You tell your parents that you've decided to study psychology and hope to be a psychologist someday. They smile and tell you, "that is a great thing to be, but what is there to study? Everyone knows that psychology began and ended with the work of Freud!" If you wanted to teach your parents about some of the other early schools of thought in psychology, what information would you share?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

There are many possible answers a student may give, but some relevant points might include the following:Structuralism: the early work of Wilhelm Wundt, that was later named structuralism by his student Edward Titchener, emphasized understanding the basic elements of consciousnessFunctionalism: this was the work of William James, focused on understanding the purposes (or functions) of consciousness and knowing how it assists us in our lives.Gestalt psychology: the work of such individuals as Wertheimer, Kohler, and Koffka focused on studying "wholes" rather than breaking things into pieces in order to understand them. In this manner, they felt that other approaches were losing what they were attempting to know by breaking them apart to analyze them.Behaviorism: the early behaviorists, led by Watson, disregarded other approaches that focused on unseen mental processes and argued that a science should only focus on that which is observable and measurable.