PSYCH 101

Psychology=study of brain, mind, mental processes and behaviours and their relationships.

Missed a slide:

Syllabus
Lect 2: History & Philosophical Foundations
Wilhelm Wundt, 1879  scientific psychology,
Bump Ga
Trepanation, skulls 6500 BC (heart vs head, location issue)
Ancient  Heart: soul  feelings etc.
Edwin Smith Papyrus  Left-side brain controls right, functions in areas of brain
3-cell theory/doctrine, ventricles in brain (specialised)
Cortex not ventricles (very specialised)
Phrenology
Franz Josef Gall  Spurzheim
Phrenometer
Jean …
Phineas Cage evidence localised functions  lobotomy
High specialisation:
Paul Broca  tan, no speech, motor function
Karl Wernicke  speech, no sense

Lect 3
Nature Vs Nurture

Nature: all knowledge at birth (inborn)

Nurture: learning from your environment

Noam Chomsky “language is an innate faculty of the human mind”  supporting nature,
language environment

William Molyneux’s Question  blind man able to distinguish objects by touch is able to
distinguish objects by sight once allowed to see.

Nativism vs Empiricism

Body vs Mind
Monism: Materialism: everything tissue (reductionism)
Subjective idealism: world exists only in my mind
Dualism: body and mind (interactionism)

Plato (nativism) : Plato’s cave + Plato’s triangle  Rationalism

John Locke  born without innate ideas, knowledge delivered by senses, experience
derived from perception

Rooting Reflex (innate)

Tabula Rasa Idea

Body vs Mind  Monism vs Dualism

Monism
- Materialism: reality is physical material, mind reduced to biology
(reductionism)
- Mentalism: (immaterialism, subjective idealism)  reality only in mindct

Dualism - Descartes
- Interactionism: B + M  interact

Modern Nativist Thinking – Chomsky (innate language acquisition)

Lect. 4
 Gustav Fechner = father of psychophysics
 Question whether language innate  Wild Boy of Averyron, failed to learn to speak
 1970s  13 years, Genie trapped in confined space  , no growth, unable to
communicate or walk.
 Weber’s law: the change in a stimulus is only noticeable at a constant ratio of the original
stimulus.
 Demarcation: problem of distinguishing between science and non-science.
e.g. Science: subliminal messages can affect mood and memory but not behaviour
Non-Science: fraudulent results stating that subliminal messages “Drink Coke” etc. increase
sales.

 Karl Popper  falsifiability/refutability = scientific hypothesis must be able to be false

Thomas Kuhn suggested scientific progress based on current system of paradigms which
are hard to change, and only change for unexplainable anomalies e.g. change in ‘Zeitgeist’
(fight between ideas)

Lect. 5
 Wundt first lab 1879  start of academic psychology, controlled experiments  how
mind/brain works?
 Structuralism: What are the building blocks of our conscious experience
 Introspection: Technique to look into brain, examine one's own conscious thoughts and
feelings
 Edward Titchener  introspection: examine conscious experience for the basic elements
of this experience.
o Introspective analysis: presented objects, subject not to report object name,
but describe raw data of experience.
 Functionalism and Gestalt movement opposed Structuralism
Functionalism: William James  ‘stream of consciousness’  cannot divide thought 
but importantly ‘What is the function?’
 Gestalt movement: Koffka: “the whole is other than the sum of its parts”  perceiving is
not just sensations but process of organising by brain
 Perceptual Organisation: A stimulus organises itself, e.g. Panda
 “You can’t understand architecture by studying a brick”
 Gestalt Laws: Similarity, Proximity
 Learning: An experience which can alter an individual’s future behaviour
 Behaviourism: B.F Skinner  operant conditioning

Lect.5
Thorndike Puzzle Box

Cognitive Revolution: 1950-1970

1. Human performance (WW2)
2. Scientific development
 3. Chomsky + Linguistics

11 Sep 19

Cognitive neuroscience:
Neuroscience + cognitive science

Hippocrates  mental illness natural occurrence in human body

Psychology  clinical
Witmer  ‘Clinical Psychology’
Freud  psycho-analysis, personality, id, ego, superego, consciousness, unconsciousness 
hysteria
Behavioural Model  change from conditioning, systematic desensitisation

Humanistic approach: Carl Rogers

Current: Mix of all.

SCIENCE AND STATISICS

Lect. 1
Lect.2

Science  degree of accuracy

Constructs are hypothetical
Constructs  conceptual or operational
Reification  an analytic or abstract relationship viewed as concrete entity
Adjective  noun e.g. evil
Vitalistic Thinking
Falsifiability  Karl Popper  theory must be able to be disproved.
Pragmatic Fallacy 
Operational  Measure
Social desirability contaminate data

Lect. 3

Anecdotal evidence NOT data.

Case Studies
Correlational Studies  positive/negative and weak/strong correlation
Causation: AB, BA, ZAB
True experiment Random allocation, all IV manipulated
Quasi at least one IV manipulated but other not
Correlational  no IVs, no RA

External Validity random selection of subjects

Internal validity random allocation of IVs

Lect. 4
Experimental Hypothesis
Null Hypothesis  Disprove/Don’t  Reject/Retain
Rule out  Confirmation Bias
Null Hypothesis Vs. Experimental e.g. 100-coin toss  50 heads and 50 tails Vs
Experimental:
Ex
Lect. 5
Hypothesis  Test Null Hypothesis
Population  entire collection of interest
Sample  selection from entire collection of interest
Sampling distribution  variability across experiments, hypothetical, likelihood of obtaining
a result if null true
Raw score distribution  real, variability across individuals, likelihood of obtaining a
particular score.
P < 0.05  reject null
Small p-value  highly improbable result obtained by chance

Lect. 6
Type 1 error  a
Type 2 error  B
Null is false Null is true
Retain the null
Reject the null

Statistical power = chance of rejecting a false null hypothesis  lack of uncertainty

Statistical power  sensitivity
Statistical Significance:
Practical Significance:
Argument from ignorance
Denialism 
Forensics
Lect. 1
Forensic Psychology: application of psychological knowledge  all aspects of justice
system.

