The Psychological Record, 1989, 39, 143-152

DEFINITIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY

TRACY B. HENLEY, MICHAEL G. JOHNSON, and

ELIZABETH M. JONES
University of Tennessee

HAROLD A. HERZOG
Western Carolina University

Definitions of psychology were obtained from 233

introductory psychology textbooks published between 1887 and
1987. An examination of these definitions yields both a finite set
of definitional categories as well as interesting patterns over time.
The work of Kuhn (1970) on evolution and revolution in science is
used in interpreting the results, as the results do show paradigm-
like trends. These trends include the return of mentalism and the
stability of behavior as representing current definitions.

At this pOint in the history of the discipline most psychologists realize

how difficult it is to give a simple definition of our field. As American
psychologists we should have at least some awareness of the
discipline's evolution within this country and century, yet as a moment's
honest reflection will show, it is no easy task to provide a quick and
cogent definition or historical sketch with which all or even most of our
colleagues would agree without qualifications. Indeed, defining
psychology and putting such definitions in historical perspective are not
at all straightforward tasks. The reasons for this are legion. Foremost
among them are the traditional problems encountered by any such
historical task, such as how to provide an unbiased historical narrative
from within the field itself, and how to reflect current practices and
definitions against this historical backdrop.
The question "What is psychology?" presents still another problem.
As practicing psychologists we tend to encounter it only in two contexts:
as a genuinely naive question, and as a rhetorical entrance to some new
prescription for a better way of considering or doing psychology. We
encounter the former when we advise new students, teach the
introductory course, or make conversation at cocktail parties. With
respect to the latter, we hear definitions which reflect the concerns or
interests of a subset of psychologists (some recent and favored
examples from one journal alone include Hebb,1974; Kimble,1984;

The authors thank Stephen Handel, John Malone, T. M. Meguiar, and Raymond
Shrader for their assistance in collecting texts and other aspects of this project.
Correspondences should go to Tracy Henley, Department of Psychology, University of
Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996.
144 HENLEY ET AL.

Peterson, 1976; Piaget, 1978; Rogers, 1973; Russell, 1970; Skinner,

1975, 1987). Or, as in the work of Kessan and Cahan (1986) we are
offered an interesting and scholarly history of the field itself with some
passing attention given to its definitions. Definitions of psychology per
se, however, are rarely offered except for the purpose of instructing the
naive inquirer. A rare, and perhaps the singular, exception of an
attempted scholarly definition of psychology not intended for the naive
audience, and seemingly nonperscriptive, is Lapointe's (1970)
discussion of the history of the term itself from Melanchoten in the 16th
century up through Herbart's textbooks in the early 1800s.
The definitions we give to the naive (i.e., beginning students), such
as those found in introductory textbooks, cannot be assumed free of our
biases either. Yet, looking at enough of them and over a long enough
time span should provide an interesting perspective on the definition of
psychology with its evolution giving us some insight as to the history of
the field as well. Indeed the biases or theoretical bents reflected within a
general psychology textbook definition portray much of the mood of that
time and can therefore be useful for historical purposes. This is noted
by Hilgard, Atkinson, and Atkinson (1975) as they write in their
introductory text "Throughout its brief history, psychology has been
defined in many different ways. The early psychologist defined their field
as 'the study of mental activity'. With the rise of behaviorism at the
beginning of this century, and its concern with studying only the
phenomena that could be objectively measured, psychology came to be
defined as 'the study of behavior' .... Most psychology textbooks of the
1930's through the 1960's used this definition. The cycle has come
around again with the development of cognitive and humanistic
psychology; most current definitions of psychology include reference to
both behavior and mental processes." In conjunction with this they refer
to a table which provided several selected historical examples.
This study agrees with Hilgard, Atkinson, and Atkinson and the
general idea that valuable information about both the definition of
psychology, and the history of psychology, can be gained by examinin.9
introductory textbook definitions over time. We have attempted to go
beyond the use of selected historical examples and have collected as
much empirical data as was possible on textbook definitions and their
trends over time. For this study definitions out of as many introductory
or general textbooks as could be found were obtained.
Although in one sense this is a purely descriptive study, we have
chosen to use Kuhn (1970) as an informing metaphor or framework for
our discussion of the results. We realize that psychology is not the type
of endeavor Kuhn was referring to and, indeed, may not be the type of
endeavor to which Kuhnians refer. Nonetheless the use of Kuhn as a
framework for discussing the history of psychology has precedents (e.g.,
Gholson & Barker, 1985; Palermo, 1971; Weimer & Palermo, 1974) and
should provide a novel perspective for considering the phenomenon at
hand.
 DEFINITIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY 145

