Nature Of Psychology

A moment’s reflection will make it clear that in all the below questions brain, mind or mental activities and behavior are involved. Any observable action is an outcome of a coordination of brain, mind and behavior. Brain has a physical structure whereas mind is considered a functional correlate of brain. Psychology tries to understand the laws and principles characterizing the linkages across them in a scientific manner.

How human beings receive information from environment and perceive objects? 

How people, learn and remember experiences? 

How do people think, reason and solve problems? 

How do they differ in various psychological characteristics like intelligence, personality and interest? 

How do people cope with various problems in life? 

Interest in psychological issues has a long past. However, attempts to formalize the understanding of psychological phenomena in modern sense started only during 19th century. It was influenced by the developments in the disciplines of philosophy as well as natural sciences. 

Today psychology is considered as a science as well as a profession contributing to the improvement in quality of life. It focuses primarily on the study of various aspects of mental and behavioral functioning. Psychologists use scientific methods to understand the causes of behavioral phenomena and develop principles and theories about them. 

They attempt to understand various questions related to human behavior. In the course of its growth, in this century, psychology has expanded in many directions and has encompassed almost all areas of human life. Thus we can say that psychology is a scientific study of mind, brain and behaviour.