Questions to reflect on

- Why does my body sometimes react before I’ve consciously thought about it?

- How do children learn what is safe, dangerous, good, or wrong?

- Why can beliefs we learn when we’re young feel so self-evident?

- How do parents, friends, groups, and authority influence the way we think?

- Why do some thoughts or reactions remain when our circumstances change?

- How do fear, guilt, peer pressure, loyalty, and the need for approval arise?

- Can you learn to distinguish what you have been taught from what you think or want yourself?

- Why can intelligent and independent people still be strongly influenced by their environment?

Welcome to the A-Z encyclopedia – psychology

Discover how our brain learns, adapts, and is influenced by upbringing, experiences, groups, and the environment in which we live.

What will you find in this encyclopedia?

Psychology tries to understand how people think, feel, learn, choose, and react.

Why do people sometimes follow a group? How does fear arise? Why do we search more quickly for information that confirms what we already believe? How do children develop a conscience? What does authority do to us? How does identity develop? And why can learned responses continue for a long time?

Scientific research into questions like these has been going on for decades.

In this A-Z encyclopedia, insights from learning psychology, social psychology, developmental psychology, and cognitive psychology, among others, are explained in plain language.

What does an environment do to a child?

A child is not born with a complete worldview.

It gradually learns what things mean. Through parents, family, school, friends, culture, and other important groups, it learns, for example, what is expected, which rules apply, who is trustworthy, what may be dangerous, and which behavior brings approval or disapproval.

That happens to all children.

In a highly structured environment, such boundaries are often especially clear. A child receives a lot of information about what is right and wrong, safe and dangerous, or desired and undesired.

The brain tries to recognize patterns in this.

experience
   ↓
repetition
   ↓
meaning
   ↓
expectation
   ↓
automatic response

Much of what later feels self-evident was once learned this way.

That does not automatically mean that what was learned is true, false, good, or bad.

It means that the way something is taught can influence how self-evident, important, or threatening it later feels.

Our brain is constantly learning

The human brain is constantly making connections.

When a situation is often associated with safety, approval, fear, rejection, or reward, expectations and automatic reactions can develop from that.

That can be very useful.

But the same capacity for learning also plays a role in more complex subjects such as rules, authority, identity, guilt, social approval, and group norms.

As a result, someone may rationally know one thing while their feelings or body react differently.

I KNOW:

“Nothing is happening now.”

but my feelings say:

“Be careful.”

In this encyclopedia, you will regularly come across how such automatic reactions arise and why they sometimes continue to exist.

Everyone is influenced

Being influenced does not mean that someone is weak, stupid, or naive.

Even intelligent and independent people are susceptible to group norms, authority, repetition, framing, confirmation bias, and social influence.

That applies within families, companies, political movements, friend groups, sports clubs, social media, and religious communities.

That is why psychology is not only about:

“Why do other people do this?”

but also about:

“How does this work in me?”

Why examples from the world of Jehovah’s Witnesses?

The psychological mechanisms in this encyclopedia are not unique to Jehovah’s Witnesses.

They are universal human experiences.

Because this website is read by current and former Jehovah’s Witnesses and people who have dealings with this world, recognizable examples are sometimes used from the congregation, upbringing, field service, meetings, conventions, baptism, or interaction with others.

Such an example does not automatically mean:

“This proves that Jehovah’s Witnesses are wrong.”

Psychology usually cannot determine whether a religious belief is true.

It can, however, help explain how people learn, how groups exert influence, how beliefs are formed, and why certain reactions can be so strong.

The conclusion remains up to the reader.

What have I learned and what do I think for myself?

A belief may be taught by parents, culture, or a faith community and later still be fully embraced by someone on their own.

Conversely, someone may discover that certain beliefs felt especially strong because of habit, fear, social expectations, or past experiences.

That is why the same underlying question keeps coming back in many articles:

WHAT HAVE I LEARNED?

        ↓

HOW DID I LEARN IT?

        ↓

WHAT DO I THINK ABOUT IT NOW, ON MY OWN?

The goal is not to automatically replace old beliefs with new ones.

The goal is to better understand how beliefs, reactions, and behavior come about.

Why an A-Z encyclopedia?

Psychology is a broad field, and many topics are interconnected.

That is why this knowledge library is organized as an A-Z encyclopedia.

You can start with the topic that speaks to you, for example learned optimism, fear conditioning, independent thinking, confirmation bias, cognitive dissonance, framing, memory, peer pressure, group identity, attachment, indoctrination, self-censorship or black-and-white thinking.

From each article, you can then continue to related concepts.

Understanding is not the same as judging

When you understand why someone does something, that does not yet mean you have determined whether that behavior is good or bad.

And when you discover that a belief was shaped by social influence, that does not yet prove that belief is false.

Psychology mainly helps to keep different questions separate:

WHAT IS HAPPENING?

WHY IS SOMEONE REACTING THIS WAY?

WHAT INFLUENCES ARE AT PLAY?

WHAT ARE THE FACTS?

WHAT MEANING DO I ATTACH TO IT?

WHAT DO I MYSELF THINK?

Finally

This A-Z encyclopedia is ultimately about something very human:

How does a person become who they are?

What does upbringing do? What does repetition do? What does fear do? What does love do? What does a group do? What does authority do? How does a conscience develop? How do we develop identity? And why do some reactions persist for years?

The intention is not to decide in advance which faith or worldview is correct.

The intention is to make the psychological processes behind it visible and understandable.

Because the better you understand how the human brain learns and responds, the better you can also examine:

What have I been given? What have I examined myself? And what do I ultimately embrace as my own?

Welcome to the A-Z encyclopedia of psychology.

Sources and further reading

American Psychological Association – general psychological knowledge and research. About learning, behavior, cognition, social influence, development, and mental processes.
Daniel Kahneman – Thinking, Fast and Slow, 2011. About automatic thought processes, cognitive biases, and decision-making.
Albert Bandura – Social Learning Theory, 1977. About learning through observation, social environment, and modeling behavior.
Edward L. Deci & Richard M. Ryan – Self-Determination Theory. About autonomy, motivation, internalization, and social influence.
Elliot Aronson, Timothy D. Wilson & Robin M. Akert – Social Psychology. About group behavior, conformity, beliefs, and social influence.
Laurence Steinberg – research on adolescent development. About identity development, social sensitivity, and decision-making during adolescence.