| Psychology |
 |
| History |
| Psychologists |
| Divisions |
|---|
| Abnormal |
| Applied |
| Biological |
| Clinical |
| Cognitive |
| Comparative |
| Developmental |
| Differential |
| Industrial |
| Parapsychology |
| Personality |
| Positive |
| Religion |
| Social |
| Approaches |
| Behaviorism |
| Depth |
| Experimental |
| Gestalt |
| Humanistic |
| Information processing |
A psychologist is a scientist who studies psychology, the systematic investigation of human behavior and mental processes. Unlike psychiatrists, psychologists are not medical doctors and hence, generally, cannot obtain a license to prescribe medications. While many psychologists study and treat the mentally ill, a larger number study healthy people of all ages in their efforts to discover the factors that affect how human beings think, feel, and act in different situations. Ultimately, the purpose of psychologists is to understand human nature, and thus to help people overcome difficulties and fulfill their potential as true human beings.
Types of psychologist
Psychologists are usually categorized under a number of different fields, the most well-recognized being clinical psychologists, who provide mental health care, and research psychologists, who investigate and analyze various aspects of human behavior. Psychologists also work in many other applied fields.
Clinical psychologists
Clinical and counseling psychologists diagnose and evaluate mental and emotional disorders, using psychological tests and interviews. They use tools such as psychotherapy and hypnosis to treat affected patients.
A clinical psychologist is a mental health professional, who has a professional doctoral degree (usually a Ph.D. or a Psy.D.) in clinical or counseling psychology and has met local licensing criteria. Those criteria typically include a period of post-doctoral practice under the supervision of a licensed psychologist, a licensing exam, and continuing education requirements. Such licensed psychologists can legally provide psychotherapy, and use this term to refer to aspects of the mental health treatments they perform.
Research psychologists
Research or experimental psychologists study behavioral processes by conducting scientific research on human beings and animals. They work in universities and private research centers, as well as for government organizations. Common areas of research include emotion, intelligence, learning, memory, motivation, personality, psychopathology, and factors affecting psychological development. Research psychologists generally have an academic doctoral degree (Ph.D.). The requirements are different from the professional degrees of medical doctors and clinical psychologists in that they include significant academic research experience and original contributions to scientific research in the form of a dissertation.
Major contributors to psychology
This list includes famous psychologists and contributors to psychology; some of them may not have thought of themselves primarily as psychologists but are included here because of their important contributions to the discipline.
Contents: Top - 0–9 A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
A
- Karl Abraham (German psychoanalist)
- Alfred Adler (Austrian founder of individual psychology)
- Gordon Allport (American personality theorist)
- Michael Argyle (British social psychologist)
- Solomon Asch (American Gestalt psychologist)
- Roberto Assagioli (Italian transpersonal psychologist)
B
- Alexander Bain (Scottish philosopher and educationalist)
- James Mark Baldwin (American experimental psychologist)
- Albert Bandura (Canadian Social learning theorist)
- Sir Frederic Bartlett (British experimental psychologist)
- Aaron T. Beck (American psychiatrist, founder of cognitive therapy)
- Ernest Becker (Canadian cultural anthropologist)
- Bruno Bettelheim (American child psychologist)
- Alfred Binet (French differential psychologist, inventor of IQ test)
- Eugen Bleuler (Swiss psychiatrist)
- Benjamin Bloom (American educational psychologist)
- Edwin G. Boring (American experimental psychologist, known for his work as one of the first historians of psychology
- John Bowlby (British developmental psychologist)
- James Braid (Scottish neurosurgeon who invented the procedure known as hypnotism)
- Donald Broadbent (British experimental psychologist)
- Urie Bronfenbrenner (American developmental psychologist)
- Jerome S. Bruner (American cognitive psychologist|
- Sir Cyril Burt (British differential psychologist)
C
- Mary Calkins (early American psychologist of the Self)
- James McKeen Cattell (First American professor of psychology)
- Raymond B. Cattell (British personality theorist)
- Jean-Martin Charcot (French neurologist)
- Kenneth Craik (British cognitive psychologist)
D
- Étienne Bonnot de Condillac (leading philosopher and psychologist of the French Enlightenment)
- John Dewey (American educator)
- Wilhelm Dilthey (German philosopher and psychologist)
- Rudolf Dreikurs (Austrian-American psychiatrist and educator
E
- Hermann Ebbinghaus (German pioneer of research on memory)
- Albert Ellis (American psychotherapist)
- Havelock Ellis (British physician, psychologist, and social reformer, famous for his work on human sexuality)
- Erik H. Erikson (developmental psychologist)
- Hans Eysenck (Personality theorist)
F
- Gustav Fechner (German psychologist who invented psychophysics, laying the foundation for experimental psychology)
- Sandor Ferenczi (Hungarian psychoanalyst)
- Leon Festinger (American social psychologist)
- Viktor Frankl (Austrian psychotherapist)
- Anna Freud (daughter of Sigmund Freud, pioneer of child psychoanalysis)
- Sigmund Freud (founder of psychoanalysis)
- Karl von Frisch (Austrian ethologist)
- Erich Fromm (German-American psychoanalyst)
G
