Construct

A psychological construct serves the purpose of illustrating and quantifying a specific mental process, be it a thought, feeling, or behavior. Since a number of such mental processes, such as intelligence, self-esteem, or anxiety, are not overtly observable, psychologists must create constructs in order to study them. Constructs serve as mental instruments that facilitate the classification of observations in a more organized fashion. The term “motivation”, for instance, explains a desire that researchers seek to understand in order to comprehend the integral processes of behavior initiation, continuation, and termination. Constructs are defined and measured through operational definitions, which can be in the form of surveys, behavioral assessments, or physiological measures. Constructs that are clearly defined and reliable are vital to research and theory construction, as well as to the practical fields of evaluation and psychotherapy. Constructs that are poorly defined can cause the researcher and the audience to lose focus. Constructs enable psychologists to operationalize a mental process in a way that it can be measured and examined, thus contributing to the discipline of psychology.