I'm Stuck

[KathyM]

I'm stuck on my homework.

 

Firstly I'm doing an essay to compare/contrast two approaches to psychology (of my choice). I chose psychoanalytical and behavioural. Why? God WHY?!

 

There, that's out of my system. Now for the actual help needed.

1. My tutor said she wants us to do no more than 500 words which is according to her 4 sides (and is according to me, just over one side!) - what do I do? Cut the text right down and hand in a tiny looking piece of work, or do the full four sides and go over the word limit by a gazillion?
   
2. When Harvard referencing, do you only reference in the actual text when it's a direct quote or do you have to do it for each piece of info even in your own words?
   
3. When writing an introduction - do I say about what the tutor asked us to do, or what I'm about to write (2nd sounds more grown up yeah?)
   
4. Lastly - why the hell did I think (and my tutor think) that I could catch this up - it's 10pm and I have to be up at 6am.
   

 

If I could ask her this I would (and I will if I have to but this is by my own goal due in tomorrow).

[KathyM]

Hmmm. I doubt this'll get much attention in this bit - BUT, I suppose that's a good thing (can you tell I've been learning PMA in Study Skills). Focus on the positive. Hooookay. I'm off back into Word. I'll sling messenger on in case anyone sees this in the depths of the never visited Help section.

[snow]

Never visited??? I bleeding live in this section

 

You sure she didn't say 5,000 words Kathy? Thats about 4 A4's in type if I remember from my college days.

 

I'd struggle to do a compare/contrast in 500 words, all you could really aim for is a bare bones description of the different approaches and the odd few sentances comparing/contrasting.

 

If I can get hold of my external floppy drive I'll have a look see what I have from when I did it....

[PamJade]

Thoughts:

 

1. 500 words means just that, no more. It does seem very brief, sure it wasn't 1500? That was our standard essay size. Whatever, stick to the word count, not the pages. One of my lecturers would state 'no more than x words' stop and refuse to read even to the end of a sentence!

 

2. If it is your own thoughts then you don't need the ref. but if it's eg 'Piaget was known to refer to this system as blah, blah' (Then you need a quote for the info) Harvard is the sytem of refs - ie how they are set out, not which bits need references.

 

3. Just answer the question. You can do an intro based on what you are about to say and a summary, but in 500 words that's going to be VERY brief so you can probably skip it, especially on a comparison cos you don't need a conclusion by the sound of it.

 

4. You're going to be tired tomorrow! Good luck

[KathyM]

Yayyyy! Thank you you two.

 

It's definitely 250-500 words. She did this last time though (said 200 words = 2 sides), and I did over 200 words and it got marked. This isn't part of the assessed work, it's practice, but I want to get it as right as I can if you get me. I think she's got her word counts for pages all wrong basically. I've done one side and it's over 500 words and I havent even added the intro and conclusion yet. I even skipped explaining each psychosexual stage of development, which I would've thought was important given the brief:

 

250-500 words (4 sides)

Intro

Who

When

Where

What - ideas/theories

How - research/therapies

Conclusion

 

I don't get how to fit it all in 500 words - I haven't even compared them yet, just very basicly outlined them.

[PamJade]

Sounds like the word count is way out However my student days are over and my bed is calling me I'd hate to go back to 2am finishes after a full day at work.

 

Pam

[KathyM]

Thanks for the help Pam - sorry for being a pain.

 

If anyone is a night owl and knows their psychology, can I see what you think of it so far?

 

A comparison of the Psychoanalytical and Behavioural Approaches to Psychology

 

<put introduction here>

 

The Psychoanalytical approach to psychology was founded by Sigmund Freud in the 1890s. Freud was a neurologist in Vienna who was interested in finding treatments for patients with neurotic symptoms. He came to believe that their problems stemmed from repressed (and socially unacceptable) unconscious urges and desires, mainly of a sexual nature. The Psychoanalytical approach focuses heavily on emotions.

 

Freud divided the mind into three parts: the conscious, the pre-conscious and the un-conscious. He believed that we are born with un-conscious urges and drives, which he called our 'id'. Through the first two years of our lives, we develop what Freud named our 'ego'. Our ego, according to Freud, has the main aim of satisfying our id while testing how much we can get away with. By the age of five, we develop our 'superego', which represents our morals and principles. The superego's aim is perfection. Freud's theory was that the ego keeps a balance between the id and the superego.

