I came across articles that claims psychology is soft science because it is easy and that it deals with “common sense” only. I also read a lot of rebuttals that psychology is hard science because it deals with human behavior, cognition, and the dynamics of the human brain. Psychology, in its simplest definition; is the scientific study of human behavior. In the former context, soft sciences are those subjects that revolves around the social sciences aspect like political science, sociology, anthropology, etc. On the other hand, hard sciences are those subjects that are under the natural sciences field; astronomy, physics, chemistry, neuroscience, and the likes.
As a psychology student that is under the Bachelor of Science curriculum, I understand that having anatomy, physics, biology, and general chemistry makes this course a hard science. Whereas, those students that are studying bachelor of the arts major in psychology focuses more on the social science aspect. The natural sciences subject is replaced by the social sciences. In the talks about this subject, it doesn’t mean that one is superior to another. No matter what it is, studying psychology is challenging and beautiful all at once: may it be soft or hard science.
In a more scientific way to enrich this discussion, psychology as a hard science, observes physical aspects to objectively measure changes in the behavior of a person. Psychology uses scientific method to disprove something and to use it as a basis on our psychological findings and research. This leads to a much deeper understanding of the central nervous system and enhanced structured and functional knowledge of how our brain works. In addition to this, this scientific approach raises the standard and status of psychology as a field of study. This issue is relevant on psychology because biopsychology falls on the natural sciences group and understanding that what we are studying is a flexible course will help us strive harder to have an in-depth understanding of it.