History of Forensic Psychology

James Cattell (1895)  memory often inaccurate (apple seeds)
Alfred Binet (1900)  highly misleading questions resulted in poor accuracy
Aussage period of eyewitness research (1900-WWI)
Conducted “reality experiments” with staged events  testing memory
Psychologists as expert witnesses in court  Varendonck (1911)  staged an experiment at
school  determined children’s memory readily influenced.
Hugo Von Munsterberg  questioned that eye witnesses are necessarily accurate
Wigmore criticism of Munsterberg’s book, WWI  eyewitness research disappeared 50
years
Eye witness research  re-emerged 1960s & 70s:
Robert Buckhout  eye witnesses are inaccurate
Elizabeth Loftus  malleability of memory, post-event misinformation paradigm

1. Two primary function of expert witness:

- Aid in understanding particular issue relevant to case
- Provide opinion
Regular witnesses only testify what they have directly observed

2. Challenges of expert testimony

- Lack of ecological validity of psychological research
- Psychologists may lose objectivity
- Psychology can disrupt the legitimacy of legal system
- Common sense

3. Admissibility Criteria:
- Turner Ruling , common-knowledge ruling
- Evidence Act abolished common knowledge rule
-
4. Expert evidence: Fingerprints
- used in court for 100 years
- objectively studied for accuracy  very accurate, not perfect
5. Expert evidence: Facial Mapping
- Techniques not standardised and not very consistent
6. Expert evidence: Hair Analysis :
- Not accurate  false convictions

Lect. 2 - Forensics
Recall Memory  reporting details of previously witnessed event/person
Recognition Memory  recognising if details of an event are the same as witnessed
Estimator Variables  variables present at time of crime cannot be changed
e.g. exposure time, lighting, alcohol/drugs, stress
System Variables  variables manipulated after fact impact accuracy of witnesses

Perceptions vary between individuals

Expectations affect perception
Own Race Bias  tendency for people to have difficulty identifying people of another race
 due to lack of interracial contact

Memory best at optimum level of arousal  Yerkes-Dodson law

Easterbrook Hypothesis  highly aroused witnesses  better memory for central details
than peripheral
Weapons focus effect  impairs a witness’ ability to identify culprit

System Variables:
Delay between witnessing an event and interview can affect memory  Ebbinghaus
Forgetting Curve
Misinformation effect
Loftus  False Memory  can be created via leading questions. Others believe memories
are repressed.
Repressed Memory Research  Williams interviewed women with well-documented
childhood cases of sexual assault  1/3 could not recall memories  repressed/too young
for awareness/ or child not recognising abuse as traumatic hence only recall later in life.

Misinformation effect  credibility of eyewitnesses

Factors increasing susceptibility to misinformation effect: Age, Hypnosis, Suggestibility,
Credible source, Repetition of Misinformation

Limitations of Misinformation Effect Research:

= Methodological Issues: Type of questioning, ecological validity  applicability of
laboratory simulations to real life.
Ethically questionable implantation of false memories.

Lect. 3
To identify accuracy of witnesses
Two-line ups:
-
ID evidence is very convincing
False ID  guilty  free, innocent  guilty
Erroneous convictions  small proportion, injustice still exists.
DNA Exoneration Cases  DNA analysis advancements  accurately link person to crime
Common Factors leading to wrongful conviction 
Empirical Studies  Field Studies  high in ecological validity, lack experimental control
Lab Studies  more control, lack ecological validity.
Accuracy of Eyewitness ID  Estimator Variables + System Variables

Identification Procedures:
1. Show Ups  one-person line up containing one suspect  high rates of false-
identification  criticised as bias
2. Line Ups  test ability of witness to identify witness among multiple foils. Foils
should consist of foils with similar appearance to eye witness description 
minimise bias

A good foil  matches verbal description but differs in ways not mentioned in verbal
description.

Live line ups  confrontational to witnesses

Photo line ups
Mugshot search  helps identify a suspect in early stages of investigation  incorrect line
up accuracy  unconscious transference.

Simultaneous Line up  All line up members at once

Sequential Line up  Suspects presented sequentially  fewer false IDs and less correct IDs

Relative Judgment – simultaneous line up

Absolute Judgment - sequential line up

Simultaneous Line Ups  more favourable

Line Up Procedures:
- Unbiased Instructions
- Double Blind
- Foils Similar
- Confidence Measures
- Target-absent line ups
- Faster decisions  accuracy

Lect. 4
Identification and Evaluation of Criminal Suspects: Profiling & Lie Detection
 Criminal Profiling: A technique for identifying the major personality and behavioural
characteristics of an individual based on analysis of crimes committed.
 1970s  criminal profiling program at FBI
Different Profiling Methods:
 1. Deductive Criminal Profiling: Profiling the background characteristics of an unknown
offender based on evidence at crime scene, relies on logical reasoning  logic can
be flawed
2. Inductive Criminal Profiling: Profiling background characteristics of an unknown
offender based on knowledge about other solved cases, i.e. similar characteristics
among individuals who commit similar crimes

Inductive Profiling:
1. FBI categorisation of murders (Associate different characteristics with each crime scene):
a. Organised e.g. controlled  intelligent, skilled, lives with partner etc.
b. Disorganised e.g. uncontrolled  average IQ, immature, sexually incompetent

This is a simplistic model, with little research and is unable to account for a combination of
organised and disorganised features.

2. Statistical Approach:
Collection of data from solved crimes  actions occur together and allow an analysis of
typology  profiling
Analysis is limited to value of data available, analysis may be unstable if sample size is not
large enough

3. Geographic Profiling: analysis of crime scene location to determine offender residence.

Offenders are located in proximity to the location of their crimes.

Lie Detection:
Deception: Successful or unsuccessful deliberate attempt to create in another a belief which
the communicator considers untrue.
Polygraph  measures physiological change i.e. blood pressure, heart rate, respiration,
sweating.
It is assumed that telling a lie is more stressful than telling the truth
Uses of Polygraph:
 Helps in investigations
 Verify crime occurred
 Pre-employment screening
Not admissible in court

3 types of polygraph tests:

1. Relevant/Irrelevant Test  asks questions relevant to crime and irrelevant to
crime  assumes guilty party will respond more strongly when lying about
relevant questions. However, relevant problems cause stress  false positive
errors.
2. Control Question Test  1st phase: 3 questions; irrelevant, relevant and control.
Control questions designed to cause innocent individuals to exhibit a stressful
 response, enabling comparison to relevant question. Suspect must lie to the
control question. 2nd phase: Simulation Test: Designed to convince suspect that
polygraph will detect lies  make guilty fearful, innocent less fearful. 3rd phase:
control, relevant, and irrelevant questions repeated. 4th phase: Score calculated,
if relevant > control = negative score (deceptive), if control > relevant = positive
score (truth). 5th phase: confront suspect with result for confession
3. Guilty Knowledge Test  assesses if suspect has information that only criminal
would know, consists of multiple-choice questions and if suspect guilty  react
strongly to correct information. Innocent individual would not react [more
questions better odds]. Can only be used if lots of knowledge is known only to
perpetrator.

