Review from World Cat:
[The author's] goal throughout [this book] has been to depict the science of psychology as a human endeavor in which progress comes through the work of thoughtful, if fallible, people who make observations, conduct experiments, reason, and argue about behavior.... The book is divided into eight ... parts ... Part 1 ... orients students to the foundation ideas and scope of our discipline and presents some advice on how to study this book. [It also] lays out some general elements of psychological research that will be useful to students in later chapters.... Part 2 ... is devoted ... to the functionalist theme that reappears frequently in the book.... Part 3 ... is concerned most directly with psychologists' attempts to explain behavior in terms of the neural and hormonal mechanisms that produce it.... Part 4 ... is about the processes through which the brain or mind gathers information about the outside world.... Part 5 ... is about he ability of the brain or mind to store information and use it to solve problems....Part 6 ... is about social psychology.... Part 8 ... consists of three chapters on topics that students tend to most strongly identify as "psychology" before they enter the course. -Pref.