The Mind and Body Connection in Psychology

When we think of the mind and the body psychologist and historians have provided theories that correlate these two ideas and their functions that make us humans. Without the mind our body cannot fulfill its purposes and without the body our mind is left useless. These two branches influence each other and can cause different chains of reaction to erupt in our mental world [mind] and our physical world [body]. There are relationships between what we experience, (such as thoughts and feelings) and what our biological processes are (such as activity in the nervous system), (Morris, 2005). The link between the mind-body is that they are not separate entities, rather they are intricately connected, interacting with each other to function properly. The five basic issues that psychologist have associated the mind-body with are biological psych (dealing with the nervous system and its function), sensation/perception, consciousness, motivation/emotion, and clinical psych (dealing with disorders/therapy).

These five issues are an uprising principle that relates how the mind-body interacts. In biological psychology we discuss the scientific study of mental processes and behavior, coinciding with the performance of some cognitive activity. In sensation and perception, ?sensation refers to the process of sensing our environment through touch, taste, sight, sound, and smell. This information is sent to our brains in raw form where perception comes into play. Perception is the way we interpret these sensations and therefore make sense of everything around us.? In terms of consciousness we associate that with the state of being awake and aware of what?s going on around you. This is also a quality of the mind which attributes to our attentiveness. When dealing with motivation and emotion, psychologist has defined motivation as the initiation, direction, intensity and persistence of behavior, which has a temporal and dynamic state non-related to one?s personality or behavior. Emotion is what is described as ?an intense mental state that arises autonomically in the nervous system rather than through conscious effort.? It can evoke a negative or positive response which will correlate in the way we behave. Clinical psychology deals with researching and treating psychological distress, dysfunction or disorder. Psychologists who are focused in this field treat more severe disorders, such as phobias, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia. (Rishel, 2000)

The nervous system is our ?body's information gatherer, storage center and control system.? It collects information about the external conditions in relation to the body's internal state, to analyze this information, and to initiate appropriate responses to satisfy certain needs (Maintain Homeostasis).