Issue with Polygraph Tests? CQT  False positives  large number of innocent identified as
guilty
GKT  Very accurate at identifying innocent individuals, less accurate at identifying guilty
individuals.
Lect. 5
Interviewing Suspects and False Confessions
Interrogation  gain info, confession
Model of Interrogation
1. Gather evident
2. Non-accusatorial interview  assess guilt
 3. Accusatorial interview  confession

1. Positive Confrontation:
Presentation of real/fictional evidence, observe suspect’s behaviour
2. Theme development:  Psychological themes to justify crime
Emotional: Minimisation  Minimise severity of crime
Non-emotional: Maximisation  Maximise severity of crime
3. Handling Denials: Innocent will be persistence in their denial
4. Overcoming objections: render suspect’s objections useless
5. Retaining suspect’s attention:
6. Handling suspect’s passive mood  possible reasons for crime
7. Create opportunity for confession
8. Oral Confession: brief, clear, non-emotionally-charged
9. Oral  Written Confession

Minimisation  positive aspects of admission of guilt

Maximisation  negative aspects of not admitting guilt

Issues with 9-step approach:

 Interrogator bias
 Trickery/deceit
 Pressure for confession  resentment to police
 Guilty aware of deceit
 PTSD
 Brief Responses prevent whole and accurate story
 May lead to false confessions

3 types of confessions:
 Voluntary
 Coerced-compliant  response to a desire to escape further interrogation, did not
commit crime.
 Coerced-internalised  highly suggestive interrogations, confessors comes to believe
they committed the crime.

Compliance and suggestibility underlie false confessions:

Compliance  tendency to go alone with authority
Suggestibility  tendency to internalise information during questioning
Lack of clear memory, presentation of false evidence  false confessions.
Confessions to be admissible must be voluntary and by a competent individual.
Australia  PEACE Model
Psychology of Juries
Originated in Egypt
Right to trial  Athens
Jury  apply law to evidence render  guilty/innocent
Jury Nullification  ignore law render verdict on other criteria
Jury  impartial + representativeness of community
Jury Selection: Randomly drawn from list  Jury Pool  Jurors selected from pool based on
challenges
 Peremptory challenges  removal limited number of prospective jurors without
reasoning
 Challenge for cause:  both parties unlimited right to challenge with reasoning
Jury Selection: Choosing/Shaping jury through above challenges
Methods of Studying Jury Behaviour:
1. Post-trial interviews: Limitations  Social desirability, valuable recall
2. Archival Records  records of trials  no cause/effect
3. Simulation Techniques  Independent variables in simulated trial  limited
applicability to real life scenarios
4. Field Study  real trial  observe process: high ecological validity  variables
cannot be controlled, limited permission

Stages in jury reaching verdict:

1. Evidence  Notetaking + Ask Questions  Increase memory and understanding of

evidence
2. Disregarding inadmissible evidence  difficulties to ignore inadmissible evidence
3. Judge’s instructions
4. Individual Juror Decision-Making  Evidence organised into coherent whole
5. Jury Deliberation 
Leniency Bias: tendency for jury to produce a tilt to acquittal
Group Polarisation: Tendency for individuals to become more extreme In their initial
position following group discussion
Minority Influence 
6. Two-thirds Majority Scheme, Hung Jury  Jury did not reach a verdict

Similarity-latency hypothesis: Jurors tend to be more lenient with defendants that share
characteristics with them.
Black-sheep effect: Similarity in characteristics  condemnation of defendant

Against Juries
 Expensive
 :
Against
 Civic responsibility  sense of responsibility
 Decision of group of peers rather than one judge

Personality 7-9
 1. 2. Explain the distinction between a nomotheticand an idiographicfocus on
personality.
2. 3. List the four fundamental approaches to understanding personality.
3. 4. Describe the two functions/roles of any theory.
4. 5. Distinguish between testing/evaluating a theory (a) empirically, and (b)
conceptually.
5. 6. List the criteria used to test a theory conceptually.

6. 1. List the main areas into which the explanatory power of classical psychoanalysis
has reached.
7. 2. Discuss the key features of Freud’s concept of motivation.
8. 3. Identify the effects of those features in the context of a relatively long period of
infantile
9. dependence.
10. 4. Understand the difference between Freud’s notions of a descriptive and a dynamic
unconscious.
11. 5. Name some of the defense mechanisms and compromise formations, and state
their general function.
12. 6. Explain why classical psychoanalysis sometimes meets the conceptual criteria for
coherence and sometimes doesn’t.

13. Contrast Jung’s concept of the collective unconscious with Freud’s concept of the
dynamic unconscious.
2. Explain what Jung thought an archetype is.
3. Describe the alleged phenomenon of ‘synchronicity’.
4. Identify the two approaches to personality theory which Jung’s work was to influence.
5. Account for Jungian psychoanalysis’ failure to meet the criteria for theory evaluation and
pass the conceptual tests.

1. Identify the key difference between radical behaviourism and cognitive behaviourism.
2. Describe the processes involved in imitation and modelling.
3. Explain how Bandura’s theory upholds determinism.
4. Identify an important mediator of personality in Bandura’s theory.
5. Explain why Bandura’s theory remains popular.
6. Understand why cognition alone cannot function as a motivational concept.

1. Recall the key feature of any phenomenological theory.

2. Identify the aim of existentialism as an approach to the study of human nature.
3. Define Dasein.
4. Contrast the three modes of the world.
5. Describe briefly the existentialist concepts of death, Angst and free will.
6. Explain which conceptual criteria existentialism fails to meet.

1. Name the oldest of the four approaches to the study of personality.

2. Describe how personality was conceptualized by Hippocrates (circa 400BC).
3. Identify a difference between a typology and a trait conception of personality.
4. Explain how Eysenck arrives at his three factor model of personality.
5. Outline the basis of the introversion extroversion dimension, according to Eysenck.
6. State three key theoretical statements from McCrae & Costa’s five factor theory.
7. Contrast McCrae & Costa’s causal account with that of Eysenck’s.
8. Explain the problems with the McCrae & Costa account.

Lect. 1
eReserve: Hibberd. F. J (2018) Evaluating theories conceptually

Concept of Personality
Nomothetic How similar are you from other people  if true  nomothetic truth 
universal
Idiographic: How different are you from other people
Gordon Allport  introduced distinction between
 Personality: dynamic organisation within individual of psychophysical systems that
determine his unique adjustments to his environment (Allport)
Four Approaches to Personality Theory:
1. Psychoanalytic
2. Cognitive-Behavioural
3. Humanistic/phenomenological
4. Dispositional/trait
Theory  explain phenomenon and make predictions

Axioms
Philosophical Statements
Theoretical Statements

Conceptual testing of theories for evaluation is a useful tool to determine if theory is

logically impossible and hence false  therefore no use in collecting empirical data.

