The above image shows some search terms people have used to find this blog.  This tells me two things.

1. People want to know if psychology majors are crazy.

2. There are people who don’t realize a “?” is unnecessary for a search engine.

This post will focus on the first observation, rather than the second. Though I do think the second is also important.

Please note: This post is purely conjecture. I have not met every single psychology major in the world or interviewed a sufficiently sized random sample. I can’t draw real conclusions about an entire group. Everything I am saying is just based on personal experience.

The title of my blog is intended to be a little tongue in cheek. I’m a psychology major and I might half-jokingly refer to myself as “crazy” so it seemed like a good blog title. Humor is a useful defense.

So are psychology majors crazier than the average person?

I think everyone is a little crazy, just in different ways and in varying amounts.

It takes a certain amount of sanity to be able to be in college. I think a better question is “Are psychology majors crazier than the average college student?”

I can’t really answer that. I don’t think anyone can.

I believe that I am probably crazier than the average psychology major as well as the average college student.

I know a lot of “crazy” psychology majors. But I just in general associate myself with fellow crazy people. Some of them just happen to be psychology majors. The majority are not.

Looking at my peers in class they don’t seem particularly crazy. They could perhaps be excellent at hiding it. People have many different motivations for an interest in psychology. Personal experience is just one of them.

A psychology major who happens to also be “crazy” likely has greater insight into their problems. I believe that insight helps a person function better and thus makes them less crazy. It blows me away how little some non-psychology majors know about the problems they are suffering from. Knowledge is very beneficial.

A non-psychology major who I know was recently diagnosed with social anxiety. When I first met her, I assumed she already had been diagnosed with it, because it seemed obvious to me. Last semester she was struggling with her classes. A large part of the problem was her fear of talking in class for oral presentations (she’d skip class when she had one or put off doing the assignment) and she skipped appointments she made to talk to the professor for help because she’d get too anxious. Eventually she went to the school counseling center where she was diagnosed with social anxiety. She hadn’t had a clue there were treatment options for her problem and is now getting help.

A psychology major might not have needed to wait so long to realize there were options available for help.

Hypothetically, if psychology majors are psychologically different from other majors this would pose a problem for some research being conducted at universities. Many psychology classes at colleges offer small amounts of extra credit for participating in one of the school’s research studies. While many psychological studies do have specific inclusion and exclusion criteria, often (at least at my school and others I have heard of) the ones available for extra credit are open to all. If psychology  students are “crazier” this could potentially be hurting the results of the study and making them less able to be generalized to the whole population.

In conclusion, I don’t have evidence to say whether or not psychology majors are crazier than the average college student. I just think those that are, are more aware of their personal crazy. This might cause them to be more vocal about it and maybe seem more crazy, but in the end the additional insight they have is able to help them.

What do you think?