HUMAN PSYCHOLOGY

PSYCHOLOGY
Psychology is a branch of science that deals with mental processes and
behavior. It is the systematic study of human and animal behaviour, mind
and thought. To pursue the career of a psychologist, one should have a
genuine desire to help other human beings.

Psychology is mainly concerned with the way the mind works processes,
motives, reactions, feelings and nature of the human mind. Their treatment
is based on changing the behavioural patterns of the patients without
medication. They do counceling and help people by bringing about changes
in their thought process, thus improving their quality of life.

Definition : Psychology deals with the mental processes of a human

mind or psyche. It is defined as ' The scientific study of the behavior of
individuals and their mental processes'.

SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

Social psychology is the scientific study of the feelings, thoughts, and

behaviors of individuals in social situations.
Social psychology emphasizes the influence of situations on behavior. People
often find it difficult to see the role that powerful situations play in producing
their own and others' behavior, and they are inclined to overemphasize the
importance of personal dispositions in producing behavior.

Areas of Psychology
Psychology is a broad and diverse field. A number of different subfields and
specialty areas have emerged. The following are some of the major areas of
research and application within psychology:

•Abnormal Psychology is the study of abnormal behavior and

psychopathology.It is the branch of psychology that studies unusual patterns
of behavior, emotion and thought, which may or may not be understood as
precipitating a mental disorder. This specialty area is focused on research and
treatment of a variety of mental disorders and is linked to psychotherapy
and clinical psychology. Mental health professional typically utilize the
Diagnosistic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) to diagnose
mental disorders.

•Biological Psychology, also known as biopsychology, studies how

biological processes influence the mind and behavior. This area is closely
linked to neuroscience and utilizes tools such as MRI and PET scans to look at
brain injury or brain abnormalities.

•Clinical Psychology is focused on the assessment, diagnosis, and

treatment of mental disorders.

•Cognitive Psychology is the study of human thought processes and

cognitions. Cognitive psychologists study topics such as attention, memory,
perception, decision-making, problem-solving and language acquisition.

•Comparative Psychology is the branch of psychology concerned with the

study of animal behavior. The study of animal behavior can lead to a deeper
and broader understanding of human psychology.

•Counseling psychology is a psychological specialty that encompasses

research and applied work in several broad domains: counseling process and
outcome; supervision and training; career development and counseling; and
prevention and health.

•Developmental Psychology is the branch of psychology that looks at

human growth and development over the lifespan. Theories often focus on
the development of cognitive abilities, morality, social functioning, identity
and other life areas.

•Educational psychology is the study of how humans learn in educational

settings, the effectiveness of educational interventions, the psychology of
teaching, and the social psychology of schools as organizations.

•Forensic Psychology is an applied field focused on using psychological

research and principles in the legal and criminal justice system.

•Health psychology is concerned with understanding how biological,

psychological, environmental, and cultural factors are involved in physical
health and the prevention of illness. Health psychologists work alongside
other medical professionals in clinical settings, work on behaviour change in
public health promotion, teach at universities, and conduct research.

•Industrial-Organizational Psychology is the area of psychology that

uses psychological research to enhance work performance, select employee,
improve product design and enhance usability.

•Personality Psychology is a branch of psychology that studies

personality and individual differences. Its areas of focus include:

* Constructing a coherent picture of a person and his or her major

psychological processes

* Investigating individual differences, that is, how people can differ from
one another.

* Investigating human nature, that is, how all people's behaviour is similar.

