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The founding of the world’s first laboratory of experimental psychology by Wilhelm Wundt at the University of Leipzig in 1879 marked the recognition of psychology as a truly scientific subject, and as one that was breaking new ground in previously unexplored areas of research.
However, at much the same time as behaviourism began to emerge in the USA, a young neurologist in Vienna started to develop a theory of mind that was to overturn contemporary thinking and inspire a very different approach. Based on observation of patients and case histories rather than laboratory experiments, Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory marked a return to the study of subjective experience. He was interested in memories, childhood development, and interpersonal relationships, and emphasized the importance of the unconscious in determining behaviour.
Socrates (470–399 BCE) believed the main purpose of philosophy is to increase happiness through analysing and understanding oneself, famously saying: “The unexamined life is not worth living.”
German physician Emil Kraepelin believed that the origins of most mental illnesses are biological, and he is often regarded as the founder of modern medical psychiatry.
Ebbinghaus also uncovered an unexpected pattern in memory retention. He found that there is typically a very rapid loss of recall in the first hour, followed by a slightly slower loss, so that after nine hours, about 60 per cent is forgotten. After 24 hours, about two-thirds of anything memorized is forgotten.
Childhood traumas may appear to be forgotten, but according to Pierre Janet, they can often remain in the “subconscious” part of the mind, giving rise to mental problems in later life.
The behaviourist approach concentrated on observing responses to external stimuli, ignoring inner mental states and processes, which were thought to be impossible to examine scientifically and therefore could not be included in any analysis of behaviour.
To Skinner, it seemed that the consequences of an action were more important in shaping behaviour than any stimulus that had preceded or coincided with it. He concluded from his experiments that behaviour is primarily learned from the results of actions. As with so many great insights, this may appear to be self-evident, but it marked a major turning point in behaviourist psychology.
For most of the first half of the 20th century, psychotherapy was dominated by Freudian psychoanalysis, which assumes that anxiety results from conflicting forces deep within the psyche. This conflict can only be alleviated through a lengthy, introspective analysis of both the individual’s conscious and subconscious thoughts, including their formative experiences.
Freud believed that accessing the unconscious by talking to his patients would bring painful, hidden memories into conscious awareness where the patient could make sense of them, and so gain relief from their symptoms.
The Persona is one of the most important archetypes described by Jung. He recognized early in his own life that he had a tendency to share only a certain part of his personality with the outside world. He also recognized this trait in other people, and noted that human beings divide their personalities into components, selectively sharing only certain components of their selves according to the environment and situation. The self that we present to the world – our public image – is an archetype, which Jung calls the “Persona”.
In the 18th century, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant revolutionized our thinking about the world by pointing out that we can never really know what is “out there” beyond ourselves, because our knowledge is limited to the constraints of our minds and senses. We don’t know how things are “in themselves”, but only as we experience them. This view forms the basis of Gestalt therapy, which says that it is vitally important to remember that the complexity of the human experience – with its tragedies and traumas, inspirations and passions, and its nearly infinite range of possibilities – is
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The ability to find meaning in our lives is the defining characteristic of humankind.
We think we are loving, but in reality we may be seeking another form of conformity. We say “I love you” when really we mean “I see me in you”, “I will become you”, or “I will possess you”. In loving, we try to lose our uniqueness, or steal it from the other person. Our yearning to exist “as one” makes us want to see ourselves reflected in other people, which in turn leads us to artificially impose our own traits onto someone else.
Love is not found by fitting one person into another’s mould, and it is not a question of finding the perfect “match”. It is, he says, “union with somebody, or something, outside oneself, under the condition of retaining the separateness and integrity of one’s own self”.
Those who tend to orient themselves towards receiving love instead of being loving will fail; they will also seek to establish a receiving relationship in other ways, always wanting to be given things – material or immaterial – rather than to give.
Indeed, the purpose of existence is not about reaching any kind of destination, Rogers claims, because existence is less a journey towards an endpoint and more an ongoing process of growth and discovery that does not stop until we die.
Since self and personality emerge out of experience, it is of the utmost importance to stay fully open to the possibilities offered by each moment, and to let experience shape the self.
