Psychology is that educational and applied science which makes a systematic and scientific study of mental processes, experiences and both expressed and latent behavior of animals (human beings, animals etc.).
In other words, it can be said that psychology is a science which systematically studies the observable behavior and the mental and physical processes within the living being such as thinking, emotions etc. and the events of the environment. Studies by relating them with.
In this perspective, psychology has been called the science of study of behavior and mental processes. ‘Behavior’ includes both human behavior and animal behavior. Mental processes include sensation, attention, perception, learning, memory, thinking etc.
Psychology is a science of experience, its objective is to analyze the elements of the process of consciousness, the nature of their interrelationships and to find out the rules that determine them.
Child Psychology
After birth, the child observes the wonderful form of this world with great joy and surprise and attains inner happiness. Mother’s lap gives him heavenly joy. He accepts all these experiences through silent expression. He has pronunciation, signs, expressions but does not have complete language and sentences.
Gradually, he tries to learn in various ways through his own practice and through the efforts of his family and mother, through subtle measures of adjustment and expression. In this way gradually the learning process begins. He also expresses his opposing difficulties and complexities, happy and sad, through gestures, this is his symbolic language .
With the support of family, neighborhood and mother, the child becomes capable of going to school as the age increases by learning new knowledge through trial and error as per his intellectual capacity. The child does not express his feelings and curiosity by going to the nursery or primary school, but expresses his emotions and signals in his own broken language.
The desire to go to school or the desire not to go is his inner decision, which determines his confidence and distrust. It is from here that the need to understand the psychology of the child becomes mandatory for education, psychology and the teacher.
There is an inextricable connection between child development and the learning process. Therefore, the teacher should become the child’s classmate and integral trusted friend and impart education through play. The child should not feel that he is being taught anything, but through play, he should continue to receive everything that is being given to him and which he is entitled to or inherit at that age.
Gijubhai, the founder of Bal Mandir, child lover and educationist, considers the child as a deity – ‘Bal Devo Bhava’.
Today’s child will be tomorrow’s strong Indian citizen. The contribution of education, teachers and schools is paramount in the all-round development of children. For this reason, it is essential for the teacher to have knowledge of all the points and psychological bases of child development and learning. Therefore, further chapters of all child psychology are given in sequence:
holistic child psychology
- Child Development
- Individual differences, imagination, thinking and reasoning development
- Basis of child development and factors affecting them
- Meaning and principles of learning
- Learning curve, learning plateau and transfer of learning
- Motivation
- Statistics
definitions of psychology
According to Watson , “Psychology is the definite or pure science of behavior.”
According to McDougall , “Psychology is the true science of conduct and behavior.”
According to Woodworth , “Psychology is the science of human behavior in contact with the environment.”
According to Crow and Crow , “Psychology is the study of human behavior and human relationships.”
According to Boring , “Psychology is the study of human nature.”
According to Skinner , “Psychology is the science of behavior and experience.”
According to Mann , “Modern psychology is related to the scientific discovery of behavior.”
According to Garrison and others , “Psychology is related to direct human behavior.”
According to Gardner Murphy , “Psychology is the science that studies the responses of living individuals to their environment. ,
According to Stephen , “Educational psychology is the gradual study of educational development.”
According to Brown , “Human behavior is changed through education and the study of human behavior is called psychology. ,
According to Crow and Crow , “Educational psychology describes and explains the experiences of an individual from birth to old age.”
According to Skinner , “Educational psychology includes the entire behavior and personality related to education.”
According to Kolesnik , “The application of the principles and results of psychology in the field of education is called educational psychology.”
According to Saare and Telford , “Educational psychology is mainly concerned with learning. “It is that part of psychology which is especially related to the scientific exploration of psychological aspects of education.”
According to Guilford , “The study of child development enables us to know what to teach and how to teach. ,
According to Skinner , “The use of findings related to human behavior and experience in the field of education is called educational psychology. ,
J.M. According to Stephen , “Educational psychology is the gradual study of educational development. ,
According to Trow , educational psychology is the study of psychological aspects of educational situations. ,
According to BN Jha , “The process of education is completely dependent on the grace of psychology. ,
According to S.S. Chauhan , “Educational psychology is the systematic study of the development of the individual in the educational environment.”
According to Pestalozzi , “Education is the natural, progressive and unopposed development of human abilities.”
According to John Dewey , “Education is the development of man’s abilities, with the help of which he controls his environment and achieves his potential progress.”
According to John F. Travers , “Educational psychology is the science in which students, learning and teaching are systematically studied.”
According to Skinner , “The aim of educational psychology is to contribute to the value and efficiency of the educational situation.”
history of psychology
In pre-scientific times, psychology was a branch of philosophy. When William Wundt opened the first psychology laboratory in 1879, psychology was able to escape the clutches of philosophy and attain the status of an independent science.
