Approaches and biopsychology common mistakes

Common mistakes

• Confusing Classical and Operant Conditioning

  Students often describe the same learning process for both classical and operant conditioning, ignoring the key difference that classical conditioning involves involuntary responses while operant conditioning involves voluntary behaviours.

  Fix itClarify that classical conditioning links stimuli to involuntary responses (e.g., salivation), whereas operant conditioning links behaviours to consequences (e.g., lever pressing).

• Confusing Bandura’s experiment with classical conditioning

  Assuming Bandura’s study used a live model and that the child was conditioned through direct reinforcement.

  Fix itBandura’s Bobo doll experiment used a live model and demonstrated that children learned by observing, not by being directly reinforced. The key distinction is that learning was mediated by observation rather than classical conditioning.

• Confusing cognitive psychology with behaviorism

  Students often mix up the cognitive approach with behaviorism, focusing only on observable behavior.

  Fix itRemember that cognitive psychology emphasizes internal mental processes, while behaviorism focuses solely on observable actions.

• Confusing genotype with phenotype

  Students often state that genotype is the observable trait and phenotype is the genetic code.

  Fix itClarify that genotype is the genetic makeup, while phenotype is the observable expression of that genotype in interaction with the environment.

• Confusing Id with Superego

  Students often describe the Id as moral or conscience-driven, mixing it with the Superego.

  Fix itClarify that the Id is driven by instinctual pleasure, while the Superego embodies internalised moral standards.

• Confusing Humanistic Psychology with Psychoanalysis

  Students often describe humanistic concepts as unconscious motives or childhood conflicts.

  Fix itClarify that humanistic psychology focuses on conscious choice, personal growth, and the inherent drive toward self‑actualisation, not unconscious processes.

• Confusing the focus of the humanistic approach

  Assuming it is purely about self‑esteem.

  Fix itHumanistic psychology emphasises personal growth and self‑actualisation, not just self‑esteem.

• Confusing Somatic and Autonomic Functions

  Students often state that both divisions control voluntary movement.

  Fix itClarify that the somatic division controls voluntary skeletal muscle activity, while the autonomic division regulates involuntary functions of smooth muscle, cardiac muscle and glands.

• Confusing the location of sensory neuron cell bodies

  Assuming sensory neuron cell bodies are in the spinal cord rather than the dorsal root ganglia

  Fix itSensory neuron cell bodies reside in dorsal root ganglia outside the spinal cord; spinal cord contains mainly relay and motor neurons.

• Confusing Action Potentials with Postsynaptic Potentials

  Students often describe the depolarisation of the postsynaptic membrane as an action potential, rather than an EPSP or IPSP.

  Fix itClarify that action potentials are all‑or‑nothing spikes that travel along the axon, whereas EPSPs/IPSPs are graded changes in membrane potential that may or may not trigger an action potential.