Psychology is defined as the study of mind and behaviour. The concept of psychology was first introduced by the German philosopher named Wilhelm Wundt also known as the ‘Father of Psychology’. He opened the first psychology lab in 1879 at the University of Leipzig. This event led to the official start of psychology as a separate and distinct scientific discipline.The Greek word ‘Psyche,’ meaning ‘soul,’ and ‘logos,’ meaning ‘Study of the mind,’ also derive the word psychology. As we know psychology mainly focuses on the mind and behaviour it is also a multifaceted concept as it consists of different types of sub-branches and specializations. These types make psychology an important concept in various fields of life.
The Seven Types of Psychology Are:
1) CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY:
Austrian Psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud was one of the first people who say that mental illness can be treated in a person by talking and this led to the introduction of Talk therapy the earliest scientific use of clinical psychology. The study of social psychology focuses on how people interact with their physical, social, and cultural settings.
Clinical Psychology is the most popular branch of psychology that deals with patients with mental illness, psychiatric disorders and emotional issues. these clinical psychologists work in hospitals and mental health clinics. They also deal with families, couples and groups.
2) COUNSELLING PSYCHOLOGY:
Counselling Psychology focuses on providing everyday therapeutic treatments to a client experiencing a wide variety of symptoms. it is also one of the largest speciality areas within psychology. Counselling psychologists provide psychotherapy to people struggling with stress, anxiety and issues in different fields of work. Counsellors, who help people overcome distress situations in hard times, are also known. Counselling psychologists work in hospitals and mental health clinics.
The major difference between clinical psychology and counselling psychology is that clinical psychology focuses on psychopathology whereas counselling focuses on the overall development of the individual.
3) EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY:
Educational Psychology is the branch of psychology that deals with how people learn including the teaching methods, instructional processes and individual differences in learning. These psychologists focus on the learning processes of childhood till adolescence and explore the social, cognitive and emotional learning process. They deal with the students in educational settings. The intelligence quotient (IQ) test and other tests have been used in a variety of educational contexts to evaluate children’s delayed development.
4) DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY:
Development psychology studies the physical, social and psychological changes that occur at different ages and stages over a life span, from conception to old age. The primary concern of the developmental psychologists is how we become what we are. They focus on the biological, socio-cultural and environmental factors at different stages of life. Earlier they were more interested in studying the development of childhood and adolescent but now they focus more towards adult development and ageing. they collaborate with anthropologists, educationists, counsellors and almost every branch which focuses on the growth and development of human beings.
5) SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY:
The study of social psychology focuses on how people interact with their physical, social, and cultural settings. Aggression, Conformity, Group behavior, nonverbal behavior, Prejudice, Intergroup relations, etc., affect people, as focused on by social psychologists.
The way other people see can play an important role in a wide variety of actions and decisions and, Judging someone else could cause them to alter who they are in order to fit in with society, which can be detrimental to their mental health.
6) COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY:
In 1967, Psychologist Ulric Neisser introduced the term Cognitive Psychology as the study of the processes behind the perception, transformation, storage and recovery of information. This branch Investigates mental processes involved in the acquisition, storage and transformation of the information received from the environment along with its use and communication. It also focuses on the major cognitive processes such as attention, perception, memory, reasoning, problem solving, decision making etc cognitive psychologists study the human mind and brain and often conduct experiments in the laboratory for the same. Cognitive psychologists focus on the thought process behind human actions and behaviours. they work on the internal realm of the human mind and brain. cognitive psychologists also collaborate with neuroscientists and computer scientists.
7) INDUSTRIAL – ORGANIZATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY:
It’s the branch of psychology that deals with applying psychological theories and principles to organizations. They mainly work in workplace and office areas. Industrial /organizational psychologists are concerned with training employees, improving work conditions, leadership control and developing criteria for selecting employees also, they focus on the overall well-being of the employees and help them at times of distress. Industrial psychologists might tell the company to adopt a management structure that would increase the communication between the staff and the manager.
It is a branch of psychology that should be there in every workplace as nowadays the workers and employees have higher toll on their mental health.
It shows that psychology is indeed a discipline which is important in today’s world as it provides benefits in different realms of work from clinics to counsellors to careers to groups and organizations and even more as it has a vast area, also prioritising one’s mental health it is important to have different subbranches and fields of psychology in different areas of life. To connect and to talk with others is the way one can lead a happy and stress-free life.
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