Psychology

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I am not sure where this should go, but it seems to be the best place. If it does not belong here, could one of the moderators move it to the appropriate place, please?

Psychology is one of my newest interests and I'm actually taking a class in school on it. Is there any advice or practical applications for studying psychology in general? Does anyone have an idea what will be different for an aspie versus an NT?

Ah, my boyfriend has studied psychology extensively, as it is one of his interests, and would go to college for something in the field if the schooling weren't so horribly demanding. I'll see if I can get him to give you some information.

Oh, do I love psychology,
and Oh do I dislike behavioralism.

As a person who is unabashedly spiritual, I find those psychologists who
found relevancy in integrating the spiritual with the scientific having the greatest influence on me.

With that note, a short list of psychologists who influence me.

Psychologists of the Modern Era:
Sri Aurobindo: who tought that the role man was to grow in concious awareness
William James: (specifically) Varieties of Religious Experience
Carl Jung: an orientalist, hence Sri Aurobindo at the top of the list
Charles Alexander
David Chalmers

Postmodern Psychologists:
Ken Wilber
Stanislav Grof
(I am only beginning my study of post modern scholors)

Last book read
Integral Psychology by Ken Wilber
(I highly recommend this book as an entry point into post modern psychology.)

With any luck, I will be doing graduate studies at the California Institute of Integral Studies starting in the Spring. http://www.ciis.edu/academics/icp.html

My goal is to develop an integral psychology of autism.[/u]

I am a psychology student. I personally am obsessed with Abnormal Psychology and Biopsychology and where the two cross over.

I recommend going to a local university library and going through their psychology journals. American Journal of Psychology is good. They maybe even have some kind of computer system that will let you search for specifics of articles to make it easier.

Also, just searching for books/artciles online about specific subjects saves some foot travel.

And you may already know this, but read all psychology with a skeptic's eye. Sometimes they only think they know what they're talking sbout.

I studied psychology for a little while. These days it is a very popular major and most psych students probably end up doing something totally unrelated. From a very practical point of view there are always human resource jobs, though research would probably suit an aspie better. If you are really serious about it then you should plan on some graduate school.


[quote="irishmic
Postmodern Psychologists:
Ken Wilber
Stanislav Grof
(I am only beginning my study of post modern scholors)
[/u][/quote]

I was under the impression that these were "transpersonal" I think Sri Aurobindo would fall in this category as well.
I find this field utterly fascinating, and it is what I have really been studying for years independently, and formulating ideas on. It was only in the last couple of years that I discovered there was a field devoted to it.

Evolutionary psychology is a relatively new and interesting development also.

I have 3/4 of a Ph.D. educational psychology and I see the difference between my thought and everyone elses in two main areas:

1) I don't do touchy feely therapy - nor do I understand it - to me when someone tells you a problem you are supposed to give them solutions to try - the whole 'talking it through' thing is totally bizarre to me

2) I am interested in people in the same way that I watch the squirrels in my yard interact - I am interested at a distance and I have no illusions of being able to change the world

Also, before you decide to go into a career in psychology really think about what you are doing - I've nearly got a Ph.D., that is true, but I can't get a job in my field - remember, I'm a police dispatcher . . .

woo hoo! you and me both. i don't know of many people who've even HEARD of wilbur i always peg him as a philosopher. freud gets my hackles up, though, quite frankly.

Last edited by vetivert on 07 Dec 2005, 4:06 am, edited 1 time in total.

After being poked and proded by therapists and being obsessed with disorders and statistics for the past 5 years, I have recently found modern pyschology to be a load of BS.

But I believe that's it's worth studying anyhow.

well, i know that studying psychology helps me understand both myself and other people, which i doubt i'd be able to do with my theory of mind stuff, otherwise. let's face it - that sort of thing is my job, so studying it must have paid off

Did I not make a topic on psychology when I first joined? Someone remind me, I can't remember.

Meh, in any case, Psychology was the subject I did best in at college when studying at AS..........

Trans Personal and Integral are sometimes interchangeable.
Wilber and others use the term Integral to emphasise their desire to integrate hard science with spiritual principles.
Trans Personal refers to taking the whole person; body, mind, and spirit; into account.
So really which term one uses is a matter of perspective; transpersonal when discussing individuals, integral when speaking about the scientific field.

One will only see what one is ready to see, and one can only truly teach that which one has personally experienced at depth. If one is not willing to challange ones own perceptions then no psychiatric treatment will be effective at creating new levels of relating to the world.

I stand on the statement that most psychiatry of the modern era is mostly useless. By seeking to seperate the spirtual from the physical many false dilemmas are created. Material is neutral, neither inherently good or bad. It exists ultimately as a series of vibrational patterns. A perciever projects meaning onto it based on their position and world view which is entirely indicative of both their mental and spiritual states. The two can not be divorced from one another while attempting to derive absolute propositions about psychiatric states. However, that is not to say that important discoveries can not and have not been made through striving to travel one path exclusive of the other, ie. science without spirituality. In some cases important discoveries in the modern era could only be made after these two paths had been differentiated. Now that we are emerging into the postmodern, it is time too integrate what we have found.

i agree, except for two points.

1. psychiatry is not the same as psychology.

2. i would argue (and others i know agree) that we emerging OUT OF the post modern era, rather than into it. - postmodernism is having its death throes, thank goodness.

How would you define psychiatry versus psychology? I'm just curious...

Im a simple layman but psychologists in this country generally just talk you through things, diagnose etc, whereas a psychiatrist is legally permitted to prescribe drugs to their patients.

Psychiatry: The curing and prevention of mental illness

Psychology: The study of the mind and psyche.

Taken from Psychology 101 textbook.

Oh, and freudian slip from me there, I almost put text boob!

I did use the word psychiatry, I apologize.
I was really tired when I wrote that.

I would love to talk more about why some people feel that post modernism is dying.
A new topic perhaps?