Psychology-Scientific Status of Psychology

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  • Scientific status of psychology
    • Costs of being a science
      • One cost of being a science is that it is nomothetic.
        • Nomothetic is the idea that research can produce general laws of behaviour.
        • Some have argued psychology should a more idiographic approach
          • Idiographic means that each individual case is used as a means of understanding behaviour
            • For example, Laing argued that by using scientific explanations to treat schizophrenia important factors were missed out
              • Furthermore, Laing argued that each individual could only be treated by seeing them  as a unique individual rather than a set of symptoms.
    • Changing nature of science
      • Humans have always been curious and tried to explain the world.
        • Modern characteristics of science have not always been around, this means science have developed
          • Freud founded the psychodynamic approach and he wanted to study human behaviour in a rational and scientific way.
            • Freud used methods such as case studies and interviews, mainly collecting qualitative data, in an idiographic way
              • The psychodynamic approach used to be considered scientific in the past, because systematically studied human beahviour.
                • However, the psychodynamic approach is not seen as scientific in the modern age, because it lacks features such as controlled studies and objectivity.
                  • Therefore, psychology was a science in the past, but is not a science in the current sense of the word.
    • Methodologies use by various approaches
      • Changing nature of science
        • Humans have always been curious and tried to explain the world.
          • Modern characteristics of science have not always been around, this means science have developed
            • Freud founded the psychodynamic approach and he wanted to study human behaviour in a rational and scientific way.
              • Freud used methods such as case studies and interviews, mainly collecting qualitative data, in an idiographic way
                • The psychodynamic approach used to be considered scientific in the past, because systematically studied human beahviour.
                  • However, the psychodynamic approach is not seen as scientific in the modern age, because it lacks features such as controlled studies and objectivity.
                    • Therefore, psychology was a science in the past, but is not a science in the current sense of the word.
      • The psychodynamic approach's main methodology case studies and interviews.
        • These methods collect qualitative data and therefore collect subjective data, which is unscientific.
        • These methods are not scientific as they have little to no level of control of confounding and extraneous variables.
        • However, the main methodology used by the biological approach is brain scans.
          • This method collects quantitative data, therefore collecting objective data, which is scientific.
            • Therefore, psychology as a whole is not a science, but some approaches within psychology could be classed as a science.
          • The biological approach is highly influenced by biology, which is widely accepted as a science.
            • Therefore, psychology as a whole is not a science, but some approaches within psychology could be classed as a science.
    • What is science?
      • The Oxford dictionary defines science as, “the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment”.
        • Eysenck and Keane argued that modern science includes these features; controlled observations, objectivity, testing theoretical theories predictions, falsifiability, paradigm and replicability

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