1. UNIT- 1 INTRODUCTION
Tejal D. Virola
Faculty (MHN)
GHPSCON

3. • Offspring of philosophy
• Greek word:
psychi – soul &
logos – study of
• Study of soul

4. Evolution of meaning of Psychology
Study of soul
Study of mind
Study of conscious experience
Study of behaviour

5. Meaning of Behaviour
Behaviour
Cognitive
Activities
Conative
Activities
Affective
Activities

6. Major Perspectives of Psychology
Biological
Cognitive
Social
Developmental
Humanistic
Psychoanalytic

7. History and Origin of Science of
Psychology
• Separate area of study
• Split away from physiology
• 1879- first psychological laboratory was
established at the university of Leipzig by
German philosopher & Psychologist Wilhelm
Wundt
• First who measure human behaviour
accurately
• Father of Psychology

8. School of Psychology
Psychoanalysis
Behaviourism
Functionalism
Gestalt Psychology
Structuralism

9. Structuralism
• Early school of psychology grew up around the
ideas of Wilhelm Wundt in Germany and was
established by one of the Wundt's students,
Edward B. Titchener.
• The goal of the stucturalist was to find the
units or elements, which make up the mind.
• The main method used to discover these
elementary units of mind was introspection.

10. Gestalt Psychology
• Founded in Germany around 1912 by Max
Wertheimer and his colleagues
• They felt that structuralists were wrong in
thinking of the mind as being made up of
elements
• They argued that mind could be thought of as
resulting from the whole pattern of sensory
activity and the relationships and
organizations within this pattern.

11. Functionalism
• John Dewey, James R. Angell and Harvey Carr
proposed that psychology should do what
mind and behaviour do.
• They performed experiments on the ways in
which learning, memory, problem solving and
motivation help people and animals adapt
their environments.

12. Behaviourism
• Originated with John B. Watson
• He insisted that psychology should be
restricted to the study of the activities of
people and animals – their behaviour

13. Psychoanalysis
• Founded by Sigmund Freud
• He developed theory of behaviour and mind
• It is said that what we do and think results
from our urges or drives, which seek
expression in behaviour and thought
• It is expression of the unconscious drives
which is shown up in behaviour and thought.

14. Major Landmarks
Year Major Landmarks
1879 Wilhelm Wundt inaugurates first psychology laboratory in
Leipzig, Germany
1890 Principles of psychology published by Williams James
1895 Functionalist Model Formulated
1900 Sigmund Freud develops the psychodynamic perspective
1904 Ivan Pavlov wins Nobel Prize for work on fundamental
principles of learning
1915 Strong emphasis on intelligence testing
1924 John B. Watson, an early behaviourist, publishes
behaviourism
1951 Carl Rogers publishes client- centered therapy, helping to
establish the humanistic perspective

15. Cont...
Year Major Landmarks
1953 B.F.Skinner publishes Science and Human behaviour,
advocating the behavioural perspective
1954 Abraham Maslow publishes Motivation and
Personality, developing the concept of self
actualization
1957 Leon Festinger publishes A Theory of Cognitive
Dissonance, producing a major impact on social
psychology
1985 Increasing emphasis on cognitive perspective
1990 Greater emphasis on multiculturalism and diversity
2000 New subfields develop such as clinical
neuropsychology and evolutionary psychology.

16. • Psychology is the science of human and
animal Behaviour; it includes the application
of Behaviour al science to human problems.
Psychology is the science of human Behaviour.
(Walter Bowers Pillsbury—1911)
• Psychology is a science, which aims to give us
better understanding and control of the
Behaviour of the organism as a whole.
(William McDoughall—1949)
Definitions of Psychology

17. • Psychology is a science and the properly trained
psychologist is a scientist or at least a
practitioner, who uses scientific methods or
information resulting from scientific investigation.
(NL Munn—1967)
• Psychology is the investigation of human and
animal Behaviour and of the mental and
physiological processes associated with the
Behaviour. (Jackson—1976)
Definitions of Psychology

18. Nature of
Psychology
Method
Cause &
Effect
Relationship
Study of facts
universality
Validity &
Reliability
Verification
Statistical
Analysis
Predictability

19. Scope of Psychology
• The scope of a subject can usually be
discussed under the following two headings:
1. The limits of its operations and applications.
2. The branches, topics and subject matter with
which it deals.

20. Scope of Psychology
• The field of operation and applications of the
subject psychology is too vast.
1. It studies, describes and explains the
behaviour of living organisms.
2. It describes all types of life activities and
experiences-whether conative, cognitive or
affective, implicit or explicit, conscious,
unconscious and subconscious of a living
organism.

