What to focus on
For each approach, you need to know four things: (1) its core assumption about human nature and what drives behaviour; (2) two or three key figures and what they specifically contributed; (3) its main methodology; and (4) one meaningful strength and one meaningful limitation.
Don't try to memorise every detail of every approach equally. The exam almost always asks you to compare — so your priority is understanding *how the approaches differ from each other*. Focus on the dimensions of disagreement: nature vs nurture, free will vs determinism, observable vs unobservable, reductionist vs holistic.
The pairings that most often come up: behaviourism vs cognitive (the cognitive revolution rejected the "black box"); biological vs psychodynamic (both deterministic, very different levels of explanation); humanistic vs both (free will and the "Third Force"); social learning as a bridge between behaviourism and cognitive.
Key terms to memorise
Behaviourism: classical conditioning · operant conditioning · stimulus–response · schedules of reinforcement · blank slate · Watson · Pavlov · Skinner
Cognitive: information processing · mental representations · schemas · reaction time · Chomsky · Miller · Beck · computer metaphor
Biological: neurons · neurotransmitters · brain structures · twin studies · neuroimaging · reductionism · Sperry & Gazzaniga
Psychodynamic: unconscious · id/ego/superego · defence mechanisms · psychosexual stages · free association · Freud · Bowlby · object relations
Humanistic: self-actualisation · hierarchy of needs · unconditional positive regard · person-centred · free will · Maslow · Rogers
Social learning: observational learning · modelling · self-efficacy · reciprocal determinism · vicarious reinforcement · Bandura · Bobo doll
Going deeper: apply, compare, and critique
Apply to examples: Given a behaviour (e.g., phobia, aggressive behaviour, depression), be able to explain it from at least two perspectives. A phobia: behaviourists say classical conditioning (Little Albert); cognitive says irrational beliefs; biological says genetic predisposition or amygdala hyper-reactivity; psychodynamic says displaced anxiety.
Compare explicitly: The most productive comparison dimensions are — nature vs nurture (biological: strong nature; behaviourism: strong nurture; social learning: interaction); determinism vs free will (all approaches except humanistic are broadly deterministic); reductionism vs holism (biological is most reductionist; humanistic is most holistic); methodology (experimental/lab vs case study/clinical vs phenomenological).
Critique each: Behaviourism ignores mental processes and biological constraints on learning (Garcia & Koelling, 1966). Psychodynamic is unfalsifiable (Popper) and relies on uncontrolled case studies. Humanistic concepts are vague and hard to measure. Biological risks ignoring context. Cognitive has ecological validity concerns. Social learning underspecifies the role of emotion and genetics.
Why it still matters
Each approach is alive in modern psychology. Behaviourist principles underpin CBT behavioural techniques and ABA therapy. The cognitive approach is the foundation of cognitive neuroscience and evidence-based therapies. The biological approach drives psychiatry and neuropharmacology. Psychodynamic ideas live on in attachment theory and mentalisation-based therapy. Humanistic values shape person-centred counselling and positive psychology. Social learning's self-efficacy concept is one of the most robust predictors of health behaviour change. Understanding the historical approaches isn't just revision — it's understanding where every modern theory came from.
Common exam pitfalls
Describing without comparing: naming what each approach believes without ever saying how they differ will limit your marks. Explicit comparison is what examiners reward.
Vague evaluations: "it's scientific" or "it ignores feelings" without explaining *what that means for validity or explanatory power* is too thin. Tie each criticism to a specific limitation — e.g., Popper's falsifiability critique against psychoanalysis, or the ecological validity problem in Milgram-style lab studies.
Confusing social learning with behaviourism: social learning theory is *not* behaviourism — it includes cognitive processes, vicarious learning, and self-efficacy. Bandura explicitly broke with Skinner's rejection of internal states.
Forgetting that approaches can work together: the best answers acknowledge that most modern research is implicitly interactionist. Approaches are lenses, not mutually exclusive explanations.