•Social Psychology is a discipline that uses scientific methods to study

social influence, social perception and social interaction. Social psychology
studies diverse subjects including group behavior, social perception,
leadership, nonverbal behavior, conformity, aggression and prejudice. It is A
common way of understanding situation.When analyzed individually,it
becomes personality psychology.Eg:Students coming late to class react
differentl.Eventhough,they know its wrong,thet aren't bothered.Few feel
sorry for it.Few ignore it.Social psychoclogists analyse the reaction to the
situations.The 10% of people who don't reacct the common way,they are
categorised as abnormal.That is when psychotherapy and counselling comes
into play.Thoughts become evident in the form of actions/behaviour.Actions
are manifestations of the thoughts.Social psychologists aren't bothered
about indinvidual response but only of a group.Culture influences one's social
behaviour."Most of man's actions are based on instincts"said William
McDougal,the first author of a psychology book.It is necessary to channelize
one's instincts. Aristotle says"Man is a social animal".Being social is the
instinctive feeling of a human being with another human which is voiced
verbally or in other ways.Eg:Two children were completely cut off from
human contact.They were absolutely behaving like animals,didn't know how
to talk,walk and couldn,t survive as they couldn't express themselves.Hence
the process of socialisation is important to become a normal human being.
Discipline of social psychology and sociology and their differences -
They both deal with relationships but differently. Social psychology analyses
why some people like only a few other people while Sociology studies the
general trends in relationships like marriage, divorce, etc studies the
disintergration on families. Social psychology studies how social attitudes
develop in individuals. Sociology studies how attitudes differ in people. You
can divide people through sociology. Sociology comapres societies. It is
important to distinguish between social psychology and sociology. While
there are many similarities between the two, sociology tends to looks at
social behavior and influences at a very broad-based level. Sociologists are
interested in the institutions and culture that influence social psychology.
Psychologists instead focus on situational variables that affect social
behavior. While psychology and sociology both study similar topics, they are
looking at these topics from different perspectives. Social psychology deals
with the social institution which is a complex, integrated set of social norms
organized around the preservation of a basic societal value like
family,caste,marriage.Behaviour and attitudes aren't aligned.

Defintion of Social Psychology:It is a branch of pscychology that focuses

on social behaviour,how people interact with and think about others.

The scientific study that seeks to undersatnd the nature and causes of
individual behaviour and thought in social situations.

The scitentific study of how people think about influence and relate to one
another.

Three basic ideas of social pscyhology:

Basically,social pscyhology is the scientific study of

1.Social thinking: It examines social cognition, attitudes, influence and

persuasion -how we percevie ourselves and how we perceive others, what
we believe, judgements we make and our attitudes.Social thinking is
generated in terms of external factors and genetic factors.

2.Social influence: It occurs when an individual's thoughts, feelings or

actions are affected by other people. Social influence takes many forms and
can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience,
leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing.

a) Compliance is when people appear to agree with others, but actually

keep their dissenting opinions private.
 b) Identification is when people are influenced by someone who is liked
and respected, such as a famous celebrity or a favorite uncle.

c) Internalization is when people accept a belief or behavior and agree both

publicly and privately.

It includes the culture and biology, pressure to conform, persuasion and

groups of people.

3.Social relations- It refers to a relationship between two or more

individuals .Social relations, derived from individual agency, form the basis of
the social structure. They involve emotions, prejudice, aggression, attraction
and intimacy, helping, etc.

These three basic ideas of social pscyhology are interelated,inherent part of

day to day life.

EVOLUTION OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

People started understanding concepts of human mind/psych. August count,
the father of Social Psychology, is the one who coined the term, William
McDougal mentioned the term 'Social Psychology' in his book in 1908 and
regarded that human behaviour can be explained by instincts. Later other
psychologists opposed that theory.

Kurt Lenin, a social psychologist tried to escape from the Nazi camp and
successfully escaped only to write an extensive study on leadership.

1940-1960

In the later years to come, people came up with many theories but the basic
component was unbalanced. This was the period when - ' Cognitive
Dissonance' theory was firmly established with many noted psychologists
contributing to the theory.

Cognitive Dissonance

An unpleasant state that occurs where individuals discover inconsistencies

between two of their attitudes or between their attitudes and behaviour.
Festinger, a noted psychologist contributed to the 'cognitive dissonance'
theory. Groups and individual behaviour were also brought up for explaining
behaviour.

1970-1990

"Theory of attribution" was developed which comes under - "Social

perception" concept.

Attribution:

Its a process through which we seek to understand the causes of other's

behaviour. It talks about the perceptual error Eg Halo effects and
stereotypes.

Cognitive approach or perspective:This involves efforts to apply basic

knowledge about cognitive processes such as memory and reasoning to the
task of understanding aspects of social thought and behaviour.Cognitive
factors include attitudes, beliefs, values, inferences in social behaviour.

Hence Social Psychology :

-Focuses on individual behaviour

-Tries to understand causes of social behaviour and thought in terms of the

following factors

•Actions and characteristics

•Cognitive processes

•Ecological variables

•Cultural context

•Biological/ Genitic factors

Social thinking, influence and relations are influenced by the

assumptions.Eg: Rich-highly educated.

Social perception and social cognition - reasoning and memory.

