Psychology

Psychology is the study of how people and animals behave. Psychologists are interested in how and why people do such things as learn, think, remember, feel, see, hear and talk. They study how animals react to simple problems and how people react to simple and hard problems. They also study differences between people, and how people get along with each other. 

Fields of psychology 

• Child psychology is the study of how children grow and learn to do harder things. It also shows how very different children are from each other. 
• Comparative Psychology studies many animals, such as rats, ants, monkeys and dogs. These results are compared with those of people. Comparative psychologists also study the different races of people. 
• Abnormal Psychology is the study of people who have become unable to behave as other people do. 
• Social Psychology is the study of ways people do things together. Boys and girls in groups at home, at school, and at play do not do the same things. They are studied by social psychologists. 
• Physiological Psychology is concerned with the behavior changes which results from changes in the body. For example, such drugs as alcohol change people’s behavior. 
• Educational Psychology is another applied field. This is the study of school learning and individual differences among students. Educational Psychologists experiment with different methods of teaching. 

One of the first tasks of a psychologist is to describe behavior. It is often helpful to learn the many ways on which people are alike. For example, people usually want to be active for part of the time; they usually want people to admire them; they are angry sometimes, love somebody, and are afraid of something. They learn to crawl, stand up, walk and jump, although not everybody can do these things at the same age. 

Understanding these and every other aspect of the behavior is what Psychology is about. 

Questions

• Is psychology a modern subject?
• Who is a psychologist? What do you think should be the qualifications of a good psychologist besides academic studies?