Document Uploaded by J.D.

Lim

Psychology (Greek: Ψυχολογία, lit. "study of the mind", from ψυχή psykhē "breath, spirit, soul"; and
-λογία, -logia "study of") is an academic and applied discipline involving the systematic, and often
scientific, study of human mental functions and behavior. Occasionally, in addition or opposition to
employing the scientific method, it also relies on symbolic interpretation and critical analysis, although it
often does so less prominently than other social sciences such as sociology. Psychologists study such
phenomena as perception, cognition, emotion, personality, behavior and interpersonal relationships.
Some, especially depth psychologists, also study the unconscious mind.

Psychological knowledge is applied to various spheres of human activity, including issues related to
everyday life—such as family, education and employment—and to the treatment of mental health
problems. Psychologists attempt to understand the role of mental functions in individual and social
behavior, while also exploring the underlying physiological and neurological processes. Psychology
includes many sub-fields of study and applications concerned with such areas as human development,
sports, health, industry, media and law. Psychology incorporates research from the natural sciences,
social sciences and humanities. A professional theorist or practitioner of psychology is called a
psychologist.

History of Psychology

The history of psychology as a scholarly study of the mind and behavior dates back to the Ancient
Greeks. It was widely regarded as a branch of philosophy until 1879, when psychology developed as an
independent scientific discipline in Germany and the United States. Psychology borders on various other
fields including physiology, neuroscience, artificial intelligence, sociology, anthropology, as well as
philosophy and other components of the humanities. There is also evidence of psychological thought
dating to the Ancient Egyptians.

Philosophical interest in the general set of phenomena currently organized in the West under the label
"psychology" dates back to the ancient civilizations of Egypt, Greece, China and India. These earlier
forms of inquiry began adopting what would now be recognized as a more clinical and experimental
approach under medieval Muslim psychologists and physicians, whose practitioners built what we would
today recognize as psychiatric hospitals.

Psychology as a self-conscious field of experimental study is commonly said to have begun in 1879,
when Wilhelm Wundt founded the first laboratory dedicated exclusively to psychological research in
Leipzig. Other important early contributors to the field include Hermann Ebbinghaus (a pioneer in the
study of memory), William James (the American father of pragmatism), and Ivan Pavlov (who developed
the procedures associated with classical conditioning).

Soon after the development of experimental psychology, various kinds of applied psychology appeared.
G. Stanley Hall brought scientific pedagogy to the United States from Germany in the early 1880s. John
Dewey's educational theory of the 1890s was another example. Also in the 1890s, Hugo Münsterberg
began writing about the application of psychology to industry, law, and other fields. Lightner Witmer
established the first psychological clinic in the 1890s. James McKeen Cattell adapted Francis Galton's
anthropometric methods to generate the first program of mental testing in the 1890s. In Vienna,
meanwhile, the psychiatrist Sigmund Freud developed an independent approach to the study of the mind
called psychoanalysis, which has been widely influential.

The 20th century saw a reaction towards Edward Titchener's critique of Wundt's empiricism. This
contributed to the formulation of behaviorism by John B. Watson, which was popularized by B. F. Skinner.
Behaviorism proposed limiting psychological study to that of overt behavior, because that could be
quantified and easily measured. Behaviorists considered knowledge of the "mind" too metaphysical to
achieve scientifically. The final decades of the 20th century saw the decline of behaviorism and the rise of
an interdisciplinary approach to studying the human mind, known collectively as cognitive science.
Cognitive science again considers the "mind" as a subject for investigation, using the tools of evolutionary
psychology, linguistics, computer science, philosophy, and neurobiology. This form of investigation has

Some Rights Reserved http://projectdennio.blogspot.com/

Document Uploaded by J.D. Lim

proposed that a wide understanding of the human mind is possible, and that such an understanding may
be applied to other research domains, such as artificial intelligence.