Influence of philosophy on psychology
Along with the scientific trend, philosophy has also had a great influence on psychology. In fact the scientific tradition started later. Earlier, instead of experiment or observation, exchange of ideas and thinking were the generally accepted methods of solving problems. The names of some of the scholars who propounded psychological problems in the context of philosophy are noteworthy.
Descartes ( 1596 – 1650) differentiated between humans and animals and said that humans have a soul whereas animals only work like machines. Man has willpower because of his soul. Body and soul mutually influence each other on the pituitary gland. According to Descartes, there are some thoughts of human beings which can be called innate. They have nothing to do with experience.
According to Leibniz ( 1646 – 1716), the entire substance is made up of “monad” units. By dividing the state of consciousness into different degrees, he laid a foundation for Freud’s ideas that came almost two hundred years later.
Locke ( 1632-1704) believed that to understand human nature, it is necessary to know about the source of thoughts. While propounding the theory about the interrelation of thoughts, he said that thoughts are like an element and the brain analyzes them. He said that the primary qualities of every object are inherent in the object itself. Secondary qualities are not inherent in the object but they are definitely realized through the particular object.
Berkeley ( 1685-1753) said that reality is experienced not in the form of substance but in the form of idea. Expressing his views about the sensation of distance, he said that we sense distance with the help of blurring of focus and automatic adjustment. Regarding the relationship between mind and matter, Locke said that mind is perceived by matter.
Hume ( 1711-1776) mainly distinguished between “ideas” and “conjectures” and said that conjectures are more exciting and influential than ideas. Ideas can be considered copies of projections. By clarifying his views on the principle of cause and effect, Hume provided significant help in bringing modern psychology closer to the scientific method.
Hartley ( 1705-1757) can be named among the somatic psychological philosophers. According to him, sensation occurs on the basis of vibration in nerve fibres. In the background of this idea, there were facts propounded by Newton in which it was said that sensation continues even after the stimulus is removed. Hartley laid more emphasis on the principle of contiguity while stating the rules of association.
After Hartley, no notable work was done in the field of associationism for about 70 years.
Reed ( 1710-1796) Scotland, while describing the perception of objects, said that it is necessary to distinguish between perception and sensation. There is a sensation of the qualities of a particular object while the entire object is perceived. Sensation is limited only to the properties of an object, but through perception we come to know about that entire object.
Condillac ( 1715-1780) , France , laid the foundation of the tendencies of empiricism and La Mettrie of materialism. Condillac said that sensation is the “fundamental source” of all knowledge. He did not consider the ideas or experiences described by Locke at all necessary.
La Mettrie ( 1709-1751) said that thought originates from the mutual influence of the brain and nervous system. Like Descartes, he also considered man like a machine. He said that like the body and brain, the soul is also perishable. Laying the foundation of motivation in modern psychology, La Mettrie said that attainment of happiness is the ultimate goal of life.
James Mill ( 1773–1836) and later his son John Stuart Mill ( 1806–1873) developed mental chemistry. These two scholars formalized the trend of associationism and prepared a suitable background for Wundt.
The same applies to Benn ( 1818-1903) . Kant adopted the method of subjectivism in solving problems and supported innateism in the theory of perception of the external world.
Herbert ( 1776-1841) made an important contribution in giving shape to psychology. According to his opinion, psychology is an elemental, quantitative and analytical science based on empiricism. He gave physical basis to psychology instead of metaphysical one and
Lotze ( 1817-1881) made further progress in this direction.
Beginning of scientific study of psychological problems
The scientific study of psychological problems had already begun after their formal formation. In 1834, Weber published his experimental research work related to touch in a book form. In 1831, Fechner himself had published a very important article on the subject of measurement of direct current electricity.
A few years later, in 1847, Helmo presented his scientific article on energy conservation before the people. After this, in 1856 AD, 1860 AD and 1866 AD, he published a book named “Optic” in three parts. In 1851 and 1860, Fechner also published two important texts from the psychological point of view (Zend Avesta and Elemente der Psychophysik).
In 1858, Wundt had obtained the degree of Doctor of Medical Sciences from the University of Heidelberg and was working in the field of physiology on a co-operative post. In the same year Helmolts also came there from Bonn. This contact was very important for Wundt because after this he left physiology and made psychology his field of work.
Wundt brought psychology out of a foggy and vague philosophical environment by publishing countless scientific articles and several important books. He only placed psychological problems in a scientific environment and inaugurated the trend of thinking and experimenting on them from a new perspective. Since then psychology started being considered a science. Subsequently, as scientific procedures were used on patients, new problems emerged.
modern psychology
In the historical background of modern psychology, its two definite forms are visible. One is scientific psychology influenced by scientific research and inventions and the other is philosophical psychology influenced by philosophy. Scientific psychology began in the late 19th century.