Lect.2 – An overview of Freud’s classical psychoanalytic theory

Essential Reading

Freud’s concept of motivation:

Newborn has multiple innate biological drives essential for survival e.g. appetite
Drives are a physiological need
Each drive has an intensity or appetite
Drive Gratification  Drive gratified  Pleasure principle: Seeks pleasure
Drives energise seeking new information about reality, provides drive gratification
Drive Frustration  When drive gratification is restricted
The reality principle highlights that drive gratification is not always immediately  provides
learning that pleasure is not always immediate.
Pain is the frustration of the drive’s appetite for gratification
Humans have a relatively long period of infantile dependence  psychological
consequences  formulate primary attachment and personality development
Early years have a consequential effect on later years
Later years  socialisation  broader family, institutions, school groups provide other
influences.
Rewarding/gratifying drives  Drives Conflict e.g. over-gratify
Punishing/frustrating drives  Drives Conflict
Internalisation of what is socially right and wrong, by rewarding/punishing of drives 
socialisation of individual
Internal Conflict and Repression:
Socially unacceptable drives are subject to repression, therefore unacceptable material is
dynamically repressed  this referred to as the ID

Conceptualisation of psyche as consisting of:

ID  repressed material presses for release and gratification contributes to personality +
behaviour
EGO  any material not repressed
SUPEREGO  conscience, internalised beliefs about what is right and wrong

Socialisation and internalisation leads to internal conflict and repression

Defence Mechanism as compromise formations:

 Psyche is not unified

Criteria for Evaluating Theory: Psychoanalytic Theory

Clarity? At times
Coherence? At times
Can it be reformulated? Yes
Theoretical statements without adequate argument? No
Key categories omitted? No
Generality? At times
Predictive accuracy? Empirical support  Some supporting and others against.

Lect.3 – Jung’s analytical psychology

Essential Reading
Carl Jung

Jung’s word association studies support Freud’s notion of the dynamic unconscious:
Personal Unconscious:
 Repressed ideas
 Memories
 Impulses
Collective Unconscious:
Non-individual part of the psyche
According to Jung:
 Supra-personal
 Archetypes: psychological images or models inherited from ancestral past/ evolutionary
development
Jung’s Main Archetypes of Collective Unconscious child-god, mother, trickster/magician,
hero
Synchronicity: Two events occur close in time, without one having caused the other, but it
appears to the individual that there is a significant connection between the two.
Two events related via meaning rather than cause and effect
Jung’s anticipation of later approaches to personality:
oes

Criteria for theory evaluation: Jung’s analytical psychology

Not clear  vague and obscure
Coherence  poor
Reformulate?  Inconsistencies make it difficult

Lect. 4 – Cognitive behaviour approach to personality

Classical Psychoanalysis (1880s -1930s)  cognition, motivation, emotion, language

Radical Behaviourism (1913-1940s)  systematically study the effect of environmental

contingencies e.g. stimuli and response  John Watson and Burrhus Skinner  cognition
plays no role in behaviour

Cognitive Behaviourism (1920s - )  Edward Tolman, Albert Bandura

Cognition has a causul role in explaining behaviour

Albert Bandura  Cognitive behaviourism: approach to understanding personality from

1970s
Individuals can learn vicariously through four types of cognitive processes:
 Attentional processes  what is selectively observed out of many modelling possibilities
 Retention processes  enabled modelled information to be retained in memory
 Production processes  converting stored information into imitative actions of
modelled information
 Motivation processes  performing a modelled behaviour to bring about a valued
outcome

Self-System:
 Triadic reciprocal determinism:
 Cognitive/Personal
 Person’s ongoing behaviour
 Environment

Perceived self-efficacy as a mediator of the individual’s personality

Self-Efficacy: Beliefs in one’s capabilities to organise and execute courses of action required
to produce given attainments

A person will do X if they believe that X will lead to a desired outcome and they can do X.
Criteria for Theory Evaluation: Bandura’s Cognitive Behaviourism  corrected radical
behaviourism exclusion of cognition
Criticisms:
1) Disembodied cognition: idea of cognition not linked to body of psychoanalytic drives
2) Treats motivation as a cognitive process; form of cognition, cognitions are action neutral

Lect. 5 – Rollo May’s existential analysis

The humanistic/phenomenological approach to personality
Phenomenology  first person description of human experience
Existentialism  individual is free and responsible, self-determining agent, constructing
their own meaning in life
Existential Phenomenology or Humanistic Existential Phenomenology: Rollo May
 Key Existentialist Questions: What is the meaning of human existence

Dasein: Human experience, aka our being in the world.

Dasein is fluid and relational, categorised by three modes of the world:
 Umwelt  the natural physical biological world, including the body
 Mitwelt  the with world; interrelationships between human beings
 Eigenwelt your own world; relationship with self.
Death & Anxiety:
Existentialism  awareness of death  state non-Dasein, heightens meaning of life.
Psychological deaths  threaten sense of self  angst  nomothetic characteristic of man
Free Will:
Existentialism  man is conscious and responsible for his existence.

Criteria for evaluating existential psychoanalysis:

Addresses angst of human existence
Problem: Existentialism appears to have a concept: Eigenwelt, cut off from a motivational
concept, cognition alone is action-neutral and not sufficient to explain behaviour. Can be
reformulated. Free-will is a core tenet hinders ability to be reformulated
Not all key existential questions are logically incoherent. What is the meaning of life? Highly
ambiguous

Lect. 6 – Eysenck’s biological typology and McCrae & Costa’s five factor model:
Typology – trait distinction
 Dispositional/Trait Approach to Understanding Personality:
Four temperaments originating ancient Egypt:
- Sanguine
- Choleric
- Melancholic
- Phlegmatic
Eysenck’s Thee Factor Model: Extraversion, Neuroticism, Psychoticism
McCrae & Costa’s Five Factor Model: Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to experience,
agreeableness, and conscientiousness

Dark Triad: narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy

Individual’s unique character result of combination of traits

McCrae & Costa’s Five Factor Model:

1. Personality traits are endogenous basic tendencies
2. Psychological tendencies cause thoughts, feelings and actions
3. Personality trait is a property of an individual
HOWEVER, tendencies are externally controlled, under certain circumstances. Rather
thoughts, feelings and actions cause tendencies/traits.

