Methodocentricity, Theoretical Sterility, and The Socio-Behavioural Sciences

Shames, Morris L.

doi:10.1016/s0166-4115(08)60078-3

Cited by 6 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…For this methodocentrism, David Bakan (1974) trenchantly called psychology methodolatrous (cf. Shames, 1987, p. 264).…”

Section: Debates About the Scientific Crisis In Psychologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Replication Crisis – Just Another Instance of the Replication of Crises in Psychology? Historical Retrospections and Theoretical-Psychological Assessments

Maiers

2021

Review of General Psychology

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The current dismay within the mainstream of nomological psychology may result from the fact that the anomaly of non-replicability has a direct bearing on its very own methodological requirements and quality criteria of empirical research. The call for more scientific rigour on the customary avenue in order to secure unambiguous empirical findings gives, however, rise to suspect that the deeper reason for this anomaly is not yet recognised: namely, the misguided regulation of a strictly objective inquiry, distorting what is present and relevant in everyday life and treating the ‘subjective’ of the subject matter as the central root of interfering factors which have to be eliminated or neutralised in the pursuit of experimental hypothesis testing. The problems of replicability would thus be a proof once again that the notorious inversion between matter and method does not really work, due to the uncircumventable characteristics of human inter-/subjectivity. In this sense, the replication crisis replicates the perennial topic of all historical discussions about a crisis in psychology – the failure of a ‘psychology without subject’.

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“…For this methodocentrism, David Bakan (1974) trenchantly called psychology methodolatrous (cf. Shames, 1987, p. 264).…”

Section: Debates About the Scientific Crisis In Psychologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Replication Crisis – Just Another Instance of the Replication of Crises in Psychology? Historical Retrospections and Theoretical-Psychological Assessments

Maiers

2021

Review of General Psychology

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“…Add to the foregoing the charge that psychology, social psychology in particular, has failed to recognize the historical substrate of the phenomena it studies (Gergen, 1973(Gergen, , 1978(Gergen, , 1985 and, in consequence, has failed to discern the diachronic character of its subject matter. As a result, this has impeded theory generation (Gergen, 1978) as well as the proper practice of research itself (Rosnow, 1978(Rosnow, , 1981Shames, 1987aShames, , 1987b, and this has resulted in criticism which is seriously inimical to the hypotheticalism practised in psychology. It seems clear that we are in need of a "redivivus" psychology, conceived in terms of a more appropriate, veridical methodology.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…It seems clear that we are in need of a "redivivus" psychology, conceived in terms of a more appropriate, veridical methodology. Yet psychology, true to its ideological posture of some 60 years now (Shames, 1987a), has remained anchored to a vision of science which is by now somewhat shopworn and which has led more to "scientism" than to science in many psychological quarters (Koch, 1981). This, it seems, is the consequence of a methodolatry which does not admit easily of self-reflection (Bakan, 1974).…”

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confidence: 99%

On data, methods, and theory: An epistemological evaluation of psychology.

Shames¹

1990

Canadian Psychology / Psychologie canadienne

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Psychology finds itself faced with a paradox owing to epistemological and extraepistemological considerations. The paradox in question stems from the problem of discovery, which some consider to be the life-blood of science (Hanson, 1965). It is argued that psychology, in virtue of its strict hypotheticalism and its faithful adherence to scientific conventionality, has virtually foreclosed the possibility of discovery in its own practice. Moreover, its scientistic character has, ironically, rendered it less scientific. Furthermore, in light of its ambiguous philosophical underpinning, namely, the assumption of positivism and scientific realism, inter alia, psychology has tended to disqualify other competing, perhaps more authentic, epistemologies out of hand; consequently, it has generated very little coherent theory. Psychology's extant failure to disambiguate its fundamental postulates, combined with its relative methodological exclusivity, has rendered it somewhat blind to its past and augurs poorly for its future. Finally, transcendental realism (Bhaskar, 1978) is discussed as possibly a more apposite philosophical substrate which, if understood and faithfully applied, would liberalize psychology epistemologically and render it more philosophically coherent.

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2010

Dynamic Assessment, Intelligence and Measurement

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Methodocentricity, Theoretical Sterility, and The Socio-Behavioural Sciences

Cited by 6 publications

References 24 publications

Replication Crisis – Just Another Instance of the Replication of Crises in Psychology? Historical Retrospections and Theoretical-Psychological Assessments

Replication Crisis – Just Another Instance of the Replication of Crises in Psychology? Historical Retrospections and Theoretical-Psychological Assessments

On data, methods, and theory: An epistemological evaluation of psychology.

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