Cognitive processes talk about reasoning and memory. Eg 1: Long term

relationships, a bitter experience gets registered. From the next encounter,
the registered bitter experience comes to out mind and the humans tend to
connect with that because events we experience during our childhood gets
registered.Intuitions are powerful in determining our attitudes and
perceptions.

Behaviour is a conglomeration of social thinking, influence and relations.

When things are smooth, there is no necessity to analyse. Only when things
go wrong people rewind back and find out what the problem is.

Attention and repulsion are considered in caste, community and religious

also. Eg muslims and hindus

Wheareas social psychology studies indvidual psyche in relation to a

group.They study close relationships in terms of

- How certain people get attracted only to some people.

- General trends in marriage, divorce and other friendship patterns,

disintergration of families.

- How social attitudes develop on an individual and how it helps you form a
personality.Variations in each individual determines the group they belong
to.

- How social attitudes differ in people.

Sociology is the science of social phenomena subject to natural and

invariable laws, the discover of which is the object of investigation.

Natural laws - Eg brushing in the morning, having bath

Invariable laws - which cannot be changed. These laws govern the day to day
patterns.

Culture - The enduring behaviour, ideas, attitudes and traditions shared by a

large group of people and transmitted from one generation to the next.

Attitudes
1. They are learned predispositions to respond in a favourable or
unfavourable manner to a particualr object/ person/ situation

2. Attitudes are lasting evaluations of various aspects of the social world.

Attitude plays a crucial role in self identity/esteem. Already learnt inner

predisposition makes the behaviour in tune with what is expected of you. It
depends on the way one us brought up in a social situation, how a person is
socialisedd also depends upon it. Despite affective
components(likes/dislikes), still behaviuristic values related to attitude is
channelised to reality. It should not affect the values of the individuals.

The three components of attitudes - the ABC of attitudes

A- Affective component

It encourages our positive or negative emotions about

something(person,situation,object) or how we feel about it, a aubtle notion.

B- Behavioural component

It consists of an intention or predisposition to act in a particular manner that

is relevant to our attitude. The visible component is exhibited.

C- Cognition component

It refers to the beliefs and the thoughts we hold about the object (person,
situation) of outr attitude.

Why attitudes are important?

There are two basic reasons

1. Attitudes strongly influence social though i.e., how we think of an info,

process and interpretation of the information( cognitive component)

2. Attitudes strongly influence behaviour. In social thinking, we construct our

own reality. Man's intuition is powerful.Social thinking influenceand realtions
are all governed by assumptions.

All relationships are based on cognition to perception. Cognitive process

talks about memory reasoning. tThey are not powerful in a young age. All of
us create our own realities where we have our own positions and this causes
us to justify our actions often in order to maintain our realities.Our everyday
behaviour are a connglomeration of thinking, influences, relations, attitudes,
intuitions, assumptions,etc.

Formation of attitudes
3 ways by which attitudes are formed

Socialisation- The process through which we acquire new information,

forms of behaviour or attitudes or attitudes from other persons.
Internalization of norms, values and other things prevalent in the society to
make you a mormal human being . It is a 'womb-tomb' process starting from
the family (kindergarten of the development of human activities) to the
state, they are all agencies (family->peers->school & college) formally
trained to get attitudes in the right way->Religion-- Macro level self belief
patterns, Do's and Dont's, Theory of Karma, guides you in all aspects of life-
>State- citizen of a country,rulers and regulations for smooth functioning,
Do's and Dont's.These are the agencies that contribute to the process of
socialisation and helps you build a personality by forming attitudes. It is
more related to sociology (social norms and rules)

Social learning - The Process where you learn by observing others. This
observation leads to formation of attitudes. Social learning is conditioned by

-Classical conditioning

- Operant conditioning

Theories

1.Classical conditioning - basic form of learning in which one stumulus,

initially neutral, acquires the capacity to evoke reactions through through
repeated pairing with an other stimulus. Evan Pavlov, psychologist
experimental with the dogs. Eg: Dogs salivating

2. Operant/ Instumental conditional : A form of learning in which responses

that lead to positive outcomes or that permit avoidance of negative
outcomes are strenghtened. Eg Late coming penalised, hence avoidedd.
When rewarded, you tend to continue doing it. The consequences of the
outcomesof behaviour result in the formation of attitudes.

Modelling

A form of learning in which individuals acquire new forms of behaviour

through observing and imitating others. Eg Role model.