Social Psychology:
Lect. 1 – What is it? + Replication Crisis: unable to reproduce same results found in literature
Effect of social variables on individual behaviour, attitudes, motives etc.
Social Cognition: Process by which people select, interpret, remember social info.
Social Perception: Process by which people understand categorise other’s behaviours
Social Interaction: Process of inter-person interaction
1898 Birth of Social Psych  Norman Triplett
Social behaviours is shaped by the interaction between person and situation

Replication Crisis:
False Positives  Incorrect rejection of null hypothesis
Replication may fail due to: original study results being p-hacked, or were a false positive,
replication incompetence, cohort changes, contextual changes since original study

Lect. 2 – Social Perception

Attributions and consequences + theories and Attitudes
Social Perception: how we understand and categorise other’s behaviours
Attribution Theory: Tend to give a causal explanation for someone’s behaviour, crediting
internal dispositions or external situations.
Internal Attribution  explaining behaviour due to dispositional factors
External Attribution  explaining behaviour due to situational factors
Covariation Model  3 Questions:
1) Consistency: Does actor behave same to same stimulus in different situations?
2) Consensus: Do other people behave same to stimulus?
3) Distinctiveness: Does actor behave same to different stimuli?
Yes, high to all three questions  external attribution
Yes, to first, consensus low, distinctiveness high  interaction between situation &
person
Yes, to first, consensus low, distinctiveness low  internal attribution
Rather, than accounting for someone’s behaviour through situations, we overestimate a
person’s disposition/traits and consequently underestimate the situation.
 Correspondence bias (CB): tendency to infer that traits correspond to behaviour
 Fundamental attribution error (FAE): tendency to over-attribute behaviour to traits
and underestimate situational influences.
Quiz Show Paradigm  Influence of social roles underestimated, over-attributed
intelligence

Actor-Observer Bias:
Tendency to attribute our own behaviour to external causes but behaviour of others to
internal (dispositional) causes.
Attributions about others  focus on dispositional factors
Attributions about own behaviour  focus on situational factors
In Quiz Show Paradigm  Observers demonstrated actor-observer affect, contestants were
actors and did not demonstrate actor underestimate power of situation role.
Alter actor-observer bias: observers’ dispositional attributions  situational attributions
Actors’ situational attributions  dispositional attributions
Perpetual salience: Focus on the person more than the situation when observing others,
focus on situation more when observing our own behaviour
Situations lack salience
Insufficient cognitive resources  easy to make internal attributions
Cultural differences: Western  dispositional, Eastern situational
Attitudes:
What is an attitude:
Positive or negative evaluation of people objects, situations ideas
Tripartite (Three component) model, three elements comprise the attitude object:
Affective:
Behavioural:
Cognitive:

Measurement of attitudes:
Explicit attitudes conscious, deliberate attitudes e.g. political attitudes

Strongly Like to Strongly Like scales

Implicit attitudesindirect measures, unconscious, automatic

Implicit Association Test (IAT): supposed to investigate implicit attitudes, based on idea that
two particular concepts are strongly connected.
Response test Congruent trials
Incongruent trials reverse of congruent key
If there is an association between the two concepts, longer response for incongruent trials.
IAT effect provides index of strength of association

Other attitude measures:

Physiological Measures heart rate, pupil dilation
Unobtrusive measures  non-verbal behaviour
Bogus pipeline fake lie detector
Lect. 3 – Social Perception II

Do attitudes predict behaviour?

Implicit attitudes are able to predict spontaneous, non-verbal behaviour, or behaviour under
time-pressure
Explicit attitudes
Theory of Reasoned Action: 2 ELEMENTS
Attitudes towards specific behaviour
Subjective Norms  critique of other people
FORM BEHAVIOURAL INTENTION  BEHAVIOUR
Reformulation  Theory of Planned Action  Adding perceived behavioural control as
another element contributing to behaviour intention and behaviour.

Attitude Change
1. Cognitive Dissonance: State of tension one experiences after making a decision, taking
an action which is contrary to one’s prior beliefs and feelings incongruent cognitions
 Motivation to reduce tension:
- Change behaviour
- Change opinion
- Add new consonant cognitions
Festinger experiment on cognitive dissonance.

Cognitive dissonance studies show that attitudes shift to be consistent with expressed
opinions: Two explanations:
1) Motivational: Reduce tension of two opposing beliefs (dissonance reduction)
2) Purely cognitive: Observe own behaviour (self-perception theory)

2. Persuasive communications: Deliberate efforts to change attitudes advocate particular

side of an issue, to change attitudes/behaviours
Elaboration Likelihood Model:
Communication  Two routes:
1) Central Route  Compelling arguments  Strong lasting change
o Requires careful thinking
o Pay attention to quality of argument
2) Peripheral Route  Cues  Weak temporary change
o Appeal to emotion  emotion-arousing communications  mobilise action 
graphic smoking campaigns
o Think superficially
Stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination
Stereotype: Generalisations ascribed to a group + Characteristics applied to an entire group
(Cognitive)
Prejudice: positive/negative evaluation of a group
(Affective)
Discrimination: unjustified negative/harmful treatment and behaviour toward a group,
negative action on prejudice (Behaviour)
Contribute to target of prejudice

Origins of Stereotypes:
 Social Categorisation
o Social Identity Theory
o Easy Identification method
 Sociocultural learning
o Knowledge of stereotypes transmitted effectively through culture and society
Cause of prejudice:
- Social categorisation
- Sociocultural Learning
- Competition e.g. over scarce resources
- In-group bias  own group superior
- Out-group homogeneity  differential members of in-group, out-group all
seen the same.
Lect.4 – Social Influence I: Conformity

Social and situational influences:

- Social Norms
- Social Roles

Compliance  change behaviour/attitude with request

Conformity  changing behaviours/attitudes to accommodate those values of a reference
group (group pressure)
Obedience  compliance with authority figure i.e. command

Informational influence to act correctly:

- Look to others for info
- Private acceptance
Normative influence  approval
- Need to fit in
- Asch’s line conformity study
- Public compliance  expected consequences of dissent/breaking norm
Factors contributing to conformity: crisis, unanimity, gender, expertise etc
Collectivist cultures exhibit higher conformity

Lect.5 – Social Influence II: Obedience and Minority Influence

Factors Affecting Conformity:
 Ambiguity
 Need to be accurate
 Crisis/emergency
 Unanimity
 Gender
 Expertise
 Status and attractiveness of group
 Group size
Minority Influence: processes of social influence in which a minority change attitudes and
behaviours of majority.

Conversion Effect: When minority brings about internal, private change in attitudes of
majority.
Consistent Minority Influence to bring about a conversion effect must:
 Demonstrate certainty and commitment to a position
 Be distinct from the majority norm
 Not motivated by self-interest
 Be perceived as individuals with the power to freely choose and express their
position
 Draw attention to an alternative position

Obedience:
Central experiment  Stanley Milgram’s 1963 Study  a learner, and instructor were both
actors in the experiment, and the teacher was a real participant with their responses
recorded. The teacher was instructed to deliver sequentially higher electric shocks when the
learner answered a question incorrectly. The learner was not harmed. The results were
literally SHOCKING! 65% of participants went to highest shock, and hence remained
obedient to the instructor.

Why do people obey?

 Informational social influence: in ambiguous situations individuals look to others for
guidance
 Normative social influence: do not want to disappoint others, or face social disapproval
 Not due to personality

Reducing Obedience  Altered Milgram’s experiment:

 (In)consistent information  included dissenting “teachers”, contradictory
experimenters reduce obedience.
 Turning in the “victim”  different feedback from “victim”: Remote feedback (higher
obedience), Voice feedback (baseline), Proximity (same room, obedience drops by
almost half)
 Tuning out authority (experimenter) Baseline (normal), Absent experimenter: Obedience
drops significantly, Ordinary person as authority: obedience also significantly drops

Why do we continue to obey?

