Describe what is meant by applied psychology and identify the two largest specialty areas in applied psychology. Then, discuss the applied psychology specialty called industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology, including five topics of interest for these psychologists, the agencies that most often employ them, and the two main areas of I/O and what each encompasses

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Answer will include that applied psychology refers to the use of psychological principles and research methods to solve practical problems. The largest applied areas are clinical and counseling psychology. Industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology studies the behavior of people at work and in organizations. I/O psychology affects how people are selected for a job and tested, trained, or evaluated for promotion. Most I/O psychologists are employed by the government, industry, and businesses. Typically, they work in two major areas: (1) studying jobs to identify underlying skills, which can then guide efforts to select people and train them for those jobs (the industrial part); and (2) studying organizations to understand how to create structures and company cultures that will improve worker performance (the organizational part). Topics of interest for I/O psychologists should include five of the following: absenteeism, decision making, design of organizations, employee stress, employee turnover, interviewing, job enrichment, job satisfaction, labor relations, leadership, machine design, management styles, minority workers, pay schedules, personnel selection, personnel training, promotion, task analysis, task design, work behavior, work environment, work motivation, and worker evaluations.