Phrenology also became associated with other popular psychological movements: in the combination of phrenology and mesmerism known as phreno-mesmerism, when the practitioner touched various parts of the subject’s head, the subject evinced the traits supposedly connected to the underlying brain organs.

Franz Joseph Gall

Forster in 1815. It is derived from the Greek roots: phren: ‘mind’ and logos: ‘study/discourse’. Gall himself never approved of the term phrenology. He called his system simply organology and Schädellehre and later simply ‘the physiology of the brain’.

Phrenology is today recognized as pseudoscience. The methodological rigor of phrenology was doubtful even for the standards of its time, since many authors already regarded phrenology as pseudoscience in the 19th century. Phrenological thinking was influential in the psychiatry and psychology of the 19th century.

Phrenology is the study of the shape of the head through the examination and measurement of the bumps on an individual’s skull. Phrenology was one of the early biological theories of criminology and laid the foundation for the development of the biological school of criminology.

Biologically-based criminologists explain criminal behavior as determined—in part—by the presence of certain inherited traits that may increase the likelihood of criminal behavior.

Despite its initial popularity, phrenology started losing support from scientists in the 20th century due to methodological criticisms and failure to replicate various findings.

Finding a bump on the head is very common. Some lumps or bumps occur on the skin, under the skin, or on the bone. There are a wide variety of causes of these bumps. In addition, each human skull has a natural bump on the back of the head.

The skull is not perfectly round or smooth, so it is normal to feel slight bumps and ridges. However, a dent in the head, especially if it is new, requires a trip to the doctor to determine the cause.

Occipital Neuralgia is a condition in which the occipital nerves, the nerves that run through the scalp, are injured or inflamed. This causes headaches that feel like severe piercing, throbbing or shock-like pain in the upper neck, back of the head or behind the ears.

Occipital neuralgia happens when there’s pressure or irritation to your occipital nerves, maybe because of an injury, tight muscles that entrap the nerves, or inflammation. Many times, doctors can’t find a cause for it. Some medical conditions are linked to it, including: Trauma to the back of the head.