have a relationship of that kind at all – it doesn’t have to be in childhood. Rogers developed an approach to psychotherapy based on this principle. The role of the therapist, he argued, should be to provide an accepting and warm relationship for the client (he didn’t approve of the word ‘patient’) – in other words, a relationship based on unconditional positive regard. This would give the client the psychological freedom to make their own life decisions and to develop solutions to their own problems, because they wouldn’t be risking disapproval. Rogers called this client-centred therapy, because it is entirely based on what the client wants and does, and not on what the therapist thinks they should do. Many counselling psychologists still use this approach today. Cultural and social influences We can see, then, that both our social interaction and our personal relationships can have a considerable effect on how we see ourselves – on the self-concept. But our ideas about ourselves and how we are linked with other people are also shaped by the social groups and cultures that we belong to. And different cultures can make very different assumptions about individuals and what it is to be an individual human being. THE INDIVIDUAL SELF In the Western world, it is quite common to see each person as a separate individual, who may choose to link him/herself with some kind of social group if they want to. This model of the individual perso...