ic methods to study and solve social problems. As Western describes, the psychological paradigm is a collection of assumptions used to make sense of a subject area or experience, this can be applied to psychology itself. Psychology lacks one unified paradigm but has four perspectives that search for its understanding; The pyschodynamic perspective believes that behavior is a result of unconscious processes, personal motivation and early childhood experiences. It's most famous advocate was Sigmund Freud. Its method of data collection rely heavily on interpreting discussion, dreams and fantasies, actions, case studies and a limited amount of experimentation. The behaviorist perspective believes that behavior is learned and selected by environmental consequences. Its method of data collection relies heavily on experimentation conducted in the scientific laboratory where the factors studied can be controlled; or it may take place in a real life setting where more natural behavior is studied and far more variables exist. The cognitive perspective believes that behavior is a result of information processing, storage in the brain, transformation and the retrieval of information. The methods of data collection used are again experimentation but with much use of computer modeling. The evolutionary perspective believes that psychological processes echo the evolutionary processes of natural selection. Its method of data collection includes the deduction of explanations for behavior, and comparisons between species and cultures. It also invo...
