American Psychologist Quotes

John Dewey

William James

B. F. Skinner

Abraham Maslow

Steven Pinker

John B. Watson

Carl Rogers

Right action tends to be defined in terms of general individual rights and standards that have been critically examined and agreed upon by the whole society.

Lawrence Kohlberg

Millions of people have wrecked their lives in angry turmoil, because they refused to accept the worst; refused to try to improve upon it; refused to salvage what they could from the wreck. Instead of trying to reconstruct their fortunes, they engaged in a bitter and "violent contest with experience"- and ended up victims of that brooding fixation known as melancholia.

During the past three decades numerous empirical studies of economic behavior have been carried out and their theoretical foundation has been clarified. There was a rapid development and articulation of data, theory, and methodology. A new discipline of behavioral economics was emerging [which] consists of the empirical investigations of the behavior of businessmen and consumers in one country in one time. Generalizations about economic behavior emerge gradually by comparing behavior observed under different circumstances.

While no one can change events that occurred in the past, everyone can change attitudes and beliefs about them.

Philip Zimbardo

If people have multiple identities and deal with multiple realities, why should we expect them to be ontological purists?

The marriage relationship is one of God's creations for building up people. It gives husbands and wives the chance to minister to an immortal human being in a uniquely intimate fashion. To enjoy the meaningfulness of marriage, then, requires a once-made but ongoing commitment of mutual ministry to our mates and the more we seize them, the more meaning our marriage will have.

The problem of individual differences and group differences would not be made to disappear by abolishing tests. One cannot treat a fever by throwing away the thermometer.

We should be on our guard against the temptation to argue directly from skill to capacity, and to assume when a man displays skill in some feat, his capacity is therefore considerable.

Tom Hatherley Pear

Social power [is the] potential influence, the ability of a person or group to induce or prevent change in another. Social control [is] the process by which members of a social entity are influenced to adhere to values and principles of proper behavior deemed appropriate for that social entity.

A person's genetic endowment, a product of the evolution of the species, is said to explain part of the workings of his mind and his personal history the rest.

Two kinds of reading can be distinguished. I call them reading like a reader and reading like a writer... when you read like a reader, you identify with the characters in the story. The story is what you learn about. When you read like a writer, you identify with the author and learn about writing.

Frank Smith (psycholinguist)

We will use the actions of others to decide on proper behavior for ourselves, especially when we view those others as similar to ourselves

Robert Cialdini

I was born from nothing and to nothing I will return. And yet, when i say the word nothing, when i admit, at last, 'I am nothing,' i feel mysteriously like something again, ground zero, genesis, the pull of possibilities.

The advantages of having decisions made by groups are often lost because of powerful psychological pressures that arise when the members work closely together, share the same set of values and, above all, face a crisis situation that puts everyone under intense stress

Becoming human means discovering our fullness and learning to live from it.

Honest, open communication is the only street that leads us into the real world... We then begin to grow as never before. And once we are on this road, happiness cannot be far away.

John Powell (Jesuit)

In the years ahead of me, I learned that the world is actually filled with people ready to tell you how likely something is, and what it means to be realistic. But what I have also learned is that no one, no one truly knows what is possible until they go and do it.

In real life, as well as in experiments, people can come to believe things that never really happened.

Elizabeth Loftus

An affective response more appropriate to another's situation than one's own.

Temporary feelings of regret are a normal part of the mourning process. This helps us retrieve our lost dreams. If we hold on to regret, we risk trapping ourselves in a prison of unrealized dreams from which it is difficult to escape.

Barbara De Angelis

Once you become aware of what means the most to you, you're less likely to put off something that's really valuable for something that matters much less... it's knowing the difference between what's important and what isn't that allows us to solve problems effectively.

The causes of violence lie in our basic values and the way in which we bring up our children and youth.

James W. Prescott

A MAN WITH A CONVICTION is a hard man to change. Tell him you disagree and he turns away. Show him facts or figures and he questions your sources. Appeal to logic and he fails to see your point.

The power of imagination is incredible. Often we see athletes achieving unbelievable results and wonder how they did it. One of the tools they use is visualization or mental imagery… they made the choice to create their destinies and visualized their achievements before they ultimately succeeded.

George Kohlrieser

Geniuses are commonly believed to excel other men in their power of sustained attention... But it is their genius making them attentive, not their attention making geniuses of them.