Wide World of Women

I was wondering if there was a way to do various things such as change brightness or color a part of a photo without doing it to the whole picture.
I guess I could lasso the area or block it off but is there another way?

You should be able to open a duplicate layer. Adjust it how you want in the dupe layer then use the cloning tool to add it to your original layer.

I did the one below really quick as an example so I didn't fix the edges but it gives u an idea. First one is the original the 2nd one only his face is darker.

If you go to youtube there are probably quite a few photoshop tutorials on there with step by step instructions.