In 1860, Fechner ( 1801-1887) published a book in German called “ Elements of Psychophysics” (its English translation is also available), in which he described three special systems of studying psychological problems in the context of the scientific method. Methodologically described: Mean error method, minimum variation method and stable stimulus discrimination method. Even today, many important researches are conducted in psychological laboratories on the basis of these systems.
After Fechner, there are two other important names in scientific psychology : Helmholtz ( 1821-1894) and Wilhelm Wundt ( 1832-1920) .
Helmholtz propounded important rules related to vision through many experiments. In this context, he raised the scientific existence of psychology through research work on perception.
Wundt ‘s name is particularly notable in psychology. He established the first psychology laboratory at the University of Leipzig (Germany) in 1879 . Defined the formal form of psychology. In the laboratory of Leipzig, Wundt and his colleagues conducted remarkable experiments on various problems of psychology, in which time-reaction related experiments are especially important.
The names of kinetics scholar Hering ( 1834-1918) , physics scholar Mach ( 1838-1916) and G.E. Mueller ( 1850 to 1934) are also notable. Hering was one of the major promoters of phenomenology and much credit can be given to him for influencing this trend on psychology. Mach conducted extremely influential experimental research on the perception of body movements. He also laid the foundation of modern positivism. GE Müller was actually a student of philosophy and history, but as a result of his correspondence with Fechner, his attention turned towards psychosomatic problems. He did research work in the field of memory and vision through psychosomatic methods. In the same context, he also discovered “Jaast’s Law”, that is, if there are two associations of equal strength, then as a result of repetition, the old association will become stronger than the new one (“Jaast’s Law” is named after one of Müller’s students, Adolf Jaast).
Sects and branches of psychology
The main goal of psychology was to discover the rules of behavior. Various viewpoints were presented at the theoretical level. In the field of psychology, around 1912 , the main branches like structuralism , functionalism , behaviorism , Gestaltism and psychoanalysis etc. developed. The promoters of all these ideas were unanimous in the fact that the scientific study of human behavior is the objective of psychology. There was disagreement among them as to what was the best way to achieve this objective. The followers of structuralism were of the opinion that to explain behaviour, it is necessary to understand the physical structures through which behavior is possible. The followers of functionalism said that instead of physical structure, there should be more emphasis on observable and visible behavior.
On this basis, Watson later established behaviorism. Gestaltists considered perception to be the basic basis of behavioral problems. In practice, the main tendency is to achieve order in an organized manner, this was his opinion. By founding psychoanalysis, Freud attempted to explain that most of our behavior is determined by unconscious processes.
schools of psychology
- 1879, experimental psychology, structuralism — W. Wundt
- 1896, Psychoanalysis – Sigmund Freud
- 1913, Behaviorism — John Broadus Watson
- 1954, Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy — Albert Ellis
- 1960, Cognitive Therapy — Aaron T Back
- 1967, Cognitive Psychology — Ulrich Niger
- 1962, Humanistic Psychology — American Association of Humanistic Psychology
- 1940, Gestaltism — Fritz Perls
In modern psychology all these “isms” now have only historical significance. In their place, psychology has been divided into various branches for the convenience of study.
In experimental psychology, mainly those problems which were earlier solved by philosophers through thinking or discussion started being studied through psychological methods. That is, sensation and perception . Later, learning processes also started being studied under this. Experimental psychology is the oldest branch of modern psychology.
Animals can be kept in more controlled conditions than humans, and the anatomy of animals is also not as complex as that of humans. The rules of behavior can be easily learned by experimenting on animals.
Around 1912, Thorndike developed comparative or animal psychology by experimenting on animals. But to know to what extent the results obtained on animals can be applied to humans, knowledge of the evolutionary sequence was also necessary. Apart from this, formulation of rules of behavior can be possible only when there is complete and proper knowledge of the development of humans or animals. Keeping this context in mind, developmental psychology was born.
Shortly after 1912 AD, social psychology was established as a result of the efforts of McDougall ( 1871-1938) , although its foundation had been laid much earlier by the social scientist Herbert Spencer ( 1820-1903) .
Gradually the influence of psychology started being felt on various branches of knowledge. It was hoped that psychology could be useful in solving problems of other subjects. At the same time, different aspects of the problems to be studied came to light.
As a result, new branches of psychology continued to develop. Some of these have emerged recently, among which Motivational Psychology, Authoritative Psychology, Mathematical Psychology are especially notable.
There are both basic and applied branches of psychology.
Its important branches are social and environmental psychology, organizational behavior/psychology, clinical (diagnostic) psychology, guidance and counseling, industrial psychology, developmental, criminological, experimental counseling, animal psychology etc. Despite being different, these branches are interrelated.