- Sir Francis Galton (British psychometrician)
- Arnold Gesell (American pioneer in child development)
- Eleanor J. Gibson (American perceptual psychologist)
- J. J. Gibson (American perceptual psychologist)
- Stanislav Grof (Czech transpersonal psychologist)
- J. P. Guilford (American intelligence theorist)
H
- G. Stanley Hall (American pioneer of educational psychology)
- Harry Harlow (American researcher of emotion)
- Friedrich von Hayek (Nobel laureate in economics)
- Donald O. Hebb (Canadian neuropsychologist)
- Edna Heidbreder (American psychologist)
- Fritz Heider (German Gestalt psychologist)
- Richard Herrnstein (American comparative psychologist)
- Leta Hollingworth (American educational psychologist and pioneer of psychology of women)
- Karen Horney (German psychoanalyst)
- Clark L. Hull (American behaviorist)
- Walter S. Hunter (American experimental psychologist)
- David Hume (Scottish philosopher)
I
- Bärbel Inhelder (Swiss developmental psychologist, the most famous co-worker of Jean Piaget)
J
- William James (American pioneer of psychology of religion)
- Pierre Janet (French psychiatrist)
- Arthur Janov (American psychotherapist)
- Joseph Jastrow (American experimental psychologist)
- Julian Jaynes (American theorist of consciousness)
- Ernest Jones (Welsh psychiatrist and follower of Sigmund Freud)
- Mary Cover Jones (American pioneer of behavior therapy)
- Carl Gustav Jung (Swiss founder of analytical psychology)
K
- Daniel Kahneman (Israeli Nobel laureate in economics)
- Alfred Kinsey (American researcher of human sexuality)
- Melanie Klein (Austrian psychotherapist, pioneer in child psychoanalysis)
- Kurt Koffka (co-founder of Gestalt psychology)
- Lawrence Kohlberg (American moral psychologist)
- Wolfgang Köhler (co-founder of Gestalt psychology)
- Emil Kraepelin (German psychiatrist)
- Richard von Krafft-Ebing (Austro-German psychiatrist)
- Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (Swiss-born thanatologist)
L
- Jacques Lacan (French psychoanalyst)
- R. D. Laing (British psychiatrist)
- Karl Lashley (American behaviorist)
- Gustave Le Bon (French social psychologist and sociologist)
- Kurt Lewin (German social psychologist)
- Elizabeth Loftus (American researcher of memory)
- Konrad Lorenz (Swiss ethologist)
M
- Margaret Mahler (Hungarian developmental psychologist)
- Abraham Maslow (American humanistic psychologist)
- Rollo May (American humanistic psychologist)
- Elton Mayo (Australian-born American industrial psychologist and sociologist)
- David McClelland (American experimental psychologist)
- William McDougall (Pioneer in social psychology)
- George Herbert Mead (American sociologist)
- Franz Mesmer (German physician famous for "mesmerism")
- Wolfgang Metzger (German Gestalt psychologist)
- Adolf Meyer (Swiss-born American psychiatrist)
- Stanley Milgram (American social psychologist)
- Brenda Milner (Canadian neuropsychologist)
- Raymond Moody (American parapsychologist)
- C. Lloyd Morgan (British psychologist)
- Morita Shoma (Japanese psychiatrist who founded Morita therapy, a treatment program developed with zen influences)
- Hugo Münsterberg (German-American psychologist, a pioneer of applied psychology)
- Henry Murray (American personality theorist)
N
- Ulric Neisser (American cognitive psychologist)
- A.S. Neill (Scottish educator)
- Allen Newell (American cognitive psychologist)
O
P
- Ivan Pavlov (Russian Nobel laureate in physiology)
- Fritz Perls (German-born co-founder of Gestalt therapy)
- Jean Piaget (Swiss developmental psychologist
- Steven Pinker (Canadian cognitive scientist]])
- Ethel Puffer (early American woman psychologist)
Q
R
- Otto Rank (Austrian psychoanalyst)
- Wilhelm Reich (Austrian-American psychoanalyst)
- J. B. Rhine (pioneer in parapsychology)
- Carl Rogers (American humanistic psychology and educator)
- Hermann Rorschach (Swiss psychiatrist)
S
- Martin Seligman (American clinical psychologist)
- Herbert Simon (American Nobel laureate and researcher in problem solving)
- Théodore Simon (French psychologist and psychometrician, co-creator of the Binet-Simon Intelligence test with Alfred Binet)
- Margaret Singer (American clinical psychologist)
- Burrhus F. Skinner (American behaviorist)
- Charles Spearman (British Psychologist known for work in statistics)
- Kenneth Spence (American psychologist, famous for his work on learning)
- Carl Stumpf (German philosopher and experimental psychologist)
- Harry Stack Sullivan (American psychoanalyst)
T
- Lewis Terman (American cognitive psychologist known for developing IQ Test)
- Edward L. Thorndike (American learning researcher)
- L. L. Thurstone (American psychometrician)
- Niko Tinbergen (Dutch ethologist)
- Edward Titchener (English-American experimental psychologist)
- Endel Tulving (Canadian Memory researcher)
- Edward C. Tolman (American behaviorist)
- Anne Treisman (American perceptual psychologist
- Robert Choate Tryon (American pioneer in differential psychology)
- Amos Tversky (Israeli pioneer of cognitive science)
U
V
- Lev Vygotsky (Belarussian developmental psychologist)
W
- Graham Wallas (English social psychologist and political scientist)
- Hans-Juergen Walter (founder of Gestalt theoretical psychotherapy)
- Margaret Floy Washburn (First female Ph.D. in psychology)
- John B. Watson (American behaviorist)
- Max Wertheimer (co-founder of Gestalt psychology)
- David Weschler (Romanian-American developer of intelligence scales)
- Joseph Wolpe (South African-born American psychotherapy|psychotherapist]])
- Robert S. Woodworth (American psychologist)
- Wilhelm Wundt (father of experimental psychology)
X
Y
- Robert Yerkes (American comparative psychologist)
Z
- Robert J. Zajonc (American social psychologist)
- Philip Zimbardo (Sicilian-American social psychologist)
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