Kuhn's classic, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, builds a

philosophical/sociological theory of both the evolving structures of
scientific revolutions and the revolving structures of scientific evolution.
According to Kuhn the histories of the various sciences tell a common
story about their evolution. Kuhn tells first of long periods of agreement
about what the discipline is, should have as its concern, and appropriate
methodology which he calls "normal" science. This state of affairs is
ended when a discipline invariably meets a phenomenon it can not
handle under current method and theory. The meeting of this
phenomenon causes most of the discipline's entrenched researchers to
begin "patching" rather desperately the holes its presence creates within
their theoretical framework. Concurrently, younger researchers are able
to suggest radically different, or indeed competing, theories to explain
the new phenomenon. A period of confusion therefore exists involving
the old theory and the new competitors. Eventually one of the new will
emerge as the "winner" and, with the revolution complete, another long
period of "normal" science can begin.
Kuhn himself was aware that textbooks as the primary vehicle of
early education played both a key role in the propagation of a science
and that his own views could be reflected in a close analysis of changing
trends in such textbooks. After each revolution to the victor go the
spoils, and in academics that means writing the texts that will influence
the next generation. For Kuhn, this isn't a luxury but a necessity. He
writes "Textbooks, however, being pedagogic vehicles for the
perpetuation of normal science, have to be rewritten in whole or in part
whenever the language, problem-structure, or standards of normal
science change. In short they have to be rewritten in the aftermath of
each scientific revolution" (p.137). Following this we will use Kuhn's
ideas as a way of understanding the patterns that emerge from looking
at definitions of psychology over the last 100 years. We will consider the
model of disciplinary evolution he proposes and attempt to illuminate our
own findings with this model.

Method

Two hundred thirty-three introductory or general psychology

textbooks published between 1887 and 1987 form the basis for the
textbook definitions examined in this study. Books were acquired from
libraries and colleagues accessible to the authors, and a complete list of
these books is available upon request. Each of these books was
reviewed for its definition of psychology. For purposes of this study a
definition is taken to be a statement of the general form "Psychology is
... " or "Psychology is defined as .... " The first such statement
encountered in a text was said to be that book's definition unless it was
stated negatively (for example; "Psychology is often defined as the
science of behavior. But we prefer to think of it on a grander scale and
define it as the study of human existence"). A statement of this general
146 HENLEY ET AL.

form was found in 205 of the 233 textbooks. A designation of "no

definition" was assigned to the remaining 28 books since no single
statement or paragraph of the general form could be found within the
text. In most of these cases it was made obvious by the author(s) that
no simple definition of psychology was going to be given. In other cases
nothing of the general form could be found, and no paraphrase to force
such a form was attempted. In all the 205 other books exact verbatim
definitions using the general forms described previously were used as
data.

Table 1

Textbook Definitions

Time Period and Number of

Sample Size Definition Occurrences Percentage

1980 - 1987 Behavior 31 41%

N= 76 Behavior and its Causes/Applications 5 06%
Behavior and Mental Processess/ Mental Activity 16 21%
Behavior and Experience 4 05%
Mind and Behavior 5 06%
People/Human Conduct! Human Nature 3 04%
Other 5 06%
No definition 7 09%

1970 - 1979 Behavior 42 50%

N=84 Behavior and its Causes/Application 1 01%
Behavior and Mental Processes/Mental Activity 8 10%
Behavior and Experience 2 02%
Mind and Behavior 1 01%
Mind 1 01%
Mental life/Mental States 1 01%
People/Human Conduct!Human Nature 2 02%
Other 7 08%
No definition 19 22%

1950 - 1969 Behavior 24 60%

N=40 Behavior and Experience 2 05%
Behavior in Environment 1 03%
People/Human Conduct!Human Nature 5 12%
Other 5 12%
Mind 3 08%
No definition 0

1930 - 1949 Behavior 5 27%

N= 18 Experience and Behavior 3 17%
Behavior and its Causes/Applications 1 05%
Behavior in Environment 1 05%
Physical and Mental Activities in Environment 1 05%
Activity 2 11%
People/Human Conduct!Human Nature 2 11%
Other 2 11%
No definition 1 05%
 DEFINITIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY 147

