Social Psychology

Social psychology involves the study of how individuals perceive, influence, and relate to others. According to Gordon Allport's classic definition, social psychology is an attempt to understand and explain how the thought, feeling, and behavior of individuals is influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others. This suggests that social influences are felt even in the physical absence of other people. Social psychologists tend to take an interactional approach to human behavior that emphasizes internal factors (cognition, affect, and personality traits) and situational factors. The field relies on scientific research to generate theories of social behavior.

Social psychology has applications into all of the areas of social activity, for example, education, business, government, health and welfare, sports, politics, jurisprudence, and community development.

Personality psychology is a branch of psychology that studies the individual processes that makes persons unique. Personality psychologists are usually interested in a broad view of the individual. This often leads to an interest in the most salient individual differences among people.

Division 8 of the American Psychological Association – the Society for Personality and Social Psychology seeks to advance the progress of theory, basic and applied research, and practice in the field of personality and social psychology. Members are employed in academia and private industry or government, and all are concerned with how individuals affect and are affected by other people and by their social and physical environments.

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