People

Sigmund Freud, born Sigismund Schlomo Freud (6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939), was an Austrian
psychiatrist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychology. Freud is best known for his theories of
the unconscious mind and the defense mechanism of repression and for creating the clinical practice of
psychoanalysis for curing psychopathology through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst.
Freud is also renowned for his redefinition of sexual desire as the primary motivational energy of human
life, as well as his therapeutic techniques, including the use of free association, his theory of transference
in the therapeutic relationship, and the interpretation of dreams as sources of insight into unconscious
desires. He was also an early neurological researcher into cerebral palsy. While of unique historical
interest, many of Freud's ideas have fallen out of favor or have been modified by Neo-Freudians,
although at the close of the 20th century, advances in the field of neurology began to show evidence for
many of his theories. Freud's methods and ideas remain important in clinical psychodynamic approaches.
In academia his ideas continue to influence the humanities and some social sciences.

Branches of Psychology

1. Abnormal psychology is the branch of psychology that looks at psychopathology and abnormal
behavior. The term covers a broad range of disorders, from depression to obsession-compulsion
to sexual deviation and many more. Counselors, clinical psychologists, and psychotherapists
often work directly in this field.
2. Behavioral psychology, also known as behaviorism, is a theory of learning based upon the idea
that all behaviors are acquired through conditioning. While this branch of psychology dominated
the field during the first part of the twentieth century, its hold loosened during the 1950s.
However, behavioral techniques remain a mainstay in therapy, education and many other areas.
3. Biopsychology focuses on the study of how the brain influences behavior is often known as
biopsychology, although it has also been called physiological psychology, behavioral
neuroscience and psychobiology.
4. Cognitive psychology is the branch of psychology that focuses on internal states, such as
motivation, problem solving, decision-making, thinking, and attention. This area of psychology
has continued to grow since it began taking hold in the 1960s.
5. Comparative psychology is the branch of psychology concerned with the study of animal
behavior. The study of animal behavior can lead to a deeper and broader understanding of
human psychology.
6. Developmental Psychology looks at development throughout the lifespan, from childhood to
adulthood. The scientific study of human development seeks to understand and explain how and
why people change throughout life. This includes all aspects of human growth, including physical,
emotional, intellectual, social, perceptual, and personality development. Topics studied in this
field include everything from prenatal development to Alzheimer's disease.
7. Educational psychology is the branch of psychology concerned with schools, teaching
psychology, educational issues, and student concerns. Educational psychologists often study
how students learn or work directly with students, parents, teachers and administrators to
improve student outcomes.
8. Experimental Psychology is the branch of psychology that utilizes scientific methods to research
the brain and behavior. Many of these techniques are also used by other areas in psychology to
conduct research on everything from childhood development to social issues.
9. Personality Psychology is focused on the patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behavior that make a
person unique. Some of the best-known theories in psychology have arisen from this field,
including Freud's stage theory of psychosexual development and Erikson's theory of psychosocial
development.
10. Social Psychology: Social psychology seeks to explain and understand social behavior and looks
at diverse topics including group behavior, social interactions, leadership, nonverbal
communication and social influences on decision-making.

Some Rights Reserved http://projectdennio.blogspot.com/

Document Uploaded by J.D. Lim

11. Media psychology emerged as an academic and professional discipline due to a social and
commercial demand for the application of psychological theory and research into the impact of
media and emerging media technologies both academic and non-academic settings.
12. 'Developmental psychology', also known as human development, is the scientific study of
systematic psychological changes that occur in human beings over the course of the life span.
13. Political psychology is an interdisciplinary academic field dedicated to the relationship between
psychology and political science, with a focus on the role of human thought, emotion, and
behavior in politics.
14. Environmental psychology is an interdisciplinary field focused on the interplay between humans
and their surroundings. The field defines the term environment broadly encompassing natural
environments, social settings, built environments, learning environments, and informational
environments.
15. Psychophysics is a subdiscipline of psychology dealing with the relationship between physical
stimuli and their subjective correlates, or percepts. Psychophysics has been described variously
as “the scientific study of the relation between stimulus and sensation” or, more completely, as
“the analysis of perceptual processes by studying the effect on a subject’s experience or
behaviour of systematically varying the properties of a stimulus along one or more physical
dimensions.”