21. 3. It studies not only human behaviour, but also
human experience, language and other forms
of communication.
4. It employs to all the living creatures created
by the almighty irrespective of their species,
caste, colour, age, sex, mental or physical
state.
5. It also studies the behavior of the animals,
insects, birds and plant life.
Scope of Psychology

38. Applications
of psychology
Education
Medicine
Business
&
Industry
Criminology
Politics
Guidance &
Counselling
Military
Science
Human
Relationship &
Self-
development

39. Relevance to Nursing
• Psychology has become necessary in every
profession including nursing today.
• This is because of increasing emphasis being laid
out on the interplay of body, mind and spirit in
the health status of every individual.
• The success in life of many people depends on
how they get along with others, influence others
and react to others.
• The ability to understand ourselves and others
comes from a wise study of psychology.

40. The learning of psychology helps a
nurse in the following ways:
To understand
her own self
To understand
Patients
To recognize
Abnormal
Behaviour
To understand
other people
To provide
Quality Care
to the Patients
Help Patients
Adjust to the
Situation
Help the
Student Nurse
to Appreciate
the Necessity for
Changing the
Environment or
Surroundings
Help for Effective
Studying
Readjustment

41. 1. To Understand Her Own Self:
• The knowledge of psychology will help the
nurse to get an insight into her own motives,
desires, emotions, feelings, attitudes,
personality characteristics and ambitions.
• She will realize how her personality is highly
individualistic and complex, arrives at
decisions in her life and solves her own
problems.
• This knowledge also helps her to understand
her strengths and weaknesses.

42. • By knowing these aspects, she can not only try
to overcome such weaknesses, which affect
her work, but also develop good personality
characteristics, abilities to carry on her
responsibilities and perform her duties
effectively and efficiently.
• This will let her direct her own life more
productively and relate more easily with
others, enabling her to control situations and
attain self-discipline.

43. 2. To Understand Patients
• The nurses are professionals meant for
providing care to patients.
• The patient may be suffering from acute or
chronic disease; may be male or female,
young or old and come to the hospital with so
many physical and psychological problems.
• They may also have tensions, worries, pains
and also many doubts about their illness.

44. • The knowledge of psychology will help the
nurse to understand the problems and needs
of patients and attend to them.
• She can understand the motives, attitudes,
perceptions and personality characteristics of
patients in a better way.
• This will help the patient to attain quick relief
and cure, which is the basic motto of a nurse.

45. 3. To Recognize Abnormal Behaviour
• Psychology is relevant not only in physical
health care, but also highly relevant in the
field of mental health.
• Presently more and more people are suffering
from mental illness.
• While some patients may have minor
problems, others suffer with serious illness.

46. • The knowledge of psychology will help nurses
to understand abnormal behaviours and help
the patient in management of mental
illnesses.
• Nurses working in mental hospitals definitely
need an adequate knowledge of normal and
abnormal psychology.
• The knowledge of psychology helps the nurses
in recognizing mental illnesses at general
hospitals and community health centres and
provide appropriate guidance to deal with
stress, anxiety and other life problems.

47. 4. To Understand Other People
• The student nurse has to study, work and live with
other nurses, doctors, patients and their family
members.
• With her scientific knowledge of human nature, she
will understand them better and thus achieve greater
success in interpersonal relationships.
• She will learn why others differ from her in their likes
and dislikes, in their interests and abilities or in their
reactions to others.
• She will realize how differences in behaviour to some
extent, are due to differences in customs and beliefs or
cultural patterns of the groups to which she belongs or
to the way she has been brought up during her early
years.

48. 5. To Provide Quality Care to Patients
• A nurse with good knowledge of human
psychology can understand what fears or
anxieties the patient faces, what he feels, what
he would like to know and why he behaves the
way he does.
• It will help the nurse to anticipate and meet
requirements of the patients and his relatives,
thus help patients and relatives adjust to the
unavoidable circumstances in the best possible
way.
• A good understanding of these patients by the
nurse can be of best support to him.

49. 6. Help Patients Adjust to the Situation
• Illness and physical handicaps often bring
about the need for major adjustments.
• Many diseases such as heart disease and
cancer, etc. require special coping skills and
health care.
• A nurse trained in psychology can be an
effective health educator and help in these
kind of adjustments

50. 7. Help the Student Nurse to Appreciate
the Necessity for Changing the
Environment or Surroundings
• Good nursing care depends upon the ability of
nurse to understand the situations properly and
also in obtaining the cooperation of other people
concerned.
• The change in the environment is sometimes
necessary for better adjustment and happiness.
• For example, a boy who is completely denied the
affectionate care of his parents may do better if
he is given the care of foster parents.

51. 8. Help for Effective Studying
• The nurse has to learn many new things
during her training.
• She has to obtain the knowledge of correct
facts about disease conditions and their
treatment.
• The study of psychology of learning will help
the nurse to acquire knowledge in an effective
way.

