How can you distinguish scientific psychology from the popular notions about the discipline of psychology?

Class 11 | psychology | Question And Answer

Swyam Mehrotra, Subject Matter Expert at EDUMARZ

Solution:

The differences between scientific psychology and the popular notions about the discipline of psychology are as follows-

Scientific psychology	Popular notions about the discipline of psychology
Scientific psychological theories are based on scientific principles. For example – the pavlovian conditioning concept is tested and is based on scientific principles.	Popular notions about the discipline of psychology are mostly based on common sense. For example – out of sight out of mind concept or distance makes the heart grow fonder.
Psychology as a science quest for patterns of behaviour that can be predicted and not explained after the behaviour occurs.	While Common sense is based on hindsight.
In-depth explanations are available	Very little information is available as it’s based on common sense.

Moreover, scientific knowledge that we gain through the psychology discipline often runs against common sense. For example Dweck(1975) study on children who gave up easily when faced with difficult situations and failure. She wanted to help them. ( please refer you NCERT: pg-7)

There are many notions based on common sense that are not at all true. For example- men are more intelligent than women, women cause more accidents than men etc.
Common sense also postulates that one may not be able to give one best if you are asked to perform before a large audience, however psychological studies have shown that if you practice well you may end up doing great.

Thus, these are grounds on which we can distinguish the scientific psychology and the popular notions about the discipline of psychology.