Categories

Body Dysmorphic Disorder

A preoccupation with perceived flaws in physical appearance that others do not observe, accompanied by repetitive checking, grooming, or avoidance. Research …

Borderline Personality Disorder

A personality disorder of emotional instability, intense interpersonal relationships, impulsivity, and chronic fears of abandonment, often linked to childhood …

Brief Psychotic Disorder

A short-lived psychotic episode lasting between one day and one month with full return to premorbid functioning, often triggered by acute stress. Research …

Bulimia Nervosa

An eating disorder of recurrent binge eating followed by compensatory behaviors such as self-induced vomiting or laxative misuse, with self-evaluation unduly …

Bystander Intervention

Research on why and when witnesses of emergencies do or do not help, including diffusion of responsibility and the bystander effect.

Career Development Across the Lifespan

Research on how vocational interests, choices, and occupational pathways evolve from childhood through retirement.

Cerebellum and Motor Learning

Investigates how the cerebellum refines movement timing, coordination, and error-based motor learning.

Cerebral Cortex and Cortical Organization

Studies the laminated structure of the neocortex, its regional specialization, and how cortical circuits support perception, cognition, and action.

Character Strengths

Research on positive, morally valued traits such as courage, honesty, and perseverance and their contribution to flourishing.

Child and Adolescent Mental Health

Focus on emotional, behavioral, and psychiatric problems in young people, including their epidemiology, assessment, prevention, and treatment.

Child Temperament

Investigation of constitutionally based individual differences in emotional reactivity and regulation that appear early in life and shape development.

Chronic Pain Psychology

Explores the psychological dimensions of persistent pain, covering psychological models, therapeutic approaches, and biopsychosocial factors that shape pain …

Circadian Rhythms and Psychological Function

How the internal biological clock shapes sleep, mood, cognition, emotion, and mental health, and how rhythm disruption drives psychopathology and recovery.

Clinical Psychology

Study and treatment of mental health disorders.

Close Relationships

Study of intimate bonds such as friendship and romantic partnerships, including their development, maintenance, and dissolution.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

A structured, evidence-based psychotherapy that identifies and restructures maladaptive thoughts and behaviors driving psychological distress.

Cognitive Biases and Heuristics

Systematic deviations from normative judgment produced by mental shortcuts. Covers availability, representativeness, anchoring, and confirmation bias.

Cognitive Control and Executive Functions

Higher-order processes that guide goal-directed behavior, including inhibition, updating, and shifting. Covers their development, neural basis, and age-related …

Cognitive Development

Study of how thinking, reasoning, memory, and problem solving change across the lifespan, from infancy through old age.

Cognitive Dissonance

Research on the psychological discomfort arising from conflicting beliefs or behaviors and the motivational drive to reduce it through attitude change or …

Cognitive Load Theory

A framework describing how limited working memory resources constrain learning. Distinguishes intrinsic, extraneous, and germane load to guide instructional …

Cognitive Processing Therapy

A trauma-focused therapy that challenges distorted beliefs about self, others, and the world that develop after traumatic events.

Cognitive Psychology

Study mental processes including memory, attention, perception, language, and decision-making.

Cognitive Revolution

Cognitive revolution traces the twentieth century shift from behaviorism to information processing models of the mind.

Color Vision

The perception of color from wavelength information. Covers trichromatic and opponent-process theories, color constancy, and color vision deficiencies.

Community Psychology

Study of how individuals relate to communities and how social systems can be transformed to promote well-being and social justice.

Competency and Insanity Evaluations

Articles on forensic evaluation of criminal defendants, covering competency standards, restoration, the insanity defense, malingering, expert testimony, and …

Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

A severe variant of PTSD arising from prolonged, repeated interpersonal trauma, adding disturbances in self-organization such as emotion dysregulation, negative …

Compliance

Research on techniques and principles that elicit agreement to direct requests, including reciprocity, commitment, and social proof tactics.

Conduct Disorder

A disruptive behavior disorder of childhood and adolescence involving repeated violation of rules and the rights of others. Research covers risk factors, …

Conflict Resolution

Research on the processes and strategies used to reduce interpersonal and intergroup conflict, including negotiation, mediation, and reconciliation.

Conformity

Research on the tendency to align one's attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors with group norms, including normative and informational influence processes.

Consumer Psychology

Study of psychological processes underlying consumer behavior, including buying decisions, advertising, branding, and choice.

Contingency Management

Provides tangible incentives for verified target behaviors to reinforce abstinence, adherence, and participation in substance use treatment. Research covers …

Conversion Disorder

Covers conversion disorder and functional neurological symptoms, from historical hysteria to modern biopsychosocial models, mechanisms, diagnosis, and …

Cooperation

Study of when and why individuals work together toward shared goals, including the roles of reciprocity, trust, and social dilemmas.

Cortisol and the Stress Response

Explores HPA-axis cortisol dynamics, acute stress reactivity, and chronic stress effects on brain and body.

Couple and Relationship Therapy

Treats relational distress by improving communication, attachment, and conflict resolution between partners.

Creativity and Divergent Thinking

Creativity and divergent thinking cover the generation of novel useful ideas, their cognitive processes, assessment, training, and environmental conditions.

Criminal Profiling

Psychological methods and research on inferring offender characteristics from crime scene behavior, including geographic and behavioral profiling approaches.

Crisis Intervention

Short-term, acute stabilization strategies applied during psychological emergencies to restore coping, safety, and functioning.

Cross-Cultural Psychology

Study of cultural differences and universalities in human behavior, thought, emotion, and development.

Curiosity and Exploration

Explores the psychological drivers of curiosity and exploration, from information-seeking and novelty seeking to their roles in learning, development, and …

Dark Triad

Study of the cluster of socially aversive personality traits encompassing narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy.

Delusional Disorder

A psychotic disorder of persistent non-bizarre delusions without prominent hallucinations or disorganized symptoms, with subtypes such as persecutory, …

Depth Perception

The perception of three-dimensional structure, distance, and relative location. Covers binocular cues such as stereopsis and monocular cues such as perspective …

Developmental Psychology

Study of human development across the lifespan.

Developmental Psychopathology

The interdisciplinary study of the origins, course, and trajectories of mental disorder from a developmental perspective.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy

A skills-based treatment for emotion dysregulation developed for borderline personality disorder, balancing acceptance with change strategies.

Diffusion Tensor Imaging and White Matter

A comprehensive encyclopedia category covering diffusion tensor imaging, the physics of diffusion-weighted MRI, white matter tract anatomy, fiber tractography, …