52. 9. Readjustment
• Every profession and career requires
readjustment.
• A nurse needs to make the following kinds of
adjustments for success in the nursing career:
I. Overcoming homesickness and self-reliance is
needed if she has to live smoothly in a hostel or
hospital.
II. Adjusting to sick persons, who may cry or be
desperate or even ventilate their anger by
making the nurse a target of their abuses and
curses.
III. Trying to work and study together.

53. Methods of Psychology
Introspection
or Self
Observation
Observation Experimental
Clinical or Case
History
Survey
Genetic or
Developmental

54. 1. Introspection or Self Observation
• Introduced by E.B
Titchener
• This is known as self
observation method
• It means ‘ To look
within”
• The subject is asked to
systematically observe
his own behaviour

55. Cont...
Merits
• Fundamental method of
psychology. Observation
and experimentation are
based upon introspection.
• It gives us direct, immediate
and exact knowledge of our
own mental processes.
• It enables us to fully
understand the Behaviour
of an individual.
• This method is inexpensive,
easy and does not require
any apparatus or laboratory.
Demerits
• Not applicable for children or
animals or mentally
challenged people
• Purely private affair and
cannot be verified by other
observers.
• Patients may not have the
insight to know about their
conditions or language to
describe them accurately.
• sometimes involves attention
to a mental process (eg.
perception)

56. 2. Observation
• The objective method of
studying the Behaviour of
individuals.
• It consists of the perception of
an individual’s Behaviour under
natural conditions, its analysis
and interpretation by the
observer.
• It is essentially a way of
perceiving the Behaviour as it
is.
• In this method the observer
observes and collects the data

57. Cont...
• Steps in Observation Method:
• Observation of Behaviour
• Noting of Behaviour
• Interpretation & analysis of Behaviour
• Generalization

58. Cont...
Merits
• Economical, natural, as well
as flexible
• The data can be analyzed,
measured, classified and
interpreted
• The results can be verified
and relied
• Quite suitable for observing
developmental
characteristics like
children's habits and
interests.
Demerits
• Chances of subjective
report
• More time, energy and
money
• It lacks repeatability, as
each natural situation can
occur only once.
• Not being able to establish a
proper cause-and effect
relationship

59. 3. Experimental
• It is considered as the most
scientific and objective
method of studying
Behaviour
• to study the cause and effect
relationship regarding the
nature of human Behaviour
• the psychologists use
objective observations
under controlled conditions
to observe actions or
Behaviours of individuals

60. Cont...
• Essential Features of Experimental Method
• Requires two persons, the experimenter and
the subject or the person, whose Behaviour is
observed.
• Experimentation should be done on living
organisms
• All experiments are conducted under
controlled conditions

61. Steps of Experimental Method
Compare the results of the two groups
Measuring Dependent Variable
Allotting the subjects to treatment & control group
Treatment group Control group
Identifying study subjects
Formulation of Hypothesis
Stating the Problem

62. Cont...
Merits
• Scientific method
• Finds out cause and effect
relationship
• Maximum control of
phenomena
• Repetition is possible
Demerits
• All problems of psychology
cannot be studied by this
method
• Costly and time consuming
method.
• Handling of this method
demands specialized
knowledge and skill.
• This method fails to study
Behaviour in naturalistic
conditions.
• It cannot always be used
especially if the experiment
might be dangerous to the
subjects.

63. 4. Clinical or Case History
• This is used in clinical and
hospital settings
• It aims at studying the cause
and basis of people's
anxieties, fears and personal
maladjustments
• A great deal of relevant data is
collected by using case
histories, interviews, home
visits and psychological tests

64. Cont...
Merits
• Case histories will give
the clinician an insight
into the causes of the
problem and suggest
possible solutions.
• Case studies can be
productive sources of
ideas for further
investigation by other
methods.
Demerits
• The case history
method depends largely
on memory of
incidents, which may
have been observed
inaccurately or over
interpreted.

65. 5. Survey
• All problems in psychology cannot
be studied by the experimental and
other methods.
• Some problems like study of
opinions, attitudes, health care
needs. Etc. can be studied by means
of survey method.
• It involves collection or gathering of
information from a large number of
people by using questionnaires,
inventories, checklists, rating scales
and interviews.

66. Cont...
• Merit
• A large amount of data can be collected
in a shorter time.
• Demerit
• The Behaviour is not observed directly.

67. 6. Genetic or Developmental
• Psychologists study not
only the Behaviour of an
individual at a particular
time, but also his
development from birth to
death, the influence of
heredity and environment
in the development of the
person and conditions
favourable and
unfavourable for normal
and abnormal Behaviour

68. Cont...
• This can be done by two ways:
1. Cross-sectional study in which, the children of
different age groups will be studied simultaneously.
2. Longitudinal study in which the same child will be
studied in different stages of life.
• Merits
 This is a more useful method to understand the
Behaviour from point of view of hereditary and
environmental influences.
• Demerit
 This method requires more time and energy.