How to Define Psychology

Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. In order to understand psychology as it today, we have to know something about its history. Additionally, we are going to see that the field of psychology is conceivable to adopt several different approaches, including the biological, behaviorist, cognitive, psychodynamic, and humanistic perspectives.

This essay will outline and compare both biological and behavioural perspectives on human behaviour. The history, major discoveries and theories will be discussed along with some of the most influential theorists in each of these two areas of psychology. This essay will also compare the two areas strengths and weaknesses in the field of psychology.

Psychology is made up of many perspectives, such as, behavioural, biological, cognitive, social, humanistic and finally, psychodynamic. This essay will focus on the behavioural perspective and the biological perspective. According to J Walker (2012) the behavioural perspective is based on behaviourism and is the study of observing behaviour when in certain contexts and events. The biological perspective however, explains behaviour by focusing on the function of the nervous system, genes and the brain.

Psychology is a branch of philosophy until the late 1870’s when it was developed in Germany and the United States as an independent scientific punishment. In 1879, Wilhelm Wundt founded the first laboratory and dedicated it to psychological research in Leipzig, Germany. Wilhelm Wundt was also the first person to be referred as a psychologists. Early sponsors to the psychology field are Hermann Ebbinghaus, who is the pioneer in the study of the memory. William James, who is the father of pragmatism. Ivan Pavlolv, who had develop the procedures that is associated with classical conditioning, which is the learning process which an innate responses to a stimulus that comes to be elicited in response to a neutral stimulus. In 1890, Hugo Munsterberg began writing the application of psychology to production, law and other fields. Also in 1890 Lightner Witmer had established the first psychology clinic.

It is also important to consider the major features of a science, in order to judge whether Psychology can in fact be considered as one. This assignment will aim to answer the question by first looking at whether Psychology is a definable subject matter (Kuhn, 1970). The next paragraph will focus on the importance of the role of theory. This represents an attempt to explain observed phenomena, such as Skinner’s (1938) attempt to account for behaviour (human and non-human) in terms of operant conditioning. Furthermore, any science must have a hypothesis and be able to test them by making predictions about behaviour under certain conditions. Also, empirical methods and replication will be discussed as well.

When asked to define psychology there so many thoughts that runs through my mind. Psychology is the scientific study of ones thoughts and behavior. People think psychologically every day for example when you try to explain what someone else is doing to another person. There are many fields of study that try to understand how people think and the actions they take. Psychology is used for many different reasons not only do they study the human behavior they also help mental patients and try to figure them out and a problem that they have. Learning the scientific perspective on human behavior can help you develop a curiosity for how the human behavior works (Feist 2013). When studying psychology it not only makes you more aware of how people

Psychology is the study of the human mind and behavior, as well as what affects behavior. Some aspects of psychology include human development, perception, intelligence, memory, consciousness, personality, learning, emotions, and mental disorders. There are many fields of psychological study, including biological, behavioral, social, and cognitive. Behavioral psychology studies the physical causes of behavior. According to it's views, an organism is the basis of the mind. Behavioral psychology, however, focuses on behavior modification, based on the idea that behavior in humans exhibits similar tendencies. It avoids the study of the unconscious mind, because it views it as impossible to access, scientifically. Social psychology focuses on the

Psychologists have been focused on observing and understanding human behavior for centuries, dating back to the Greek philosophers when psychology and philosophy were considered one.Today, Psychology is the study of human behavior, beginning before birth and lasting until death. It is clear that the observance human behavior is a vast and profound source of data for psychologists. Early philosophers relied on methods of observation and logic. A physiologist named Wilhelm Wundt in the 1800’s began using scientific research methods in his study of mental processes. However, the situation was totally different in the beginning of 20th century when psychology still struggled to be regarded as a separate discipline with practical value(Mastering,2011). Psychologists had only begun to be accepted as a science. It was John B. Watson who established the school of Behaviorism and inspired many other psychologists to study patterns of human behavior and their mechanisms. Watson 's contribution to psychology is important not to underestimate; he studied animal and human behavior to come up with a methodology that would give Psychology a respected status among other scientific disciplines. This essay will focus on the biography and works of John B. Watson with a purpose to show why his works are important for Psychology today(Hergenhahn & Henley, 2013).

Psychology is the study of people’s minds and behaviors. There are different types of psychology like health psychology, which study’s people’s health, and abnormal psychology, which study’s people’s minds, some characteristics of these psychology include the detentions of health, different types of disorders, like anxiety, and destiny, free will, fate, decisions, values, integrity, moral, and ethics. The dimensions of health and their characteristics, mental and social health, comparing and contrasting internal and external factors of self-esteem and self-efficiency. Anxiety disorder, what it is, how common it is, and signs symptoms and treatments. Destiny, free will, fate, decisions, values, integrity, moral, and ethics what they are and examples, how values and decisions effect our school lives and morals and ethics and how they affect our home lives.

There were three questions asked at the start of this paper. What is Social Psychology all about? Why is the study of it so important? Is there truly a purpose or benefit from the findings of the studies? Social Psychology is the study of attitude, behavior, and interactions of individuals within a group setting. You may have heard the saying "for every action, there is a reaction," Social Psychologists observe and interpret behaviors in effort to provide further explanation of cause and effect. It is thru the studies of Social Psychology we can learn how to get into the cause and begin to foresee patterns of reactions. A simple yet sophisticated theory.

Social psychology is an empirical science that studies how people think about, influence, and relate to one another. This field focuses on how individuals view and affect one another. Social psychology also produces the idea of construals which represent how a person perceives, comprehends or interprets the environment. Construals introduce the idea that people want to make themselves look good to others and they want to be seen as right. It is also said that the social setting in which people interact impacts behavior, which brings up the idea of behaviorism. Behaviorism is the idea that behavior is a function of the person and the environment.

Social Psychology leads us to understand the behavior of an individual person when he or she is in a social setting. Social psychology is fairly new to the world of psychology, with first experiments taking place in the late 1800’s and first text recorded in the early 1900’s. Behavior is typically determined by a reaction to stimuli, therefore it seems to be influenced by environment. Social psychology examines how much human behavior may be influenced by other people. In social psychology, behavior of an individual is observed in the company of other people, and how this behavior

Huffman (2012) explains that social psychology is a subject which, “studies how other people influence our individual thoughts, feelings and actions” (p. 567). Understanding the way people act around others can be important when society is faced with challenges, and can even help others learn how to reduce conflict with each other.

Social psychology is a scientific form of explaining human behaviour. It was developed by Gordon Allport in 1985, social psychology focuses on social interactions that cause various behaviours. It is scientific because behaviour can be observed & therefore measured in many forms. This is an objective way of collecting data that can then be used as proof to back up series of theories. One of the main points in social psychology is that it doesn't just focus on motor activities but also on behaviour such as facial expressions which can also be

Social psychology is the study of how relationships between people and groups affect feelings, emotions, and reactions toward one another.