Psychology Dictionary

The word psychology comes from the Greek word psyche, which means the vital breath/human soul (from the Greek goddess Psykhe, the goddess of the soul). The American Psychological Association (APA) defines psychology simply as the study of the human mind and behavior.

Psychology encompasses all aspects of the human experience, and the study of psychology encompasses all the elements involved in understanding behavior, and more precisely, the factors that motivate behavior.

Psychology is the study of mental processes, behavior, and the relationship between the two. Mental processes in psychology refer to learning, motivation, reasoning, and emotion, among others. In other words, the study of psychology involves learning how humans think, feel, learn, interact, perceive, and understand, whether alone or when interacting with other people or the environment.

Psychology is both a natural science concerned with innate factors and primal drives that align with the laws of nature, and a social science concerned with the study of behaviors, feelings, and thoughts, and the environmental factors that contribute to them.

Unlike other disciplines that typically deal only in the realm of the physically tangible, psychology is concerned with thoughts, emotions, memories, and perceptions, bringing a unique level of nuance and complexity to psychological study, research and practice.

Psychology is a field most often associated with mental health counseling and intervention, however, the APA is quick to point out that this discipline is also a multifaceted research based science – the science of behavior, science of cognition, and science of emotion.