| Term | Definition |
| Psychodynamic perspective | View taken by Sigmund Freud and his followers suggesting that normal and abnormal behaviors are determined primarily by unconscious forces |
| Gestalt psychology | Approach to psychology most noted for emphasizing that our perception of a whole is different from our perception of individual stimuli |
| Structuralism | Earliest approach in modern psychology, founded by Wilhelm Wundt; its goal was to analyze the basic elements of conscious experience |
| Neuropsychologist | Psychologist trained in the diagnosis and rehabilitation of brain disorders |
| Experimental group | The group in an experiment that receives the effect of the independent variable being manipulated |
| Eclectic approach | View of psychology that combines several different approaches |
| Industrial and organizational (I/O) psychologist | Psychologist who applies psychology to problems of businesses and other organizations |
| Research psychologist | Psychologist whose primary activity is to conduct and report the results of experiments |
| Debriefing | Procedure during which a complete explanation of research that has involved deception is provided to a participant |
| Environmental, population, and conservation perspective | View that psychologists should be concerned with the interactions among human behavior, the population, and the environment |
| Health psychology | Subfield of psychology that is concerned with how psychological and social variables affect health and illness |
| Ethnocentrism | The view that other cultures are an extension of one's own |
| Evolutionary perspective | Interest in the role a physiological structure or behavior plays in helping an organism adapt to its environment |
| Forensic psychologist | Psychologist who applies psychology to law and legal proceedings |
| Psychology | Science of behavior and mental processes |
| Random assignment | Assignment of experimental participants to two or more groups on the basis of chance |
| Informed consent | Written document in which a person who might be involved in a research study agrees to participate after receiving information about the researcher's specific procedure |
| Psychoanalytic theory | Treatment for maladaptive behavior developed by Sigmund Freud; its goal is to bring unconscious causes of behavior to the conscious level |
| Correlational coefficient | Number ranging between -1.00 and +1.00 that represents the degree and direction of relation between two variables |
| Cognitive perspective | View that focuses on the study of how thought occurs, how our memories work, and how information is organized and stored |
| Dependent variable | Variable that shows the outcome of an experiment by revealing the effects of an independent variable |
| Control group | A comparison group in an experiment that does not receive the effect of the independent variable being manipulated |
| Introspection | Structural psychologists' major method, in which participants reported the contents of their conscious experience |
| Cognitive psychology | Study of higher mental processes, such as thinking, knowing, and deciding |
| Survey method | Research method that involves collecting information from a selected group of people who are representative of a larger group |
| Representative sample | Sample selected so that it reflects the characteristics of a population of interest to the researcher |
| Hypothesis | Prediction about future behaviors that is derived from observation and theories |
| Operational definition | A careful and precise definition that allows other researchers to repeat an experiment |
| Humanistic perspective | Approach to psychology associated with Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers; emphasizes free will and individuals' control of their own behavior |
| Descriptive statistics | Procedures used to summarize any set of data |
| Cross-cultural psychology | Branch of psychology whose goal is to determine if research results can be applied to other cultures |
| Measures of variability | Descriptive measures that tell us about the amount of variability or spread in a set of data |
| Independent variable | Variable manipulated by a researcher to determine its effects on a dependent variable |
| Statistics | Branch of mathematics that involves the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data |
| Law of parsimony | Principle that simple explanations of phenomena are preferred to complex explanations |
| Naturalistic observation | Study of behavior in its typical setting, with no attempt to alter it |
| Bias | Beliefs that interfere with objectivity |
| School psychologist | Psychologist whose specialty encompasses diagnosing and treating learning disabilities and providing consultation on other problems of school-age children |
| Theory | Explanation for a phenomenon based on careful and precise observations |
| Experimental method | Research method that involves manipulating independent variables to determine how they affect dependent variables |
| Inferential statistics | Procedures used to analyze data after an experiment is completed; used to determine if the independent variable has a significant effect |
| Qualitative research | A holistic research method that seeks to provide a complete narrative description of an entire phenomenon or culture |
| Placebo effect | In drug research, positive effects associated with a person's beliefs and attitudes about the drug, even when it contains no active ingredients |
| Counseling psychology | Specialty of psychology that deals with less serious problems than those treated by clinical psychologists |
| Case study | In-depth study of a single person that can often provide suggestions for further research |
| Physiological perspective | View that behaviors and mental processes can be understood and explained by studying the underlying physiology |
| Scatterplot | Graph that depicts the relation between two variables |
| Consumer psychology | Specialty of psychology that studies consumers and the choices they make |
| Functionalism | Approach to psychology that focused on the purposes of consciousness |
| Behavioral perspective | Perspective that focuses on observable behavior and emphasizes the learned nature of behavior |
| Clinical psychology | Specialty of psychology that involves the diagnosis and treatment of psychological disorders |
| Sport psychologist | Psychologist who provides services to athletes and coaches based on psychological principles |
| Measures of central tendency | Descriptive measures of a set of data that tell us about a typical score |
| Extraneous variables | Variables, other than the independent variable, that can influence the outcome of an experiment |
| Scientific method | System of investigation in which a person makes careful observations of a phenomenon, makes hypotheses about future behaviors, and then tests these hypotheses through more research and observation |
| Psychiatrist | Medical doctor with specialized training in the medical treatment of mental and emotional disorders |