Unconditional self-acceptance and unconditional acceptance of others are vital, and when these are lacking, people fail to remain open to experience.
The irony is that with greater self-acceptance, and with less unhealthy pressure and constant criticism, we can actually become much more productive.
No longer at the mercy of what he thinks he should be doing, nor of what society or parents may have conditioned him to think he wants, he can much more easily simply exist in the moment and be truly aware of what he actually wants.
Cyrulnik’s research has shown that people who are better able to cope with life’s difficulties or traumas are able to find meaning in hardship, seeing it as a useful and enlightening experience, and even to find ways to laugh.
Cyrulnik has shown that the human brain is malleable and will recover if allowed. The brain of a traumatized child shows shrinkage of the ventricles and cortex, but where the child is well supported and loved after the trauma, MRI scans have shown the brain to be capable of returning to normal within a year.
"To turn natural sadness into depression, all you have to do is blame yourself for the disaster that has befallen you."
in the light of recent discoveries in genetics and neuroscience, evolutionary psychologists such as Steven Pinker have argued that our thoughts and actions are determined by the make-up of our brains, and that they are like other inherited characteristics: subject to the laws of natural selection.
When someone is unable to recall a piece of information, it does not mean that it is “forgotten” in the sense that it has faded or simply disappeared from long-term memory; it may still be stored, and therefore be available – the problem is one of retrieval.
They found the general belief that people made decisions based on statistics and probability was not true in practice. Instead, people base their decisions on “rule of thumb” – on specific examples or small samples. Consequently, judgments can frequently be wrong, as they are based on information that comes easily to mind, rather than that has actual probability.
The study of isolated tribal communities by American anthropologist Margaret Mead suggests that facial expressions are culture-specific.
Csíkszentmihályi studied cases of people who regularly reached this “ecstatic” state, and realized that it always occurred when the challenge of an activity matched a person’s skills; the task was doable, but also extended their capabilities and demanded total concentration.
we can recall more of a recent event than one in the distant past; and each time we remember the event (retrieve the memory), it is reprocessed in the brain, altering it slightly.
Erving Goffman’s best-known theory – that we act out certain behaviours to suit the impression we want to give to others – also came out of this new emphasis on the importance of social interaction.
They compared photographs of couples taken during their first year of marriage with those taken 25 years later, and found that couples looked more alike after many years of being together.
In fact, the only thing that we can control is the way we behave and think; we cannot control others. Trying to, he says, shows a lack of respect for others and is the cause of unhappiness.
His experiments clearly demonstrated that normally harmless people become capable of committing cruel acts when a situation pressures them to do so.
"Education, for most people, means trying to lead the child to resemble the typical adult of his society."
Children are not mini adults who simply do not yet know as much as adults; rather, they see the world differently and interact with it in a wholly distinct way.
"Intelligence is what you use when you don’t know what to do."
Real moral growth is not the product of adult instruction, but is based on a child’s own observations of the world.
Studies by the US psychologist Susan Gelman in 1979 demonstrated that four-year-olds were able to adjust their explanation of something in order to clarify it for a blindfolded person, and would use simpler forms of speech when talking to younger children, which is inconsistent with Piaget’s description of an egocentric child who has no awareness of the needs of others.
If the infant’s needs are badly or inconsistently met, feelings of mistrust develop that can recur in later relationships.
Healthy willpower develops as a result of learning to negotiate both success and failure.
According to the gender development theory, one reason why boys and girls tend to exhibit differences in their behaviour is that they are treated differently by their parents (as well as other significant adults and peers). It has been shown that people unwittingly tailor their behaviour towards children from birth to match their own gender-role expectations; this encourages children to behave according to what are considered gender norms.
Baron-Cohen believes that autistic people lack a “theory of mind” – the ability to interpret others’ emotions and actions successfully – and so are unable to assess another’s state of mind or intentions.
In 1936, Allport and his colleague H.S. Odbert proposed that individual differences that are most salient and socially relevant in people’s lives eventually become expressed through language; and the more important the difference, the more likely it is to be expressed as a single word.
Ability to delay gratification seemed to be a better predictor of future success than any previously measured trait.