Social comparision :The process through which we compare ourselves to

others in orer to determine whether our view of social reality is correct or
not.

Functions of attitudes
Knowledge of function

Any info that you get you observe, organise, interpret and then behave. Your
attitude analyses thw behaviour. When the attitude is not in tune with the
majority.Funtion for self repression or self identity,attitude, important
concept of personality determines how I supress my feelings there by giving
me an identity.

Self Esteem

Linked to social comparision towards yourself should be worthy.

Persuasion

The process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes or

behaviour.

Persuasion

Persuasion is a form of social influence. It is the process of guiding oneself or

another toward the adoption of an idea, attitude, or action by rational and
symbolic (though not always logical) means. It is neither inherently good or
bad. It depends on the message, situation, the source and the receiver. All
these elements have to be in congruence for successful persuasion.

Two aspects to persuasion.

Propaganda- bad side- done when things are not proper. Not applied on
micro levels(one to one convincing, families, friends)

- Education- Good side - positive connotation acquiring the right knowledge.

Education in terms of health, hygiene, social behaviour etc. Eg ill effects of
technology- education rather than persuasiion to make people understand.

There are two routes to persuasion:

a) Central route to persuasion - The central route to persuasion involves

being persuaded by the arguments or the content of the message. For
example, after hearing a political debate you may decide to vote for a
candidate because you found the candidates views and arguments very
convincing, services like baking, comouter and anything giving facts comes
under central route to persuasion(hard appeal)

b)The Peripheral Route to Persuasion - The peripheral route to

persuasion involves being persuaded in a manner that is not based on the
arguments or the message content. For example, after reading a political
debate you may decide to vote for a candidate because you like the sound of
the person's voice, or the person went to the same university as you did. The
peripheral route can involve using superficial cues such as the attractiveness
of the speaker.Beverages, fair and lovely and anything playing with the
minds of the people comes under peripheral route to persuasion(soft appeal)

Group behaviour in sociology refers to the situations where people interact

in large or small groups. The field of group dynamics deals with small groups
that may reach consensus and act in a coordinated way. Groups of a large
number of people in a given area may act simultaneously to achieve a goal
that differs from what individuals would do acting alone .A large group (a
crowd or a mob) is likely to show examples of group behaviour when people
gathered in a given place and time act in a similar way—for example, joining
a protest or march, participating in a fight or acting patriotically.

COMPETITION

Competition is a contest between individuals, groups, nations, animals, etc.

for territory, a niche, or a location of resources. It arises whenever two or
more parties strive for a goal which cannot be shared. Competition occurs
naturally between living organisms which co-exist in the same environment.
For example, animals compete over water supplies, food, and mates, etc.
Humans compete for water, food, and mates, though when these needs are
met deep rivalries often arise over the pursuit of wealth, prestige, and fame.
Business is often associated with competition as most companies are in
competition with at least one other firm over the same group of customers.

CO-OPERATION
Cooperation or co-operation is the process of working or acting together,
which can be accomplished by both intentional and non-intentional agents.
In its simplest form it involves things working in harmony, side by side, while
in its more complicated forms, it can involve something as complex as the
inner workings of a human being or even the social patterns of a nation. It is
the alternative to working separately in competition. Cooperation can also be
accomplished by computers, which can handle shared resources
simultaneously, while sharing processor time.
Group Competition v/s Co-operation
Human like all animals form co-operative groups to compete for limited
resources.
All life is ultimately competitive because the natural tendency of any
population is to explode, all though it is kept in check by the limited food
supply.Competition brings out the beast in us, co-operation brings out the
best in us.
GROUP COOPERATION
Co-operation has an impact on individuals working together in several key
areas.Not only does it create more fluid leadership but it allows everyone to
participate actively without fear of censure.Co-operative individuals are
better adjusted psychologically and physically healthier than their more
competitive counter-parts.
Ways to facilitate co-operation:

• Focus on doing well

• Allow ample time
• Use similar language
• Share leadership
• Learn co-operative problem solving tools.
• Practice reciprocity
• Share resources and information
• Reinforce team efforts.

GROUP VS DECISION MAKING

Groups Decision Making

More people is equal to more information

More people to do more work
More people means people can do what they are best at
Groups can discuss, process information (check for errors, etc.)
Groups have standards for deciding (e.g., majority rule
People are more likely to follow through it if part of a group that decide
is not caused by any one mechanism, but by several processes.