 

Freud's theory also said that we develop as children through stages, which relate to specific erogenous ones on our body – these are called Freud's Psychosexual Stages of Development. These stages are: the Oral Stage, the Anal Stage, the Phallic Stage, the Latency Period (which is a period of psycho-sexual dormancy rather than a stage in itself), and the Genital Stage. In order for a child to progress through these stages, he/she needs to resolve each stage successfully before moving on to the next.

 

The Behavioural approach to psychology focuses nearly entirely on behaviour, based on the idea that emotions cannot be scientifically studied, whereas behaviour can be. It began in earnest with a Russian physiologist called Ivan Pavlov, in 1911.

 

Pavlov was studying salivation in dogs when he noticed that the dogs salivated in anticipation of being fed, even when the food itself was not present. He called this “psychic secretion†and set out to study the phenomena. Pavlov discovered classical conditioning – the theory that behaviour/responses can be brought about by new (conditioned) stimuli if introduced at the same time as the original (unconditioned) stimulus. In 1920, John B. Watson, a psychologist at Johns Hopkins University, conducted an experiment on a toddler to study classical conditioning of fear responses to an originally pleasant experience to the toddler – his pet rat. This was called the Little Albert Experiment, and unfortunately for Albert, was extremely successful in creating a fear response – one that was not reversed while Albert was still in the clinic's care.

 

Operant conditioning was first studied by Edward L. Thorndyke (1874-1949), who studied the behaviour of cats trying to escape from cages. He observed that when the cats were first placed in the boxes, they took a long time to escape. After a while, behaviours that had not helped them escape stopped, and successful attempts happened more frequently. In his Law of Effect, Thorndyke wrote that successful responses producing satisfying consequences were “stamped in†and therefore strengthened the behaviour and happened more frequently. B.F. Skinner added to Thorndyke's theory with a more detailed idea of operant conditioning, and the effects of reinforcement, punishment and extinction.

 

 

That's it trimmed as far as I dare so far - if I've waffled I'd appreciate snipping tips.

 

Sorry, sorry, sorry.

[PamJade]

Quickly skipped thru it and I must get some sleep.

 

I'd skip the bit "Freud was a neurologist in Vienna who was interested in finding treatments for patients with neurotic symptoms" you have to assume some knowledge on the part of the reader.

 

Maybe:

The Psychoanalytical approach to psychology was founded by Sigmund Freud in the 1890s, he was interested in finding treatments for patients with neurotic symptoms.

 

Sorry if I go thru the lot I'll be here ages! I only did one year of Psych and I'd forgotten this lot, mine was child Psychology.

 

Pam

[KathyM]

Thanks ever so much Pam. Now get to bed Mrs.

[La_Femme_Pires]

Psych Matters

 

I use this site quite a bit but must admit i'm not sure it'll be of any help.

 

Harvard referencing, direct and indirect quotes must be refrenced in text and at end in reference section, they don't count in word count though. Citations must also be done and they confuse me most!!

 

We've only started Freud today so can't help much and every time I think of Pavlov I can't get the Eddie Izzard sketch out of my head! Sorry not much help but I hope you'll find something on that site.

 

Good luck!

 

Edited to change linky...

Edited November 20, 2006 by La_Femme_Pires

[pboae]

You haven't got enough words to be that descriptive Kathy, are you allowed to use bullet points? With so few words, cut straight to the chase and start comparing and contrasting, you start by telling us where psychoanalysis came from, next para should be telling us about behaviorism. Be explicit about any differences (e.g. emotion vs behaviour, scientific method vs analysis), and any similarties, i.e. both were interested in cause and effect. If you have a look on google, there is a really famous quote from John Watson around 1913 (I think) where he essentially slates introspection. It sums up the fundamental differences between the two approaches, and might be a good place to start.

[alexis]

We had to double space all our essay work (ours was 3000 - 5000 words per essay!)This makes it easier to read and mark as well and is very easy to do in Word.

 

Harvard referencing- this makes it look quite simple!

 

http://www.lmu.ac.uk/lskills/open/sfl/cont...ting/index.html

 

 

we had to reference with just numbers which is much more fiddly!

[pboae]

The quote and a summary are here

 

sorry to be so brief but I am on someone else's PC and it's useless.

