History and Approaches ❮ 55Functionalism
American psychologist William James thought that the structuralists were asking the wrong
questions. James was interested in the function or purpose of behavioral acts. He viewed
humans as more actively involved in processing their sensations and actions. James and
other psychologists, such as James Cattell and John Dewey, who studied mental testing,
child development, and educational practices, exemplified the School of Functionalism.
Functionalists focused on the application of psychological findings to practical situations
and the function of mental operations in adapting to the environment (stream of con-
sciousness) using a variety of techniques. Their goal was to explain behavior. Functionalism
paved the way for behaviorism and applied subfields of psychology.
Mary Whiton Calkins, who studied psychology under James at Harvard, became the
first woman president of the American Psychological Association. She viewed her psychol-
ogy of selves as a reconciliation between structural and functional psychology.Principal Approaches to Psychology
Major modern perspectives or conceptual approaches to psychology are behavioral, psycho-
dynamic, humanistic, biological, evolutionary, cognitive, and sociocultural. An overarching
approach is the biopsychosocial model.Behavioral Approach
The behavioral approach focuses on measuring and recording observable behavior in relation
to the environment. Behaviorists think behavior results from learning. Russian physiologist Ivan
Pavlov trained dogs to salivate in response to the sound of a tone, demonstrating stimulus-response
learning. Pavlov’s experiments at the beginning of the 20th century paved the way for behaviorism,
which dominated psychology in America from the 1920s to the 1960s. Behaviorists examine the
ABCs of behavior. They analyze antecedent environmental conditions that precede a behavior,
look at the behavior (the action to understand, predict, and/or control), and examine the conse-
quences that follow the behavior (its effect on the environment). Behaviorists have rejected the study
of consciousness/ mental processes because such private events cannot be verified or disproved.
American behaviorist John B. Watson said that psychology should be the science of behavior.
B. F. Skinner worked mainly with laboratory rats and pigeons, demonstrating that organ-
isms tend to repeat responses that lead to positive consequences and not to repeat responses
that lead to neutral or negative consequences. He thought that free will is an illusion.
Like Aristotle and Locke before them, behaviorists such as Watson, E. L. Thorndike, and B. F.
Skinner took the position that behavior is determined mainly by environment and experience
rather than by genetic inheritance. In Germany, Gestalt psychologists studying perception disa-
greed with structuralists and behaviorists, maintaining that psychologists should study the whole
conscious experience.Psychoanalytic/Psychodynamic Approach
In Austria, Sigmund Freud also disagreed with behaviorists. He treated patients with mental
disorders by talking with them over long periods of time to reveal unconscious conflicts,
motives, and defenses in order to enhance each patient’s self-knowledge. His psychoanalytic
theory focused on unconscious internal conflicts to explain mental disorders, personality, and
motivation. Freud thought that the unconscious is the source of desires, thoughts, and mem-
ories below the surface of conscious awareness, and that early life experiences are important
to personality development. Variations of psychoanalysis by Carl Jung, Alfred Adler, Karen
Horney, Heinz Kohut, and others are collectively known as the psychodynamic approach.