- clinical psychology
Due to clinical problems like neuroticism, psychoneurosis, psychosis and problems like schizophrenia, hysteria, obsessive-compulsive disorder, the need for clinical psychologist is increasing day by day. The main function of such a psychologist is to diagnose diseases and use diagnostic and various therapeutic techniques.
- developmental psychology
Developmental psychology includes psychological, cognitive and social developments that occur across the lifespan. It studies the changes in behavior during infancy, childhood and adolescence or from adulthood to old age. Earlier it was also called “ child psychology” .
criminal psychology
This is a challenging area, where work is done in relation to the specific behavior of criminals. Criminology, Psychology is the branch of criminal science, which is related to the investigation of crime and related facts.
Animal psychology is an amazing branch.
The main branches of psychology are –
- Abnormal psychology
- Biological psychology
- Clinical psychology
- Cognitive psychology
- Community Psychology
- Comparative psychology
- Counseling psychology
- Critical psychology
- Developmental psychology
- Educational psychology
- Evolutionary psychology
- Forensic psychology
- Global psychology
- Health psychology
- Industrial and organizational psychology (I/O)
- Legal psychology
- Occupational health psychology (OHP)
- Personality psychology
- Quantitative psychology
- Psychometrics
- Mathematical psychology
- Social psychology
- School psychology
- Environmental psychology
- Yoga Psychology
- Nature and Scope of Psychology
To understand the scope of psychology correctly, the most important category is the category which shows what psychologists want?
On the basis of work done, psychologists can be divided into three categories:-
- The first category includes those psychologists who are busy in teaching work.
- The second category includes those psychologists who research psychological problems and
- The third category includes those psychologists who use skills and techniques in real situations based on the facts obtained from psychological studies.
In this way, psychologists have three main areas of work:-
- teaching,
- research and
- Application.
The main facts related to these three work areas are described below –
Academic areas
Teaching and research is a major work area of psychology. From this point of view, psychologists show their interest in the following branches under this field-
- Life-span developmental psychology
- Human experimental psychology
- Animal experimental psychology
- Psychological Psychology
- Quantitative Psychology
- Personality Psychology
- Social Psychology
- Educational Psychology
- Cognitive Psychology
- Abnormal Psychology
Life-Span Developmental Psychology
Initially, child psychology was concerned only with the study of child development, but in recent years, emphasis has also been laid on the study of adolescence, adulthood and old age in developmental psychology. This is why it is called ‘life span developmental psychology’.
In developmental psychology, psychology studies almost every area of human life like intelligence, muscular development, emotional development, social development, sports, language development from a developmental perspective. In this, the effects of some special factors like heredity, maturity, family environment, socio-economic differences on the development of behavior are also studied.
5% of total psychologists are working in the field of developmental psychology.
human experimental psychology
Human experimental psychology is an area where all those human behaviors on which experiments are possible are studied. Theoretically, such experiments can be done on any aspect of human behaviour, but psychologists try to conduct experiments on only those aspects which can be isolated and the process of studying which is simple. In this way, a lot of experimental study of behaviors like vision, hearing, thinking, learning etc. has been done.
Those psychologists who are called the founders of experimental psychology have also shown great interest in human experimental psychology. Among these, the names of William Wundt, Titchener and Watson etc. are more famous.
animal experimental psychology
This area of psychology is similar to Human experimental psychology. The only difference is that here the experiment is done on animals like rats, cats, dogs, monkeys, orangutans etc. Most research in animal experimental psychology has been done to study the biological aspects of learning processes and behavior. In the field of animal experimental psychology, the names of Skinner, Guthrie, Pavlov, Tolman etc. are prominent.
The truth is that whatever we know today about modern learning theory and biological aspects of human behavior is based on animal experimental psychology. In this psychology an attempt is made to understand the behavior of animals. Some people are of the opinion that if psychology is mainly concerned with the study of human behavior then studying the behavior of animals does not seem to be a more logical thing. But psychologists have some constraints due to which they show interest in the behavior of animals. For example, studying animal behavior is less expensive. Then there are some experiments which are not possible to do on humans from the ethical point of view and the main reason being the short life span of animals. About 14% of the total number of psychologists are working in the field of human and animal experimental psychology.
somatic psychology
The scope of work of psychologists in physical psychology is to study the physical determinants of animal’s behavior and their effects. There is a branch of this type of somatic psychology which is closely related to biological science. It is also called psycho-biology. Nowadays, psychologists have become more interested in studying the relationship between brain functioning and behavior. This has given rise to a new interdisciplinary specialty called ‘neuroscience’. Similarly, somatic psychology is also interested in the study of the effects of hormones on behavior. Nowadays, various types of drugs and their effects on behavior are also being studied in somatic psychology. Due to this, a new specialty has been born which is called Psychopharmacology and which includes everything from behavioral effects of various drugs to molecular research in neural and metabolic processes. is studied up to.
