Psychology is an academic and applied discipline involving the systematic, and sometimes scientific, study of human or animal mental functions and behavior. Occasionally, in addition or opposition to employing the scientific method, it relies on symbolic interpretation and critical analysis, albeit often less prominently than do other social sciences such as sociology. Psychologists study such phenomena as perception, cognition, attention, emotion, motivation, personality, behavior and interpersonal relationships. Some, especially depth psychologists, also consider the unconscious mind.a
Psychological knowledge is applied to various spheres of human activity including the family, education, employment, and the treatment of mental health problems. Psychologists attempt to understand the role of mental functions in individual and social behavior, while also exploring the underlying physiological and neurological processes. Psychology includes many sub-fields that span areas as diverse as human development, sports, health, industry, media and law. Psychology incorporates research from the social sciences, natural sciences, and humanities. A professional theorist or practitioner of psychology is called a psychologist.
The study of psychology in philosophical context dates back to the ancient civilizations of Egypt, Greece, China, India, and Persia. Psychology began adopting a more clinical and experimental approach under medieval Muslim psychologists and physicians, who built psychiatric hospitals for such purposes.
In 1802, French physiologist Pierre Cabanis helped to pioneer biological psychology with his essay Rapports du physique et du moral de l’homme (On the relations between the physical and moral aspects of man). Cabanis interpreted the mind in light of his previous studies of biology, arguing that sensibility and soul are properties of the nervous system.
Though the use of psychological experimentation dates back to Alhazen’s Book of Optics in 1021, psychology as an independent experimental field of study began in 1879, when the German physician Wilhelm Wundt founded the first laboratory dedicated exclusively to psychological research at Leipzig University in Germany, for which Wundt is known as the “father of psychology”. The year 1879 is thus sometimes regarded as the “birthdate” of psychology. The American philosopher and psychologist William James published his seminal book, Principles of Psychology in 1890, laying the foundations for many of the questions on which psychologists would focus for years to come. Other important early contributors to the field include the German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus (1850–1909), a pioneer in the experimental study of memory at the University of Berlin; and the Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov (1849–1936) who investigated the learning process now referred to as classical conditioning.
Starting in the 1950s, the experimental techniques set forth by Wundt, James, Ebbinghaus, and others would be reiterated as experimental psychology became increasingly cognitive (concerned with information and its processing) and, eventually, constituted a part of the wider cognitive science. In its early years, however, this development was seen as a “revolution”, as it both responded to and reacted against strains of thought—including psychodynamics and behaviorism—that had developed in the meantime.
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