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What is Psychology? Human behaviour is both complex and interesting. It is difficult to define. We like to Identify and understand human nature and behaviours. We do show a desire to know why we act in certain ways and react in certain ways. The behavioural patterns of different individuals in the same social environment are different in nature.
Ex - While some people are quite social others prefer to be loners. While certain individuals perform their tasks, speedily others perform theirs quite slowly.
Psychology proves quite important in order to get answers to most questions related to human behaviour. In this regard, psychology provides us with scientific guidance and a whole range of information.
Hans Eysenck has said that science that has influenced our lives more than any of the changes that have occurred as a result of the industrial revolution is psychology.
Psychology has continued to gain recognition as a subject that helps solve human problems that have continued to increase as modern society became more and more complex.
Although the term psychology is used extensively, there are differences of opinion as to what it really implies. What the general public often means by the word psychology is that it is a science that can analyze all human thoughts and actions. But when psychology is studied as a scientific pursuit, there is a need to construct a more rigorous definition.
1.1.1 Definition of psychology as a science about the soul. The English word psychology is made up of the two Greek words, 'Psyche' and 'Logos'. The term 'psyche' means soul and the term 'logos; stands for science. As such, the earliest definition of psychology is "Science of the soul". The belief at that time was that higher mental functions like thinking, reasoning and determination took place in a spiritual mass called the soul. Still, the soul cannot be studied scientifically because neither its source nor its nature has been discovered. Similarly, while the term soul has been used in various ways, it has been analyzed in different contexts by philosophers like Plato, Aristotle and Descartes. Since most psychologists thought that the progress of psychology was obstructed by combining it with religion and theology, this definition was gradually eliminated.