PSYC1001 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Neuropsychology, Scientific Method, New Approach
12 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Psychology and the Real World
Basic psychology and Clinical Practice
PSYCHOLOGY AND THE REAL WORLD
Educational psychologists - study how people learn in schools and academic projectories
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Forensic psychologists - prisons, police, interplay of psychology and the law; criminal behaviour
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Neuropsychologists - brain injury, cognitive function operates, rehabilitations
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Social psychologists - interaction between people
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Clinical psychologists - abnormal behaviour and emotions of people
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Types of psychologists:
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Not psychiatrists - do not study the drugs that alter the behaviours but rather the psychological techniques that can
alter behaviour and study how to alter behavioral emotions
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Most of us will experience PTSD in life (60-67%) --> 57% of those will develop PTSD
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Core symptoms: disorder characterised by memories
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Memories that are intrusive and plague a person in a distressing way
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Memories --> intrusive, distressing, vivid, can feel the memory, feel the cutting of glass, smell the petrol, etc.
(perceptually rich memory)
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Understandably, people want to avoid it
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Main way in which people have responded to this disorder: psychological debriefing
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Psychological debriefing --> been around since 1980's
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Counsellor will find patient and talk about it (what happened, how you felt, what you thought, how you
responded) for a couple of hours
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Everyone does it now --> government, business etc.
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Big question: does it prevent PTSD?
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Answer is NO! --> does not do anything at all
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Post Traumatic Disorder - anxiety and trauma of something very bad (rape, war, car accident etc.)
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About psychological debriefing --> everyone says it works, and how it was good
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But because everyone says it works or it was good --> doesn't mean it's good for them
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Scientific method: for anyone that is able to say that something works --> need to be able to provide proof that it
actually has been proven in a scientific way
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Need to measure --> standardized assessments of the thing we are going to change
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Standardized assessment --> different groups of people
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Have to do it before and after we treat the person
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If we ever test if psychological debriefing works or not:
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Psychology is measurement of something intangible (emotions, thoughts) <-- abstract
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Still need to measure them in a reliable, standardized way --> so we can measure the exact same thing
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that people's symptoms have decreased
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Still doesn't mean anything --> there are a whole lot of other factors because of it coming down
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Results:
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Because people will get better overtime (PTSD)
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Naturally coming down overtime (thus time is the treatment)
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Because psychological debriefing occurs over a longitudinal period of time --> we think it works but instead it
just means that time is the natural, real 'treatment'
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Or maybe it isn't debriefing but rather the comfort of someone being there
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A lot of the debriefing have controlled conditions
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Thus, need controlled factors
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Still not enough to satisfy --> we still need random assessments
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We can unconsciously bias one condition to another
Scientific method:
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1B - Clinical Perspectives (Bryant)
Wednesday, February 28, 2018
8:59 PM
PSYCH 1001 Page 1
Document Summary
Educational psychologists - study how people learn in schools and academic projectories. Forensic psychologists - prisons, police, interplay of psychology and the law; criminal behaviour. Neuropsychologists - brain injury, cognitive function operates, rehabilitations. Clinical psychologists - abnormal behaviour and emotions of people. Not psychiatrists - do not study the drugs that alter the behaviours but rather the psychological techniques that can alter behaviour and study how to alter behavioral emotions. Post traumatic disorder - anxiety and trauma of something very bad (rape, war, car accident etc. ) Most of us will experience ptsd in life (60-67%) --> 57% of those will develop ptsd. Memories that are intrusive and plague a person in a distressing way. Memories --> intrusive, distressing, vivid, can feel the memory, feel the cutting of glass, smell the petrol, etc. (perceptually rich memory) Main way in which people have responded to this disorder: psychological debriefing.