[KathyM]

Here you go Helen:

 

A comparison of the Psychoanalytical and Behavioural Approaches to Psychology

 

This essay will compare and contrast the theories of two competing psychological approaches – Psychoanalytical and Behaviourist.

 

The Psychoanalytical approach to psychology was founded by Sigmund Freud (in Vienna) in the 1890s, who was interested in finding treatments for patients with neurotic symptoms. He came to believe that their problems stemmed from repressed (and socially unacceptable) unconscious urges and desires, mainly of a sexual nature (Psychoanalytical Psychology, 2006). The Psychoanalytical approach focuses heavily on emotions, and on early childhood experiences.

 

Freud divided the mind into three parts: the conscious, the pre-conscious and the un-conscious. He believed that we are born with un-conscious urges/drives, which he called our 'id'. Through the first two years of our lives, we develop what Freud named our 'ego'. Our ego, has the main aim of satisfying our id while testing how much we can get away with. By the age of five, we develop our 'superego', which represents our morals and principles. The superego's aim is perfection. Freud's theory was that the ego keeps a balance between the id and the superego.

 

Freud theorised that we develop as children through stages, which relate to specific erogenous ones on our body – these are called Freud's Psychosexual Stages of Development. These stages are: the Oral Stage, the Anal Stage, the Phallic Stage, the Latency Period (which is a period of psychosexual dormancy rather than a stage in itself), and the Genital Stage. In order for a child to progress through these stages, he/she needs to resolve each stage successfully before moving on to the next.

 

The Behavioural approach to psychology focuses nearly entirely on behaviour, based on the idea that emotions cannot be scientifically studied, whereas behaviour can be (Behaviourism, 2006). Like the Psychoanalytical theory, Behaviourism places great importance on early childhood experiences and their effects on who we become. It began with a Russian physiologist, Ivan Pavlov, in 1911.

 

Pavlov was studying salivation in dogs when he noticed that the dogs salivated in anticipation of being fed, even when the food itself was not present. He called this “psychic secretion†and decided to study it. Pavlov discovered classical conditioning – the theory that behaviour/responses can be brought about by new (conditioned) stimuli if introduced at the same time as the original (unconditioned) stimulus. In 1920, John B. Watson, a psychologist at Johns Hopkins University, conducted an experiment on a toddler to study classical conditioning of fear responses to an originally pleasant experience to the toddler – his pet rat. This was called the Little Albert Experiment, and unfortunately for Albert, was extremely successful in creating a fear response – one that was not reversed while Albert was still in the clinic's care.

 

Operant conditioning was first studied by Edward L. Thorndike (1874-1949), who studied the behaviour of cats trying to escape from cages. He observed that when the cats were first placed in the boxes, they took a long time to escape. After a while, behaviours that had not helped them escape stopped, and successful attempts happened more frequently. In his Law of Effect, Thorndike wrote that successful responses producing satisfying consequences were “stamped in†and therefore strengthened the behaviour, which then happened more frequently (Operant Conditioning, 2006). B.F. Skinner (an American psychologist) added to Thorndike's theory with a more detailed idea of operant conditioning, and the effects of reinforcement, punishment and extinction.

 

When comparing the two theories, at first they seem completely different. The Psychoanalytical approach focuses on emotions and urges, whereas the Behavioural theory dismisses these nearly entirely, and focuses on what we can actually observe, behaviour. However, there are similarities between the two theories. Both believe that early childhood experiences are extremely influential on how we develop, and who we become. Both have undeniable weak points – in the Psychoanalytical approach, this mainly falls on Freud's lack of diversity in the patients he based his theory on; in the Behavioural approach that weak point is the tunnel vision created by only studying behaviour, and even then through the blinkers of ratomorphism.

 

In conclusion, it seems that most psychological approaches have areas of overlap, where certain factors are agreed on. However, these similarities do not over-ride their fundamental differences, and - particularly in these two approaches - those differences are significant.

 

Just got to fine tune the referencing and add the list of references. How's it look?

 

Sorry - just to add - read up on referencing of online articles and it said if you cant find an author, to put the title of the article and full details in reference list.

 

And yes, it's over 500 words. A bit.

 

ps: I added a z to "ones" PMSL!

[pboae]

In so few words there isn't much else you can squeeze in. If you can cut the descriptions down a little and expand your compare/contrast into an additional paragraph, it would be a little more balanced, but I wouldn't worry about it too much. You've packed a lot in already!