Human language is a wondrous and ever-changing form of expression, allowing for rich and nuanced communication, deep thinking, and fine aesthetic pleasures. Yet language is also delicate and needs to be treated with care. As language evolves, words and phrases may become dated and misused, sowing confusion, obscuring meaning, and unintentionally inflicting pain. Below is a categorized list of phrases and words from the world of psychology that are best used sparingly, carefully, or not at all.

1. “Steep learning curve”

This phrase is almost always misused to describe a difficult task when it actually refers to an easy skill learned quickly. Learning to juggle three balls has a steep learning curve. With less than two hours of practice each day, most people can go from not being able to juggle to near mastery in three days. That’s steep. Mastering Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto isn’t steep, but gradual and long. (And Rachmaninoff’s third may be so gradual that it isn’t learned at all.)

2. “Think outside the box”

Anyone who instructs us to think outside the box isn’t. Otherwise, a more creative expression would be offered. And if we can’t invent an evocative metaphor for unconventional thinking, we might as well be direct and literal, and say something like, “Imagine the unusual."

3. “Hard-wired”

When referring to behaviors and emotions, this term implies that we are simple and unwieldy electronic devices, which we are not. It also conflates contextually dependent tendencies with determined traits, while ignoring the great human capacity for learning and change. If anything, our behavior is “soft-wired”—that is, flexible, adaptive, and shaped by the interplay among our genetic endowment, environmental conditions, and personal experiences.

4. “Brain”—instead of “mind”

When people casually attribute behavioral or cognitive tendencies to their brain, they often mean their mind. The brain is a three-pound organ inside our skull, composed of glial cells and billions of neurons. Although there are documented relationships between subjective experience and brain chemistry and structure, we don’t have conscious access to the brain or to these relationships. Moreover, by saying “brain” instead of “mind,” we undervalue our agency by implying physiological determinism.

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