 No time to think
 Self-justification: gradual increase in shocks, cognitive dissonance
 Loss of personal responsibility: doing my job, fulfilling their role, following orders
 Not due to personality

Field Experiment of Obedience: Stanford Prison Experiment

Obedience has had a role in:
Genocide
Massacres
Mass Suicides in cults.
Lect. 6 – Interpersonal Processes I: Prosocial Behaviour

Types of Prosocial Behaviours:

Prosocial Behaviour: behaving in a way that is good for other people or society i.e. engaging
in acts that are positively valued by society

Helping Behaviour: acts that intentionally benefit others

Altruism: Prosocial behaviours that function to assist others even when:

1) No personal gain
2) Potential cost to helper

Explanations of prosocial behaviour:

Evolutionary Social Psychology:
 Kin Selection  assist those with similar genetics (higher degree of relatedness)
 Reciprocity  expectation of returned assistance/help
 Mutually cooperative behaviour  mutual cooperation helping allows groups to
have better chance of survival than individual

Social and Biosocial Explanations:

 Social Learning Theory (Bandura)  Learning by direct experience, vicarious
learning: influence the prosocial behaviour of individuals as they learn the benefits
to self (direct experience) and rewards to model (indirect experience) from helping
others.
 Social Exchange Theory: “What’s in it for me?”  cost-benefit analysis 
rewards/benefits: self-worth, monetary, costs: physical, social (embarrassment),
time.
 Altruistic helping  motivated by empathy: empathy-altruism hypothesis
 Egoistic helping  motivated for reward or negative-state relief hypothesis: help to
feel better above oneself.

Influences on helping behaviour:

Individual differences:
 Personality:
- There is no prosocial personality type
 Gender:
- Depends on situation, women  nurturing environments, men  in crisis
 Mood:
- Positive mood  engage in prosocial behaviour
- Negative mood  depends on mood, can restrict helping others, guilt or sadness
can promote prosocial behaviour to increase feelings of self-worth
Situational differences:
 Number of Bystanders: Bystander Effect

 5 step-model to helping (Darley & Batson)

1) Notice the event  if in a hurry: no help
2) Interpret event as an emergency  if pluralistic ignorance (NO HELP): when
individuals monitor reactions of other bystanders and conclude (from bystander’s
inaction) that they don’t need to intervene.
3) Assume responsibility  if diffusion of responsibility (NO HELP): When others are
present, individuals are more likely to diffuse their own responsibility to assist in an
emergency situation
4) Know appropriate form of assistance  if lack of knowledge/competence to help
(NO HELP)
5) Implement Decision  if danger to self; legal concerns, embarrassment (NO HELP)
Only at this point do people Intervene/Offer Help.

Lect. 7 – Interpersonal Processes II: Social Relationships

Like and Loving:
 Cross-cultural standards of beauty exist  facial symmetry.
 Physical attractiveness is important to both men and women.
 “Averageness”
 Familiarity  individuals prefer faces that most resemble their own face

What leads to attraction?

 Proximity: propinquity  more individuals see and interact with people the more they
like them (proximity  familiarity)
 Mere exposure effect (positive/negative): repeated exposure to an object results in
greater attraction to that object
 Reciprocity: like those who like us, dislike those who dislike us
 Similarity: Birds of a feather flock together. Similarity in opinions, attitudes, values
interpersonal style, NOT personality characteristics draws people together.
 Similarity promotes attraction as:
o Similar others have qualities we like
o Similar others validate our beliefs
o Facilitates smooth social interactions
o We make negative inferences about people who we disagree with
 Similarity  Familiarity  Attraction

Loving:
Passionate Love:
- Ecstatic
- Physically arousing
- Desire for Physical contact
- Immense sadness when things are not going well

Companionate Love:
- Intimate, caring etc
- Soul mates
- Commitment

Maintaining relationships:
- Positive behaviours: validating, expressing appreciation etc.
- Negative behaviours: criticism, contempt (disrespectful), defensiveness, stonewalling
(emotionally-withdrawn)
- Amount of contempt is most damaging to relationships
- Ratio of 5:1 for a happy relationship
- Attributions for partner’s behaviour:
o Internal attributions for positive and external attributions for negative
behaviours in satisfying relationships.
o External attributions for positive and internal attributions behaviours in less
satisfying relationships

Developmental Psychology:

Lect. 1 – The Importance of the Early Environment

Influence of Early Environment:

 Impoverished Early Environment

- Monkey Experiments: Suomi & Harlow (1972) social rehabilitation of isolate reared
monkeys.
Severity of behavioural disruption achieved by altering duration of isolation and age:
o Isolation for 3 months: “emotional shock”  within a month returned to normal
behaviour
o Isolation for 6 months: “emotional shock” but did not recover
o Isolation for second 6 months: aggression and fear upon return to group, but
recovered quickly
o Isolation for 12 months: social misfits, no recovery

- Orphanage Studies  insight into effects of early social deprivation

o Goldfarb compared early (<3 months) with late (>3 years) adoption of children
from orphanages. At age 12, children with late placement in foster homes
presented severe mental deficits.
o Greater age of adoption the greater cognitive and socio-emotional deficits
 o English/Romanian adoption study: 111 children adopted into English families
before age 2 contrasted with 52 adoptees from within England analysed height,
weight, head circumference, cognitive/developmental at 4 years. Those adoptees
from Romania demonstrated a significantly higher proportion of lower physical
development upon entry to UK but demonstrated considerable catch-up by age
4. IQ at 4 years showed that those children that were at the orphanage for
longer (socially isolated) were below average IQ.
o Children with first period of life in deprived environments suffer lasting cognitive
and social/emotional deficits, however, can be completely/slightly/cannot be
overcome by move to stimulating environment
o Degree to which deficits can be overcome is related to time spent in deprived
environment.

- Postnatal Depression:
o PND  20-40% of mothers  PND  irritable/hostile behaviour, less engaged,
emotion, play and warmth with infants at 3 months.
o PND  disturbed early interactions linked to cognitive delays and health
problems. At adolescence: children from PND mothers had increased cortisol,
stress hormone  anxiety. At adulthood: more reactive to stressful situations 
greater risk of anxiety/depression
- Class differences:
o SES & Disadvantaged Children  lower SES are behind entering school

 Preschool interventions to enrich early environments:

- Head Start: Children at risk (disadvantaged) given special early education programs,
aim to improve physical/mental health, enhance cognitive skills, foster social and
emotional development through early education, health/mental screening/referral,
nutrition plans, social services, parental involvement  increased likelihood to cope
with and finish high school + improved social competence

- Abecederian Program

Lect. 2 – Introduction to Developmental Psychology

Developmental Psychology is the discipline that seeks to identify and explain the changes in
behaviour that individuals undergo throughout their life.

