The Science of Psychology
“Psychology is the scientific study of mind, brain and behaviour. Some
of what you do learn may seem like ‘common sense’, or at least
familiar to you because you are learning about topics in which you can
relate to. However some things you may believe is true, but is
incorrect. The way we know this is through the application of
scientific methods.”
Mark Leary suggests that the subject matter of psychology is much more
familiar to most people than is the subject matter of physics or
biology; we see behaviour all around us. Psychology would be an odd
science of thought and behaviour if it only considered thoughts and
behaviours completely foreign to people’s experiences, or if its
finding always can counter to most people’s beliefs. Many people
believed whole-heartedly in flat Earths and cheese moons only to find
their common sense views dismantled in the face of scientific
evidence. This is the same with psychology. Although most people would
like to believe that large rewards produce greater liking for a boring
task, that the behaviour of men and women is determined by their
biology or that absence makes the heart grow fonder. In short, the
popularity of a common sense belief may not always support the weight
of scientific evidence.
Psychologists are primarily engaged in the task of explaining
behaviour, rather than merely cataloguing it. The difference between
theory and description – “why” versus “what” – echoes the difference
between science and common sense. Common sense certainly helps
describe what takes place in behaviour, but doesn’t compel us to
understand why it takes place. The develo...
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...e, as most of the behaviour towards different situations is
used in everyday life, but the fact that the measurements and the
results that were found in each study I have explained, helps in
finalising the decisions between different matters and opinions,
whether people really do this or that.
In 1974, Joyson, wrote an article, saying that every person is there
own psychologist, after all who knows best an outsider or yourself? He
also said that if psychologists did not exist would we need to invent
one?
We all have to use a bit of psychology to negotiate our lives,
regardless of whether or not we have studied it.
Bibliography
Internet References
www.completepsychology.co.uk
www.randi.org/vbulletin/printread.php?s=8a0c1318ff319ffe9564b62b4cd872...
www.psych.ubc.ca
www.holah.karoo.net
The World of Psychology. (2002). A Pearson Education Company. Boston, MA: Samuel Wood & Ellen Green Wood p. 593
Psychology comprises of two words originally used by the ‘Greeks’, ‘psyche’, defining the mind, soul or spirit and lastly ‘logos’ being study. Both words define together the ‘study of the mind’. Psychology perspectives evaluate the normal and abnormal behaviour and how persons’ deal with different concepts of issues and problems. Psychology theories’ are based on ‘common sense’, but its scientific structure, everything needs to be evaluated and tested, therefore, promoting different psychological theories’.
The field of psychology is a discipline, originated from many branches of science. It has applications from within a complete scope of avenues, from psychotherapy to professional decision-making. The flexibility and versatility of this field reflects its importance and demands in-depth analysis. Psychology was a division of philosophy until it developed independent scientific disciplines. The history of psychology was a scholarly study of the mind and behavior that dates back to the beginning of civilization. There are important details from previous theory psychologist, research have contributed to behaviorism approaches and have contributed towards specific current behavioral practices. Contemporary behavior therapy began to emerge into distinct practical and core learning theories concerning the needs and knowledge engaging cultural and professional differences.
Psychology can be broadly defined as the scientific and systematic study of people’s behavior and mental processes.
Waiten,W., (2007) Seventh Edition Psychology Themes and Variations. University of Nevada, Las Vegas: Thomson Wadsworth.
The birth of psychology was in December of 1879, at Germanys University of Leipzig (Myers, 2014, p.2). In 1960, Wilhelm Wundt and Edward Titchener defines psychology as “the science of mental health” (Myers, 2014, p.4). However, two provocative American psychologists, John Watson and B.F Skinner, redefined psychology in 1920. They redefined psychology as “the scientific study of observable behavior” (Myers, 2014, p.4). The problem arose when psychologists realized people could not observe feeling or thought so they needed to come up with a new definition for psychology. We define psychology today as “the science of behavior and mental processes” (Myers, 2014, p.4). Psychology includes many subfields such as human development, social behavior,
My paper is based on an article from the text’s web site (chapter 9) entitled “Lack of sleep ages body’s systems.” The basic claim of the article is that sleep deprivation has various harmful effects on the body. The reported effects include decreased ability to metabolize glucose (similar to what occurs in diabetes) and increased levels of cortisol (a stress hormone involved in memory and regulation of blood sugar levels). The article also briefly alludes (in the quote at the bottom of page 1) to unspecified changes in brain and immune functioning with sleep deprivation.
Psychology is the scientific study of the mind, brain, and behavior. In psychology, and all of the other sciences, relying on opinions is abandoned in order to find out which explanations best fit the evidence or data given. Science continually forces us to question our findings and conclusions. Over time, psychology has advanced greatly and a main reason for such progressiveness is because of the change in the research model used.
Psychology is a social science that aims to study the mind and the behaviors of humans. It aims to understand what drives humans to act the way they do. It differs from sociology and anthropology in that it takes accounts the individual rather than society as a whole.
The development of psychology like all other sciences started with great minds debating unknown topics and searching for unknown answers. Early philosophers and psychologists such as Sir Francis Bacon and Charles Darwin took a scientific approach to psychology by introducing the ideas of measurement and biology into the way an indi...
The British Psychological Society states that ‘Psychology is the scientific study of people, the mind and behaviour’ (BPS). In this essay I will be discussing what is actually meant by this and whether psychology fits into both the traditional views of a science, as well as more contemporary perspectives. It is widely suggested that Psychology is a “coalition of specialities” meaning it is multi-disciplinary (Hewstone, Fincham and Foster 2005, page 4). I will therefore examine whether it could be considered wrong to think that all parts of the discipline should neatly fit into one view of a scientific approach.
Psychology is the investigation of the mind and how it processes and directs our thoughts, actions and conceptions. However, in 1879 Wilhelm Wundt opened the first psychology laboratory at the University of Leipzig in Germany. Nevertheless, the origins of psychology go all the way back thousands of years starting with the early Greeks. This foundation is closely connected to biology and philosophy; and especially the subfields of physiology which is the study of the roles of living things and epistemology, which is the study of comprehension and how we understand what we have learned. The connection to physiology and epistemology is often viewed as psychology, which is the hybrid offspring of those two fields of investigation.
Public Safety Officials have been battling the difficult question of profiling for quite a while. The question is how do they know the suspected individual fit the category associated with an offense? While it has been proven that many profiling cases are somewhat directed to a racial profile, it can be proven that people, given the discretion, are able to identify explanations for a series of behavioral events by identifying what that behavior accredits to. This theory, identified by Frite Heider, “suggested that we have a tendency to give casual explanations for someone’s behavior, often by crediting either the situation or the person’s disposition,” called the attribution theory. Until recently, a study of the like was considered to be a branch of sociology and not a form of psychology. Social psychology essentially became the focus on the individual rather than the group as a whole. Many thoughtful ideas are collected in response to the studies of social psychology. Human cognition is understood to arise from interacting socially; highlighting the importance of socialization. We use social cognition to develop our explanations and our ideas on why a person’s behavior is/does what it is/does.
Psychology is the scientific study on how people think, behave and feel. It is the study of the human mind, and its functions affecting behavior in a certain condition. To me, the word psychology means the study of people’s mind and how it works. Psychology often includes emotional characteristics of people as well. The characteristics help determine why people behave and respond they way they do.
Edited by Raymond J. Corsini. Encyclopedia of Psychology, Second Edition, Volume 3. New York: John Wiley and Sons Inc.