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Psychology

The science of behavior and mental processes

Nature-nurture issue

The long-standing controversy over the relative contributions that genes and experience make to the development of psychological traits and behaviors

Natural selection

The principle that, among the range of inherited trait variations, those contributing to reproduction and survival will most likely be passed to succeeding generations

Neuroscience

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how the body and brain create emotions, memories, and sensory experiences

Evolutionary

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how nature selects traits that promote the perpetuation of one's genes

Behavior genetics

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how much our genes, and our environment, influence our individual differences

Psychodynamic

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how behavior springs from unconscious drives and conflicts

Behavioral

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how we learn observable responses

Cognitive

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how we encode, process, store, and retrieve information

Social-cultural

The perspective of psychological science that deals with how behavior and thinking vary across situations and cultures

Basic research

Pure science that aims to increase the scientific knowledge base

Applied research

Scientific study that aims to solve practical problems

Clinical psychology

A branch of psychology that studies, assesses, and treats people with psychological disorders

Psychiatry

A branch of medicine dealing with psychological disorders, practiced by physicians who sometimes provide medical treatments as well as psychological therapy

Hindsight bias

The tendency to believe, after learning an outcome, that one would have foreseen it

Critical thinking

Thinking that does not blindly accept arguments and conclusions. Rather, it examines assumptions, discerns hidden values, evaluates evidence, and assesses conclusions

Theory

An explanation using an integrated set of principles that organizes and predicts observations