Major trajectory of developmental change is: Dependence  Independence

Or… External regulation  Self-regulation

Children are active and sophisticated despite limited self-regulatory abilities.

Self-regulation and independence require priority of goals. Goals guide self-regulation, the
prolonged period of “helplessness” is necessary to formulate the ability to prioritise only
goal-relevant information.
2 Types of Research:
1. Reverse engineering the way world is now
2. Interventions to make the world better
Collaborations are necessary to inform both studies.

Interpreting Children’s Behaviour:

- Where does behaviour originate is it normal?
Delayed Gratification Test
- What determines behaviour: Biological/Maturation (nature), Experience (nurture)

Methodological Considerations:
Design a study that answers a specific question:
Conduct a lab or naturalistic observation (internal/external validity)
What are you measuring and how e.g. measuring an emotion?
Consider a change: cross-sectional or longitudinal design

Cross-sectional study: different subjects are studied at different ages

Longitudinal study: same subjects studied at a variety of ages

Cross-sectional design
Advantages Disadvantages
Studies are time-efficient No information about past determinants of
age-related changes
Data collected over a wide age range in a Issue of “cohort variation” – each age group
short time born into different years and
environmental influences
No information on individual development
Longitudinal design
Advantages Disadvantages
Provides extensive information on Extremely resource dependent
individual development Time and cost
Subject lost (selective attrition)
Cross-generational change (is early data
relevant)
Inflexibility (stuck with the initial sample
measures)
Longitudinal sequential design: Sequence of samples of different ages, each of which is
followed longitudinally for a period of time
Advantages:
- More efficient than longitudinal design
- Reveals cultural/historical effect using a time-lagged comparison (compare samples
born in different years at same age)

Design Issues:
- Sampling Bias (require a representative sample)
- Observer Effect (mother/teacher/researcher)
- Selective attrition (problem in longitudinal studies)
 - Practice effects (repeated measures – influence performance)
- Validity/reliability of tests

Lect. 3 – Constructivist Theories of Cognitive Development

Cognition: All mental activities
Cognitive development: processes by which humans come to think and understand

Two cognitive development theories:

- Piaget’s stage theory
- Vygotsky’s sociocultural (contextual) theory

Piaget’s fundamental questions:

1) What is the origin of knowledge?
2) How is knowledge acquired? How is it used to reason? How does it change with
development?

Explanation of development relies on Theory of development:

1) Nature (biological factors) or nurture (environment)
a. Predeterminists – environment plays minor role, maturation main role
b. Environmentalists (Behaviourists)– environment has pre-eminent role
c. Interactionists – both nature and nurture
2) Continuous or discontinuous development

Piaget’s theory is a form of interactionism called “constructivism”  children born with no

knowledge but innately driven to learn by constructing their knowledge through their
perception of the world and actions on the world.

Piaget’s theory suggested that children are active in their own development (self-driven
learners) rather than passive such as within a solely nurture-based theories and purely
nature-based theories.

Piaget’s stage theory: For children to advance to the next stage of development, Piaget
proposed that they must reach a level of learning and maturation  Discontinuity in
development, continuous development within a stage, significant change in nature of
thinking in new stage.
Main Features:
- Individuals pass through a series of qualitatively different levels/stages of structural
organisation
- Development involves changing underlying structures
- Sequence of stage progression is invariant
- Stages are universal
- Nature and nurture contribute
- Schemes/Schemata are mental structures that capture common properties of
behaviours, objects, experiences
 - Knowledge, thoughts and ideas develop through adaption: the modification of
schema

Two complementary processes of adaption:

1) Assimilation  Understanding an experience in terms of existing schema, i.e.
adjusting information to fit existing schema/structure
2) Accommodation  modifying schema to account for new experiences, i.e. altering
cognitive structure to account for new information.

Piaget’s Stages:
1) Sensorimotor stage (approx. 0-2 years) reflexes to symbolic thought, understanding
world through direct experience, understanding nature of objects: object
permanence (understanding that objects have a separate, permanent existence)
2) Preoperational stage (approx. 2-7 years) development of symbolic thought – mental
action, thought is unsystematic, illogical and characterised by egocentric thought 
used 3 mountain task. Involves centration (focusing on only central features, or
single dimensions), perceptually bound (judge the world by its appearance),
animism. Tested using conservation tasks  failure of this task a result of centration.
3) Concrete operations stage (approx. 7-11 years): mastering of mental manipulation: -
decentring and reversible thinking enabling classification, conservation
4) Formal operations stage (approx. 11 years +): logical operations on
abstract/hypothetical concepts, thoughts, ability to reflect on own thinking
(reflective thinking)

Problems with Piaget’s theory:

- Why do adults fail formal tests of logical reasoning?
- Why do abstract thinkers often need concrete examples

Contemporary Criticism:
- Underestimation of young children’s abilities and overestimation of adult’s abilities
- Does cognitive development progress in DISTINCT stages?
- Are developmental sequences truly universal?

Contemporary Constructivist theories:

- Agree with Piaget that child is active in own development, and no innate knowledge
- Disagree with Piaget that development is non-continuous. Propose development is
continuous.
- Two drivers of cognitive development: acquisition of domain-specified knowledge
(more knowledge in an area allows more sophisticated thinking) and maturation of
domain-general “executive function” (self-regulation skills, taking in information,
responding appropriately).
- Co-development of knowledge and executive function to support goal-directed
behaviour
Cognitive development involves development of executive function: self-regulating
behaviour to enact complex plans to achieve goals:
- Enables ability to juggle multiple sources of information, and select and focus on
important information to act to achieve goals.

Lect. 4 – Social Development

Vygotsky’s social-cultural theory of cognitive development:
 Vygotsky alternatively proposed that the mental life of a child is co-developed with the
people around them.
 Object of development is child’s culture, which child grows into and learns about.
 To understand development must observe behaviour in context of its occurrence
o Different levels of context from face-face interactions to more general cultural
belief systems
 “zone of proximal development”  distance between child’s development level
determined by independent problem solving and higher level of potential development
through problem solving under guidance.
 Vygotsky’s method incorporated a dynamic assessment of children’s potential
development levels
 Vygotsky’s contextual theory predicts larger cross-cultural in child development
o Focus of research on cultural variation of individualism vs collectivism
 Parents have different views of child development in collectivist and
individualist countries
 Correa-Chavez & Rogoff (2009) 5-11 year old children in different
cultures shown how to construct a toy in front of siblings
o In children with little exposure to individualised Western
schooling, children learned from simply observing their
siblings
o Those children exposed to Western schooling, displayed
much less observational learning
 Richard Nisbett  adults in individualised cultures focused on
more individual features, whilst adults in collectivised cultures
focused on more broad features.
 Vygotsky theory proposed that culture provides psychological tools: language (most
important), writing, maps, art etc (these psychological tools vary culturally)
 Language  Speech  Internalised speech over time  Child learns to use language
and “inner-speech” to control their behaviour/self-regulation

