Self Help / Personal Development
What is Self Help?
Our self help books cover subjects such as happiness, grief, work-life balance and substance abuse. Most self help books are shelved in the Psychology section between 150-159.
What do you think of our personal development, psychology, and philosophy collection at Central Library? We welcome your feedback via an online survey
Where to find Self Help books
Click on the links to browse books by subject and call number. This is a selection of topics - ask a staff member if you have difficulty locating another subject. Only the main Dewey numbers are listed below.
| Topic | Main Dewey number |
| Astrology, Feng shui & parapsychology | 133-135 |
| Child psychology & parenting | 155.4, 305.231 (social issues), parenting pathfinder |
| Death | 155.937 |
| Dreams | 154.6, 135.3 |
| Emotions | 152.4 |
| Freud & psychoanalysis | 150.1952 |
| Jung | 150.1954, 131.3464 |
| Marriage | 306.872 |
| Men and psychology | 155.332, 305.31 (men and society) |
| Mental health & depression | 362.2, 616.8527 (depression), 616.89 (mental disorders) |
| Money | 332.024 |
| Self-help, happiness & interpersonal relations | 158.1-158.2 |
| Separation & divorce | 306.89 |
| Sexuality | 306.7 |
| Substance abuse, quitting smoking | 362.29, 613.85 (smoking) |
| Tests - psychometric, employment & personality | 152.8, 155.28, 658.31125 |
| Women and psychology | 155.633, 155.333, 305.4 (women and society) |
| Work-life balance and job satisfaction | 650.1, 158.1 |
Searching the catalogue
Subjects search and Keyword search are different search types.
Keyword search:
- searches for your keywords in titles, subjects, table of contents - everything except for author names.
Advantage : A keyword search expands the search to all occurrences of a given word of combination of words.
Disadvantage : A keyword search may retrieve more items than you want, some of them unrelated to your subject.
Subjects search:
- only searches Library of Congress subject headings, and if you use different words than they do, you'll get no results.
Advantage : A subjects search retrieves exactly what you ask for.
Disadvantage : A subjects search limits you to only what you ask for.
If you are not sure which search type to use, or how to search the catalogue to find what you want, please feel free to ask a librarian for assistance, or try our Catalogue help page
Magazines
Our psychology magazines include Psychology today and Psychologies magazine. We also have many health, religion and social issues magazines with self help articles. There are several psychology magazines in our online databases such as EBSCO MasterFILE Premier and Gale Health and Wellness Resource Center.
New books in MyLibrary
MyLibrary is an online portal that gives you access to the latest books on subjects that you are interested in. Check out our personal development recent picks every month.
Online resources
Wellington City Libraries members can use the Mygateway.info databases for free from internet computers anywhere. Many psychology journals are available in EBSCO MasterFILE Premier and Gale Health and Wellness Resource Center.
Related Websites
- Te Puna Web Directory - Psychology
- Te Puna Web Directory - Community and Social Studies
- Mentalhelp.net
Some of the above websites can be accessed freely using the free internet computers at your local library. Ask a librarian to show you where these are located.
