Industrial and organizational psychology

Industrial and organizational psychology applies psychological science to work, studying employee behavior and designing ways to improve individual and organizational effectiveness.

Personnel selection: The process of assessing job applicants to decide who is best suited for a role. Psychologists design selection methods that predict job performance while limiting bias.
Job performance: The behaviors and outcomes through which an employee contributes to organizational goals. Researchers distinguish task execution from other work behaviors when defining effectiveness.
Psychology: The scientific study of mind and behavior. Industrial and organizational psychology applies this broader discipline to work.
Walter Dill Scott: An American psychologist who helped develop early applications of psychology to advertising and personnel selection. His work helped establish psychology as a practical resource for employers.
Human resource management: The organizational function responsible for policies and practices involving an employer’s workforce. It shares workplace concerns but emphasizes management practice rather than psychological science.
Job analysis: A systematic description of a job’s tasks, responsibilities, and required capabilities. It provides the evidence base for selection criteria, training, and performance standards.
Work motivation: The forces that initiate, direct, and sustain effort in work settings. Motivation theories explain why employees choose tasks and persist toward goals.
Organizational behavior: The study of how individuals and groups behave within organizations. It overlaps with the organizational side of the field, especially in management research.
Hugo Münsterberg: A German-American psychologist who studied psychological methods for selecting and training workers. His 1913 book argued for applying experimental psychology to industrial problems.
Occupational psychology: The application of psychology to work, especially in the United Kingdom and other countries. This is a closely related name for much of the same professional and research tradition.

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