What is Psychology?

Psychology is something we all run into in our lives at least once, ehm i.e. everyday because we sort of live it but let's leave that for later. Pause.

To me, psychology is a vast realm sparking with ideas, notions, theories, research, all differing with perspectives. It is nothing, but even more than that and it is tremendously arduous for me to convey how it makes me feel in words. But I suppose that's okay, as all of this is going on inside my head now, and that's the baseline. If I'm getting a tad philosophical hear, I deeply apologize. And if you are going like 'what the crap is she talking about?' that's fine as well, because I don't even know.

Anyways, I fall short. Let me try and give you a more objectivized - yes, that's a good word as psychological research must be objective in order to be generisable - remnants of my A level psychology lessons, excuse me. I'll attempt to operationalize all information so that it's coherent and easily interpreted, because what's worse than a bunch of muddled ramblings stuffed with jargon nonsense? (Not that I haven't been doing exactly that up until now.)

Let's break this down!

Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behavior - there are countless opinions whether psychology is an actual science or not so don't bang me up with that one. For me, psychology is both a science and well, psychology.

Its roots trace back to ancient philosophy which we could funnily enough consider psychology's great great great… grandma, or grandpa? Or non-binary? I'll leave that open to subjective interpretation. Where was I at? Ah! With thinkers like Socrates, Platon and Aristotle pondering the nature of the soul, consciousness, and human behavior. The term 'psychology' itself originates from the Greek words psyche (soul) and logos (study). Nevertheless, it was the famous Wilhelm Wundt in 1879 who had torn psychology off as a distinct scientific discipline and established the first experimental psychology lab in Germany.

Early - baby - psychology was heavily influenced by philosophy, focusing on introspection and abstract theories. As time went, however, it evolved into a rigorous science, incorporation empirical methods to explore perception, cognition, emotion and behavior.

Modern psychology encompasses several approaches - like biological, behavioral, cognitive, psychodynamic - and branches, for example social, clinical, genetic, developmental, forensic and so on and so on…

Neuroscience plays a vital role, merging psychology with the scientific study of the brain, implementing various methods such as the Magnetic Resonance Imagining (MRI) and PET scans. These help to uncover the causes of mental disorders, improve treatments, and explain how brain function influences behavior and thought.

In essence, psychology seeks to understand how our minds work and why they work the way they do, and how we can improve individual and societal well-being. Psychologists intend to gain insight into the background of our behavior and discover what lays beyond the veil of mind.

So, that's all for today. We shall look together at some more specific areas of psychology next time!

Take care of yourselves and stay healthy!

Lolita