Nature of Psychological Science
MCCCD Course Competencies
After reading this textbook and successfully completing PSY 101, Maricopa Community Colleges hopes that you have gained important knowledge and skills within the field of psychology. Think of the Course Competencies as goals to work towards and master as you work through the course. Some of the course competencies are chapter-specific and others can be applied to several different chapters. You will see the primary course competencies to keep in mind listed in a shaded purple box at the beginning of each chapter and listed again at the end of each chapter for review. Here are the primary goals for you to make sure that you learn by the end of this chapter.
- Describe how the scientific method is used to draw logical conclusions about behavior and mental processes.
(Hint: You will be working on the following three Course Competencies throughout each chapter. You will see them often!)
- Interpret research findings related to psychological concepts.
- Apply psychological principles to personal growth and other aspects of everyday life.
- Examine how psychological science can be used to counter unsubstantiated statements and foster critical thinking.
What is Psychology Learning Objectives
These green shaded boxes break down the text by section. They provide more specific learning objectives of what you will learn. By the end of this section, you will be able to:
- Define psychology
- Understand the merits of an education in psychology
What is creativity? Why do some people become homeless? What are prejudice and discrimination? What is consciousness? The field of psychology explores questions like these. Psychology refers to the scientific study of the mind and behavior. Psychologists use the scientific method to acquire knowledge. To apply the scientific method, a researcher with a question about how or why something happens will propose a tentative explanation, called a hypothesis, to explain the phenomenon. A hypothesis should fit into the context of a scientific theory, which is a broad explanation or group of explanations for some aspect of the natural world that is consistently supported by evidence over time. A theory is the best understanding we have of that part of the natural world. The researcher then makes observations or carries out an experiment to test the validity of the hypothesis. Those results are then published or presented at research conferences so that others can replicate or build on the results.
Scientists test that which is perceivable and measurable. For example, the hypothesis that a bird sings because it is happy is not a hypothesis that can be tested since we have no way to measure the happiness of a bird. We must ask a different question, perhaps about the brain state of the bird, since this can be measured. However, we can ask individuals about whether they sing because they are happy since they are able to tell us. Thus, psychological science is empirical, base