10 More Common Misconceptions About Psychology

GREGORY MYERS APRIL 19, 2013As we ve already seen in a recent list of mine, there
are many misconceptions about psychology. Some have taken such a strong hold tha
t even many students of psychology believe them. Here are ten more examples:10
There is only one type of amnesia
Home-Remedies-For-Memory-Problems-1Many people are only familiar with the popula
r culture version of amnesia, whereby someone forgets their past but can remembe
r new things with no trouble; this is indeed a real condition, and is known as r
etrograde amnesia. Of course, the movies in which someone gets a bump on the hea
d, forgets everything, and then remembers it later with another bump, are absurd
. There is also a second form of amnesia most people haven t heard of called anter
ograde amnesia, and this one is arguably much worse than the first one. If you a
re struck by anterograde amnesia, you ll be able to remember your past but you won t b
e able to form any new long-term memories.
9
Dreams play an important role in psychological counseling
Dreaming 0Some people believe that dreams are a valid way of understanding peopl
e s problems, and that they are therefore used regularly in therapy but this is not
the case. This particular misconception has been propagated mostly by movies and
television, which often show the fictional therapist lying their client down on
a couch and asking him about his dreams. It s important to note that dreams suppo
sedly had a lot to do with the unconscious, according to Freud s theories, and wer
e very important. Many of Freud s theories relating to dreams involved very young
children. But more recent research shows that dreams in younger children have ve
ry little detail or subtext. Freud contributed greatly to psychology but it s genera
lly agreed that his theories about human sexuality and dreams are total nonsense
.8
You should not comfort babies too much when they cry
Crying-BabyThis one is a bit controversial; there are a few contrasting opinions
on it, to say the least. Some self-help authors have come up with the idea that
parents should simply let their baby howl away. Most researchers, however, don t
think that comforting a baby will bring it any harm; some studies have even show
n that ignoring a crying baby could well have detrimental effects. Importantly,
some researchers have found that at least during the first few months of its life yo
u should always console a crying baby.7
It s possible to multi-task
Multitasking-InsanityFor some reason, people love to brag about how good they ar
e at multi-tasking as though it were a really important skill. The truth is that m
ulti-tasking is not, and never has been, real; you cannot carry out two tasks th
at require a degree of concentration at the same time. Sure, you can switch your
brain back and forth really quickly between multiple tasks but your brain can onl
y engage in one cognitive task at once. For every extra thing you are juggling b
ack and forth, you are making it harder for your brain to work efficiently. The
only possible exception to this would be someone with split brain syndrome, whos
e corpus callosum (which connects the two halves of the brain) is damaged or sev
ered. In rare cases this is done on purpose, for patients who suffer from extrem
ely bad seizures.6
Psychologists can read minds
Owen 630Many psychologists report hearing this one all the time: someone decides
that they must be capable of reading minds, or at least of deeply analyzing the
m like some sort of Jedi while staring at them from between their fingers. One p
sychologist, trying to deal with this myth, pointed out that human minds are so
complex that psychologists often have trouble reading their own minds. Though ps
ychologists are indeed skilled at understanding human behavior, this in no way m
eans that they are capable of reading minds. Anyone who claims this faculty is n
o doubt trying to swindle you.5
All Psychologists do is talk to crazy people
Crazy Person By NothingstockMany people get the impression that anyone who works
in psychology spends most of their time talking to crazy people and that most of
this talking involves some form of therapy, usually centered on dreams. But this

a fundamental misconception: for starters, there are a huge number of fields in

psychology that don t involve talking to crazy people at all and most psychologists
work in these fields. Another basic misconception is that anyone who has a degr
ee in psychology can actually perform counseling. The truth is, a bachelor s is no
t enough; only a couple of states allow you to perform counseling without a doct
orate.4
Schizophrenics have multiple personalities
psycho-anthony-perkins-as-norman-bates-620x350This is another one that just does
not want to die, probably thanks in a large part to the film Psycho. People hea
r about a schizophrenic and assume that this person hears voices, sees people, a
nd most typically has multiple personalities.As it turns out, not all schizophrenics
hear anything; visual hallucinations are extremely rare; and more importantly,
schizophrenics do not have multiple personalities. There is a specific disorder
for multiple personalities called dissociative identity disorder but there is grea
t controversy surrounding even this. The controversy stems mostly from the fact
that a large percentage of the psychological community doesn t believe that multip
le personalities are even real. As you can imagine, this has led to some spirite
d debate over the years.3
Boys and girls do not have unique gender characteristics at birth
Boy And Girl From MauritiusSome people are convinced that boys and girls only de
velop their gender attributes because of the social environment in which they ar
e raised. Others take a the opposite extreme, arguing that gender differences ar
e based entirely on genetics. As you ve probably imagined, both of these sides are
completely incorrect. Men and women are obviously different (though it must be
stressed, not unequal), with different physical characteristics and different ho
rmonal balances affecting their inclinations and behavior. Of course, environmen
t is always going to play a role, too; there s no doubt that society s expectations
play an important role in the behavior of a female versus the behavior of a male
.2
Overstimulating a baby will make it more intelligent
Baby-TvFor a while, people believed that extra stimulation would cause babies to
grow up smarter. Products like Little Einstein were all the rage. Unfortunately,
after testing by scientists, it was discovered that not only were the Little Ein
stein videos not making children smarter they may actually have been doing the exa
ct opposite. Researchers found that the vocabulary development of children who h
ad not seen the videos was better than that of children who had. Some child psyc
hologists insist that the best way to help a baby develop an intelligent mind is
via one-on-one contact with parents, as opposed to television.1
Counselors, psychologists, and psychiatrists
50502There are several misconceptions here in regards to what a counselor is, wh
at a psychologist is, and what a psychiatrist is. It would take too long to expl
ain what they are not (there s a lot of misinformation to dig through, after all)
so we will content ourselves with explaining what they are. To begin with, a cou
nselor (as seen in many schools, for example) is not necessarily a psychologist.
In some states, often provided you have a master s degree associated with social
work of some kind, you ll eligible to perform counseling. Psychologists are people
who have a doctoral degree in psychology. Many of them do not perform counselin
g at all, but they are qualified to do so if they wish. Psychiatry usually requi
res several extra years of study upon becoming a psychologist. Psychiatrists are
basically medical doctors who are trained and certified to prescribe drugs to d
eal with mental health problems and they don t usually perform counseling.