1887 - 1929 Intelligent Behavior 1 07%

N= 15 Mind and Behavior 1 07%
Experience 1 07%
Mind 3 20%
Mind and Nervous System 1 07%
Consciousness/Conscious Processes 2 13%
Mental Life/Mental States 2 13%
Reaction to Environment 1 07%
Phenomena of Self 1 07%
Soul 1 07%
No definition o
Note. Total N = 233. These should be understood as being of the form "Psychology is the
science/study of ... "

Results and Discussion

Results of the textbook definition analysis with the data categorized

by time (era in which that edition was published) can be seen in Table 1.
Textbook definitions tend to be so stylistically formalized as to form a
concise natural category system, that is, the definition results in the
table. The fact that about 10 consistent definitional categories emerged
from the verbatim data of the 1930s and beyond to form this natural
categorization system was a welcomed but unanticipated surprise. As
was discussed previously in the method section the general form of
"Psychology is ... ," or some minor variation of this, was part of each
definition. Because only minor paraphrasing for correct grammar was
done, the results in Table 1 can be understood as the completion of the
phrase "Psychology is the study of .. ,," Indeed the exact sentence
"psychology is the study/science of . . ." appears in about 80% of the
books. It is noteworthy that study is used about 40% of the time, and
science about 50% of the time in these textbook definitions; the
remainder use phrases such as understand or state the matter some
other way. This rough equality in using study and science did not vary
significantly across time periods. Reliability of assigning a specific
definition to a category was accessed by exact agreement to be 83%.
Almost all the disagreement was with regard to the "other" category.
When raters could not agree upon a category "other" was used as the
default.
The category of "other" was also used for definitions which either
could not be captured in a short phrase (such as that of Coon, 1982,
"psychology is: memory, stress, psychotherapy, love, persuasion,
hypnosis, perception, death, conformity, creativity, conditioning,
personality, aging, intelligence, sexuality, emotion and so much more"),
or were definitions of too complex a nature to be paraphrased (such as
Hebb, 1975, "Psychology is then defined as the study of the more
complex forms of integration or organization in behavior"), or finally were
those which were highly idiosyncratic and fell far outside the mainstream
(such as Herbart's, 1891, "Psychology is the study of the metaphysical
148 HENLEY ET AL.

idea of the soul"). Except for definitions from 47 books which were
classed as "other" or having no definitions, the fact that definitions from
233 texts could be captured without major paraphrasing (as given in
Table 1) comes as a most interesting result.
As was noted by Hilgard, Atkinson, and Atkinson (1975), the
definition of psychology seems to have come full circle from the almost
complete mentalism of the century's turn to the return of such mentalistic
definitions in the 1980s. Several pOints nicely illustrate this idea: That
references to mind, consciousness, and mental activity account for 10 of
15 definitions prior to 1930; then from 1930 through 1969 mind,
consciousness, and mental activity are mentioned only 4 times in 58
definitions; but that in the 1980s mind and mental activity are in almost
a third of the definitions. The fact that this seems to be a growing trend
is suggested by the rise of the phrase behavior and mental activity which
was used 10% of the time in the decade 1970 through 1979, and it has
been used already in 21 % of the texts in the 8 years since 1980.
Tracing the term behavior over the 100 years shows it to have been
used in 14% of the definitions before 1930, 54% between 1930 and
1949, rising to 68% between 1950 and 1969, then declining to 64% in
the 1970s and climbing to 79% in the 1980s. This suggests a continued
growing acceptance of behavior as the central theme of psychology.
Nevertheless, it appears to be a qualified acceptance as can be seen by
comparing purely behavioral definitions with "behavior and . .. "
definitions: Before 1930 it was never behavior alone; from 1930 through
1949 it favored pure behavior just over 2:1; from 1950 through 1969
63% were pure behavior and 5% behavior and something else; in the
1970s 51 % were pure behavior and 13% behavior and something else,
and in the 1980s that shift is greater showing 41 % pure behavior and
32% "behavior and . ... "
Such trends certainly lend themselves to a Kuhnian notion of
paradigms. The early mentalism and talk of "phenomena" reflect the
psychology of Europe as it arose out of British Empiricism and the
Kantian and Hegelian philosophies from the continent. The degree to
which American psychology was still not differentiated from what we
today would call philosophy of mind in the late 1800s can be seen by a
careful study of James' Principles of Psychology (1890). Nevertheless
there was a growing sense at that time that American psychology should
be more applied and less philosophical. This change of attitude can be
marked by the splitting off of the American Philosophical Association
from the American Psychological Association in 1910 and by the
growing challenge of behaviorism (Benjamin, 1981). The turn to
behaviorism following Watson (1913) becomes manifest in the
introductory texts somewhat later as would be predicted by Kuhn.
These events could be seen as reflecting a paradigm shift in which the
old Guard mentalists died out and were replaced by younger
psychologists who had been influenced by Watson and a more applied
psychology. By 1930, this group had come to be in the position of
writing the textbooks and the shift in paradigms was complete.
 DEFINITIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY 149

