The Little Book of Psychology

Author Name: Caroline Riggs, Emily Rowles

The biological processes that occur in the brain and contribute to our daily experiences and behaviors can be observed, assessed, and utilized using a variety of modern scientific methods. Today, we can observe the brain processing information in real time using brain-scanning techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). However, this has not always been the case, and the biological study of the brain represents only one aspect of the study of psychology. While we now understand that the brain can be said to "contain" the mind, there are many aspects of human experience that cannot be observed using biological methods and require a more nuanced and subjective approach to understanding them . Throughout this book, we will discuss various attempts in the history of psychology to explain our behavior, ranging from traditional scientific approaches such as biological and behavioral psychology to the subjective approaches of Freud and psychodynamic psychology.