Features of sociocultural theory of cognitive development:

- Must study the “child-in-activity-in-context”, how context affects how they think and
remember
- Zone of proximal development must be understood to successfully gauge their
capabilities
- mental functioning originates from sociocultural conditions
 - mediation of intellectual functioning by tools provided by culture

Bandura’s social learning theory:

- based on stimulus-response (S-R) theory taking into account social/cognitive
variables within human development and proposed S-O-R theory, where
O = organismic variables = cognition and mediates S and R
- Most of human learning through observational or vicarious learning: learning by
observation of consequences/outcomes for others

Infamous for “bobo doll” experiment – learned aggression  tested influence of modelled
behaviour on children’s behaviour

Children imitate behaviour of models that are:

- Prestigious e.g. superman
- Of their own sex
- Rewarded for their behaviour
- Perceived as being like themselves

 Parents consciously teach morals through preaching but also through their practice of
moral actions  self-regulation of own moral behaviour

Early prosocial behaviour and development of theory of mind:

Theory of mind (ToM) is the ability to attribute mental states – beliefs, intents, desires etc –
to oneself and others and understand that others have beliefs, desires that are different
from one’s own.
Prosocial behaviour: voluntary behaviour intended to benefit another

Key test for ToM development: false-belief task

- A child must show they understand that other’s beliefs determine other’s
behaviours, even if child has a different belief
Piaget & Kohlberg on Moral judgment:
Presented moral dilemmas and assessed children’s response to them.
Two types of moral judgment:
1) Externally regulated (from 5 years old)  rules from another: an external morality
2) Self-regulated phase (8 years +)  internal morality
3 Broad stages of Moral Judgment:
1) Pre-conventional  focused on punishment/reward, what is right is rewarded, what
is wrong punished
2) Conventional  what is right and wrong extends to a system of
fairness/empathy/helping others, legality/morality often equated
3) Post-conventional  individual supersedes conforming to law, recognises universal
principles of justice/human rights, recognise some laws are immoral

Lect. 5 – Language development

Major theoretical approaches to language development:
Human language is unique as a result of grammar/syntax
Nature or Nurture: Three approaches:
1) Empiricists (Skinner, Bandura)  learning approach (nurture)
2) Nativists (Chomsky, Pinker)  innate language (nature)
3) Interactionists/Constructivists (Bates, Tomasello)  Domain-general maturation
and cognitive/social learning account for language

Behaviourist:
Skinner  Language acquisition through positive reinforcement
Bandura  Social learning perspective through imitation and reinforcement

Nativists:
Chomsky  inborn capacity for learning language: Language Acquisition Device (LAD)
Recursion: sentences can be embedded within sentences enabled infinite computations
(infinitely generative) which Chomsky argued Skinner and Piaget’s learning mechanisms
could not explain.

Interactionists-Constructivists:
Language acquisition is a product of interaction between maturation and environmental
factors connected to cognitive development
Language emerges from domain-general cognition and social learning mechanisms

How language helps us think:

Driving Question: Can we have concepts without words?

Gentner: Natural Partitions Hypothesis

- Objects are perceptually cohesive, and language is not needed to form object
concepts
- Relations between objects are perceptually less define, language is more important
for learning relational concepts
 o Experimental exploration: Children asked to match between the top and
bottom row the same sized object and not the same relative middle object.
However, when the objects are labelled “daddy, mommy, baby” children pick
the middle object.
 Language helps children understand abstract/relational
commonalities.

Carey: Core Knowledge & Conceptual change in learning numbers:

- To learn maths, a new conceptual system is required. Language provides this new
conceptual system enables children to understand that each new word: one, two,
three… represents a different/unique quantity measure/meaning.
Gelman: Conceptual Essentialism:
- When children form categories, they are assumed to not be arbitrary and have
underlying qualities that define them
- Attribute essences to categories and individuals in them
- Domain- specific language input increases domain-specific cognitive development

Lect.6 – Motivation, Achievement & How to Talk to Children

Praise & Motivation & Achievement in School:
“Psychology of Self-Esteem” (Nathaniel Brandon)  massive social movement emphasising
children’s self-esteem as central factor determining a successful childhood
Thought that children with high self-esteem will try hard, succeed in school, have friends
etc. Low self-esteem  will fail at school, have no friends, drug addicts.
- However, teenagers with high self-esteem are shown to drink and do drugs and are
violent from narcissistic self-entitlement
- Constant, indiscriminate praise leads to more “fragile” self-esteem, therefore for
“secure” self-esteem the individual must feel as if the praise they receive is earned.

Why not reward and praise children?

Intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation:
Intrinsic: working because one likes it
Extrinsic: working to achieve reward
Immediate rewards such as giving children lollies for doing well on their homework can shift
an intrinsic motivation to an extrinsic motivation. Therefore, when reward no longer
available individuals lose motivation.
Intrinsic motivation  mastery goals, master a skill for its own sake
Extrinsic motivation  performance goals, desire to perform for other’s sake

Dangers of “person” praise: Carol Dweck

Praising qualities of a person: e.g. “You’re so smart!”  encourages an entity mindset that
intelligence/value is a fixed/innate quality  leads to lack of effort, inability to cope with
failure

Benefits of “process” praise: Carol Dweck

Praising process: “You did so well because you worked so hard!”  encourages growth
mindset that intelligence is a skill  leads to accomplishment of mastery goals and
increased effort with failure.

Person vs Process / Entity vs Growth tested by making two groups of children solve puzzles,
one praised as being innately good at solving the puzzle (person, entity) and the other
praised for their process and effort  process-praised opted for harder/more challenging
puzzle, whilst person-praised opted for easier puzzles, and displayed stress, and sadness
upon failure, and performed worse than process-praised on a final set of do-able puzzles.
Boys more likely to receive process praise and hence more likely to have growth mindsets.

Immediate reward and person praise are dangerous:

1) Reduces intrinsic motivation and mastery goals
2) Encourages entity mindsets increases performance goals in order to maintain self-
image
3) Reduces ability to cope with challenge & failure
Process praise and reinforcing that the idea that the mind is a muscle:
1) Increase growth mindset  effort & mastery goals

Parents & Teacher’s attitudes and how that affects children: e.g. gender stereotypes in
maths:
Studies have revealed that females view maths more negatively, have high maths anxiety,
less likely to pursue degrees involving maths.
Parental endorsement of gender stereotype: “Maths is for boys” and apply this stereotype
on their children  leads to children endorsing gender stereotypes, and assimilate (Piaget’s)
evidence based on their beliefs, rather than changing/accommodating their beliefs because
of the evidence (which counters stereotype)