Wake Tech General Pyschology

Behavior

Any overt (observable) response or activity by an organism.

Behaviorism

A theoretical orientation based on the premise that scientific psychology should study only observable behavior.

Clinical psychology

The branch of psychology concerned with the diagnosis and treatment of psychological problems and disorders.

Cognition

The mental processes involved in acquiring knowledge.

Critical thinking

Purposeful, reasoned, goal-directed thinking that involves solving problems, formulating inferences, working with probabilities, and making carefully thought-out decisions.

Culture

The widely shared customs, beliefs, values, norms, institutions, and other products of a community that are transmitted socially across generations.

Empiricism

The premise that knowledge should be acquired through observation.

Evolutionary psychology

Examines behavioral processes in terms of their adaptive value for members of a species over the course of many generations.

Functionalism

Based on the belief that psychology should investigate the function or purpose of consciousness, rather than its structure.

Humanism

A theoretical orientation that emphasizes the unique qualities of humans, especially their freedom and their potential for personal growth.

Introspection

The careful, systematic self-observation of one’s own conscious experience.

Positive psychology

Uses theory and research to better understand the positive, adaptive, creative, and fulfilling aspects of human existence.

Psychiatry

A branch of medicine concerned with the diagnosis and treatment of psychological problems and disorders.

Psychoanalytic theory

Attempts to explain personality, motivation, and mental disorders by focusing on unconscious determinants of behavior.

Psychology

The science that studies behavior and the physiological and cognitive processes that underlie behavior; it is the profession that applies the accumulated knowledge of this science to practical problems.

Structuralism

Based on the notion that the task of psychology is to analyze consciousness into its basic elements and investigate how these elements are related.

Theory

A system of interrelated ideas used to explain a set of observations.

Unconscious

Contains thoughts, memories, and desires that are well below the surface of conscious awareness but that nonetheless exert great influence on behavior.