Psychology in Everyday Life, fifth edition, introduces the science of mind and behavior through familiar situations. David G. Myers and C. Nathan DeWall cover perception, learning, memory, social influence, stress, and mental health in a brief course format. The text suits introductory psychology students and general readers interested in connecting research with everyday experience.
Inside this title
Memory, perception, learning, and behavior in everyday situations
Current listed price $27.00Regular price $65.00Digital ebook
Questions about remembering, learning, perceiving, and interacting with others organize this introduction to psychology. Explanations of memory examine encoding, storage, retrieval, and forgetting, while learning topics include classical and operant conditioning. Conformity, obedience, and group dynamics connect individual decisions with social surroundings.
The discussion of stress and coping links psychological processes with health, and the mental health material introduces disorders and treatment approaches. Myers and DeWall use everyday examples to relate scientific concepts to experiences at home, school, and work. The fifth edition is designed for a brief introductory course and also suits readers seeking a general foundation in the research-based study of behavior.
Study guide included
Inside Psychology in Everyday Life, 5th Edition.
Myers and DeWall take familiar moments—a missed detail, a study habit that feels productive, a silent classroom—and ask what research says about them. The brief format still covers biology, development, sensation, learning, memory, motivation, stress, social influence, personality, disorder, and therapy. Curiosity is paired with skepticism, and every explanation is invited to show its evidence and its limits.
An opening chapter on critical thinking sits alongside practical study advice, so method and application arrive together. Brain and sense processes are tied to experience, development is followed across the lifespan, and learning, memory, and thought explain how action changes. Motivation, stress, relationships, personality, and group behavior extend the view beyond the single mind. The last chapters address classification of disorder and the evaluation of therapy, and short exercises let readers compare competing study routines in their own preparation in this fifth edition.
Testing Claims From Everyday Life
Hindsight makes outcomes look predictable, and confidence often exceeds accuracy. A description records events, a correlation supports prediction, while a controlled trial can probe whether something causes a change, so the first task is to identify the comparison, the selection or assignment, and the outcome. Selection and assignment are separate operations: one concerns who is represented, the other makes groups comparable before manipulation. Ethics and open reporting belong to both.
Name the claim's evidence type
Keep sampling distinct from assignment
Ask how far the finding reaches
Ch. 1
Brain, Genes, and the Lifespan
Neurons send impulses and pass signals across synapses; the brain and spinal cord coordinate perception, with hormones running alongside. Plasticity describes how experience and injury can reorganize the system, with variable timing. Development covers prenatal life, attachment, childhood thinking, teen years, and aging, while family comparisons shed light on what heredity and surroundings contribute, though no single life separates the two. Sexuality and gender material likewise separates bodily development, identity, and lived experience.
Trace communication from neuron to circuit
Place age effects in their environment
Separate biology, identity, and experience
Chs. 2–4
Sensation, Attention, and Awareness
Sensory systems convert energy into nerve signals; the mind then organizes and interprets them using the stimulus plus prior experience. Shifting light, motive, or expectation can change what the same scene appears to be, and one sense can alter another. Awareness also depends on brain state and focused attention, which allocates limited processing and can leave visible events unnoticed. Sleep and drug effects show how changing state changes experience and everyday risk.
Check the signal before the meaning
Treat attention as a limited resource
Note the state the person was in
Chs. 2 and 5
Learning, Memory, and Study Practice
Classical conditioning teaches that one signal predicts another, operant conditioning reshapes conduct as consequences follow, and watching others supplies a third route. Predictive information, expectation, and biological readiness shape what is learned, so one demo rarely covers every case. Remembering depends on intake, retention, and later access, and recall practice surfaces gaps that review can hide. Cues at recall, competing material, and post-event details bend what comes back, while heuristics trade speed for systematic error.
Identify the mechanism behind the habit
Retrieve first, then review
Test recall after a delay
Chs. 6–8
Motivation, Stress, and Group Pressure
Motives range from bodily requirements and rewards to social pulls like belonging and accomplishment, and accounts of emotion disagree about linking arousal, action, and appraisal. Strain hinges on what a demand seems to require and on what reserves someone can reach, with support and perceived control changing the experience. Group behavior adds conformity, authority, persuasion, social roles, and framing, and the chapter applies these to bias, conflict, liking, and assistance.
Read the body and the interpretation
Look for control and support
Check the setting before the character
Chs. 9–11
Personality, Disorder, and Treatment
Trait models summarize lasting differences, humanistic views emphasize growth, psychodynamic accounts stress less conscious influence, and social-cognitive views look at how persons and situations act on each other. A description can predict a pattern while a setting draws out something else. Diagnostic groups name recurring distress or interference with daily functioning, read against cultural expectations and life stage. Therapy claims deserve scrutiny of the measure, the comparison, the participants, and whether gains lasted.
Compare personality accounts on their evidence
Name the outcome and the scoring method
Ask whether benefit persisted
Chs. 12–14
Chapter and section map
Psychology’s Roots, Critical Thinking, and Self-Improvement ToolsCh. 1
The Biology of Behavior and ConsciousnessCh. 2
Developing Through the Life SpanCh. 3
Sensation and PerceptionCh. 5
Learning and MemoryChs. 6–7
Stress, Health, and Human FlourishingCh. 10
Social PsychologyCh. 11
Psychological Disorders and TherapyChs. 13–14
Key takeaways
Before repeating a psychology claim, ask if the support merely records, forecasts, or truly tests a cause.
Pair spaced review with retrieval attempts, then correct the gaps those attempts reveal.
When behavior looks like character, inspect group expectations, social roles, and rival pressures before naming a trait.
Students in introductory courses and curious general readers who want a concise, applied overview of mental life and conduct in the 2020 fifth edition from Worth Publishers.
Topics covered
introductory psychology
critical thinking
study techniques
memory strategies
stress and health
social influence
personality theory
psychological therapy
Questions about this ebook.
Edition, audience, and study-guide details at a glance.
What is Psychology in Everyday Life, 5th Edition about?
Psychology in Everyday Life, fifth edition, introduces the science of mind and behavior through familiar situations. David G. Myers and C. Nathan DeWall cover perception, learning, memory, social influence, stress, and mental health in a brief course format. The text suits introductory psychology students and general readers interested in connecting research with everyday experience.
Which edition of Psychology in Everyday Life, 5th Edition is this?
This listing is for the 5th edition. Check the title, ISBN, and book details above before ordering, especially if your course or reading list names a specific edition.
Who is Psychology in Everyday Life, 5th Edition for?
Students in introductory courses and curious general readers who want a concise, applied overview of mental life and conduct in the 2020 fifth edition from Worth Publishers.
Does this page include a study guide?
Yes. This page includes an original study guide with six thematic sections, key takeaways, and a chapter and section map for structured reading.
