Psychology In A Week

by Nicky Hayes

Learn in a week, remember for a lifetime!

In just one week, this accessible book will give you knowledge to last forever. End of chapter summaries and multiple choice questions are all designed to help you test your knowledge and gain confidence.

So whether you are a student or you simply want to widen your knowledge, you will find this seven-day course a very memorable introduction.

Learn how humans grow up in and adapt to a social environment
Discover what emotions are and what affects our state of mind
Consider why we are motivated to do what we do
Discover the Buddhist scriptures and learn how they are interpreted today.
Engage with evolutionary psychology and the role of genes. Think about what intelligence is and how it comes about.
Discover the factors influencing the psychological development of children, adolescents and adults.
Explore what psychologists do and how

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction

128 pages, Paperback

First published August 30, 2013

Reviews

[Ayat Al Bloushi · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm kinda disappointed by this book because of several things. First of all, I believe that the subjects lack organization. The author seems to throw all the information about to a specific concept into the reader's mind without paying attention to the structure or the coherence of ideas. Second of all, the book doesn't cover most of the important topics in Psychology. I'll give one example. How can an introduction to Psychology dismiss talking about Sigmund Freud's major contributions to the field of child psychology?! Another example is that the author doesn't give sufficient information about important concepts, such us in the topic of associative learning. He doesn't really spend time in explaining the differences between negative reinforcement and punishment, for instance. This doesn't make the book a good candidate for those who do not have background information in Psychology. Third of all, I believe the book represents the author subjective view in many topics, and I personally do not categorize the book as informative. In some parts, it seems to me as a self-help book.

However, there are few good things about the book, especially at the end, where the author reveals the positive results of studying the mind of old people in respects to memory and intelligence. As I've mentioned, the writing seems subjective, it's written in a positive tone!

[Claire · Rating 4 out of 5]

Imo this book was structured well, easy to read, and taught core concepts of psychology. There is even a little test at the end of each chapter, of which there is one for every day of the week.
I finished the book a few days ago but cannot remember much. Perhaps it could have been more impactful with stories I'd remember to exemplify the topics.
Something I learnt from this book is that 'group think' is a very real thing, not just something from an Audous Huxley book. Considering recent pandemic events, it's worth a review of this book to see how clearly it describes the public's reaction to official pandemic responses. (The book is not pandemic related).

[Henna · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was ok

[Guacamole Soup · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such an easy book to read, it was so informative and comprehensible, a must read.

[Ranyabelmaachi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Psychology is the scientific study of the human brain and it’s functions, is mostly about how it changes the person’s behavior. Psychology by DR. Nicky Hayes talks about seven major topics in psychology. The seven major topics are Social Development and Interaction, Emotions and States of Mind, Motivation, Cognitive psychology, Evolution and Genetics, Learning and Intelligence, and finally From childhood to Old Age. Psychology has several connections in real life like groupthink, it has also taught the readers about areas of psychology, and how different topic like Emotion and states of mind, have subtopic as dreaming.

There are many interesting things that readers can learn when reading Psychology. A few things that were learned throughout the novel were Groupthink and areas of psychology. Groupthink occurs when a group of people is very comfortable together and when one gives an idea and a person in the group is contradictory to that idea they will still do it. For instance when you are in class and everyone starts laughing the person might not think it’s funny but will laugh too because of groupthink. In Psychology there are six different areas. Psychology is very vague and psychologists need to divide all of these sections. Two psychologies are cognitive and developmental psychology. Cognitive is the mental process of the brain and how it takes in information and understands thing (it is called perception). Developmental psychology is “concerned with understanding how changes in childhood, adolescence, adulthood and old age affect us, and what those changes actually involve” (Hayes 4). To conclude a few thing the readers can learn while reading this book is about groupthink and areas of psychology.

A topic Psychology by DR. Nicky Hayes talked about was the emotions and states of mind and it talked about several subtopics. The subtopics in the chapter emotions and states of mind are dreaming and stress. Psychologists say that dreams come from our unconscious minds and most of the times are our deepest secrets. During the dreams we use symbols to represent those secrets. For instance if you dream several times of falling off a cliff and you end up in a puddle of spiders, this means that you might have a fear of height and spiders. Stress is “being anxious and constantly producing physiological arousal, which doesn’t go away” (Hayes 31). An example of stress would be being anxious about having enough money to pay the bill, or passing for a test in English class. To conclude the subtopics in emotions and states of mind are dreaming and stress.


There are numerous ways that Psychology relates to people’s everyday life. Some connections with real life are the way we think with our emotions and groupthink. Psychology says that when we are happy and one bad thing happens we will only think of the negative emotions that the reader has. For instance if a normal day is occurring and mostly good things occur and a negative thing happens to someone most people tend to look at the negative effects. To connect it to real life once, a person is going to an extraordinary trip, however there is a small problem with their luggage. The person will say that the trip will be a disaster and that every thing is horrible. Groupthink is “when a group of people have become so comfortable and certain that their own way of seeing the world is right that they ignore and dismiss any information that contradict their ideas” (Hayes 60). For instance a real life example is bullying most people are against it but because people around them do it they feel as if they should do it too. One can see how our emotions and groupthink relate to real life.

Psychology has several connections in real life like groupthink, it has also taught the readers about areas of psychology, and how different topic like Emotion and states of mind, have subtopic as dreaming. Psychology is a very interesting subject because it relates to many things in real life like how our emotions work. Furthermore it has shown the readers the different interesting gears of psychology as areas of psychology. Also knowing the different emotions and states of mind of our brain is very imperative because it shows us how are emotions work and how dreaming is vital for your brain and body. This book is essential because it show people how their brain works and the different aspects and subject that it has. This book can change some peoples life because it shows how sleep is important and teens nowadays don’t sleep much and a chapter in this book shows how sleeping is critical which could make them sleep more.

[Aprile · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a quick read that condenses psychology into 7 days of reading. I liked it.