For 20 years or more a period of what Kuhn would call "normal"

science seems to follow both as reflected in the texts and in the
historical record. These were the grand days of learning theory, of
Tolman, Spence, Hull, and Skinner. Although some infighting certainly
occurred, it follows much the structure laid out by Kuhn. Then in the late
1950s and early 1960s the situation altered. Several conferences
(Kentucky 1967, MIT 1956, Rice 1962) and monographs (Giorgi, 1970;
Miller, 1956, 1962; Miller, Galanter, & Pribram, 1960) are used to mark
the cognitivist and humanist revolutions against behaviorism. At about
this time the work of Simon, Fodor, Chomsky, Neisser and other early
"cognitive scientists" became increasingly popular. And likewise,
perhaps fueled by the ideological liability of the Vietnam era, humanistic
or existential understandings of man such as the work of Sartre, Camus,
and Merleau-Ponty also came in vogue. That a number of paradigms
(cognitive, humanist, and behaviorist) were competing in the 1970s is
suggested by the data when we note that for that decade 22% of the
texts contain no definition, as opposed to 5% across all other time
periods. Indeed not defining psychology was a topic to be discoursed
upon at length by some textbook writers (see e.g., Brown & Herrnstein,
1975). This period of no definition could be interpreted as the kind of
confusion Kuhn predicts occurs in interparadigm periods.
Beyond the decline and return of mentalism and the growth and
continued dominance of behavior two other minor trends emerge. This
is the use of experience and environment as key words within
definitions. Experience appears within each of the time frame categories
in Table 1 and is used both independently as well as in conjunction with
behavior.
There is one important factor which must be addressed in this
analysis, and that is the question raised by the inherent polysemy of the
words behavior and (especially) mind. Do these terms mean essentially
the same thing over each time frame under consideration? One way to
answer this question is to note that the basic categories of psychological
inquiry (e.g., perception, memory, learning, consciousness, individual
differences, etc.) have changed very little over the last century (cf.
James, 1890). Even though the specific facts and theories considered
important have changed, they have not done so in anything like an
evolutionary or cumulative fashion (Newell, 1973)-they have just
changed. With the approaching centennial of the publication of James'
Principles of Psychology, many psychologists are beginning to suggest
that little improvement has been made in the state of fundamental
psychological knowledge (Matarazzo, 1987).
Also there is the often bitter debate between the mentalists and
behaviorists that began in 1913 and has extended to the present.
People are very aware which label would root them in which camp.
Given the audience for which these texts were written there seems to be
no reason to be subtle, covert, or possibly confusing. As the behavioral
paradigm has widened to look at "mental activity" or at least topics dear
150 HENLEY ET AL.

to the mentalists, this change just has been reflected in that simple
definition. Again, given the audience, and the data, it seems more
parsimonious to believe that no great shift in the meaning of the terms
behavior and mind is at play within the textbooks.
We conceived of and attempted to execute this examination as an
annotated descriptive study. However, some trends, such as the use of
behavior and the move toward a "behavior and ... " definition seem to us
especially significant for an attempt to say what psychology is, as well as
what is has been, and what it will be. Recently B. F. Skinner (1987)
asked hypothetically what a curve showing the appearance of the word
"cognitive" in the psychological literature would look like. His own
intuitions, that it appeared in the 1960s and rose exponentially were both
wrong and right. These data do suggest that it is on the rise, but that his
own championed "science of behavior" is still holding its own. He further
noted the increasing popularity in textbooks of something like "a science
of behavior and mental life" and argued from an almost Kuhnian
perspective that a confusion was on hand. Something about his whole
article seemed to validate our more complete use of Kuhn, which we
believe suggests that a period of "behavior and cognition" is here to
stay-until the next revolution that is.

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