Status as a Science

Criticisms of psychology often come from perceptions that it is a "fuzzy" science. Philosopher Thomas
Kuhn's 1962 critique implied psychology overall was in a pre-paradigm state, lacking the agreement on
overarching theory found in mature sciences such as chemistry and physics. Psychologists and
philosophers have addressed the issue in various ways.

Because some areas of psychology rely on research methods such as surveys and questionnaires, critics
have asserted that psychology is not scientific (due to the largely correlational nature of survey research).
Other phenomena that psychologists are interested in such as personality, thinking, and emotion cannot
be directly measured and are often inferred from subjective self-reports, which may be problematic.

Misuses of hypothesis-testing occur in psychology, particularly by psychologists without doctoral training

in experimental psychology and statistics. Research has documented that many psychologists confuse
statistical significance with practical importance. Statistically significant but practically unimportant results
are common with large samples. Some psychologists have responded with an increased use of effect
size statistics, rather than sole reliance on the Fisherian p < .05 significance criterion (whereby an
observed difference is deemed 'statistically significant' if an effect of that size or larger would occur with
5% (or less) probability in independent replications, assuming the truth of the null-hypothesis of no
difference between the treatments).

Sometimes the debate comes from within psychology, for example between laboratory-oriented
researchers and practitioners such as clinicians. In recent years, and particularly in the U.S., there has
been increasing debate about the nature of therapeutic effectiveness and about the relevance of
empirically examining psychotherapeutic strategies. One argument states that some therapies are based
on discredited theories and are unsupported by empirical evidence. The other side points to recent
research suggesting that all mainstream therapies are of about equal effectiveness, while also arguing
that controlled studies often do not take into consideration real-world conditions.

Loop-A-Word: Psychology Version

Jose Dennio P. Lim Jr.
P
U P R A G M A T I S M S E E
L C S L P S C R T E L T L B C
O V Y I V I I Z A N P Z Y E P
E E C N E I C S O R U E N F L

Some Rights Reserved http://projectdennio.blogspot.com/

Document Uploaded by J.D. Lim

B E H A V I O R Y M R O U U O
E P O L I T I C A L V C S Z M
T G L A C I S Y H P O I B Z E
A C O P E R S O N A L I T Y D
S I G M U N D F R E U D C S I
S C I S Y H P O H C Y S P C A
E G S C P N O U S P M I E I E
T C T E T C O G N I T I V E G
G I Z E C E E R G E R M A N Y
S P T O C L O A E E B I R C P
E T P V R E C L S S N N C E T

psychologist egypt greece

sigmund freud neuroscience political
cognitive biophysical psychophysics
personality media behavior
germany pragmatism fuzzy science

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O
1
P U P R A GMA T I S M S E E
2
L C S L P S C R T E L T L B C
3
OV Y I V I I Z A N P Z Y E P
4
E E C N E I C S ORU E NF L
5

6
BE H A V I OR Y M R O U U O
E P OL I T I C A L V C S Z M
7
T G L A C I S Y HPO I BZ E
8
A C OP E R S ON A L I T Y D

Some Rights Reserved http://projectdennio.blogspot.com/

Document Uploaded by J.D. Lim

1
S I GMUN D F R E U D C S I
0

1
SC I S Y H P OH CY S P CA
1 E G SC P N O U S P M I E I E
1
2 T C T E T C OGN I T I V E G
1
3 G I Z E CE E R GE R MA NY
1
4 S P T O C L O A E E B I R CP
1
5 E T P V R E C L S S N N C ET

Some Rights Reserved http://projectdennio.blogspot.com/