Is psychology a science?
- Thread starter HeyListen
- Start date
Recommended Videos
Is that just because you say so?lukemdizzle said:
Sociology is social science.
Psychology is the science of mental life and functions. Some is physical, some is observational, some is absurdly theoretical(which I suspect is why people judge it, and where the snobbery eminates from).
It has plenty of merit as a science.
As for the "its not a science because it has too many conflicting theories." Proven and disproven theories do not a science make. Those are the products of science, science in and of itself is characterized as, in essence, experimenting using the scientific method to answer provable/disprovable questions (hypotheses).
As for Freudian *shudder* or the like, they are not representative of the whole of Psychology and thus do not necessarily (or ever) follow the scientific method. Therefore, I'm prepared to say that Psychology, the scientific part, is scientific (tautological, but see the point), while the parts that are less scientific (as in, those which don't follow the scientific method) are not.
Finally, Psychology overall, I'd say, aims to be scientific despite the number of counterproductive parts (ie Freudians, mesmers, etc). Its like calling biology (human focused) not a science simply because of homeopaths. Yeah, they're there, but they're not the defining part of the field.
Before you say "but Freud founded Psychology" no, he did not. Nor is he as popular in Psychology. He is usually only given a cursory reference in general psych courses and then glossed over in favor of more empirically supported treatments, theories, etc. Just because the layman thinks of Freud when they think of Psychology doesn't mean that he is representative of the discipline.
And..
As for Freudian *shudder* or the like, they are not representative of the whole of Psychology and thus do not necessarily (or ever) follow the scientific method. Therefore, I'm prepared to say that Psychology, the scientific part, is scientific (tautological, but see the point), while the parts that are less scientific (as in, those which don't follow the scientific method) are not.
Finally, Psychology overall, I'd say, aims to be scientific despite the number of counterproductive parts (ie Freudians, mesmers, etc). Its like calling biology (human focused) not a science simply because of homeopaths. Yeah, they're there, but they're not the defining part of the field.
Before you say "but Freud founded Psychology" no, he did not. Nor is he as popular in Psychology. He is usually only given a cursory reference in general psych courses and then glossed over in favor of more empirically supported treatments, theories, etc. Just because the layman thinks of Freud when they think of Psychology doesn't mean that he is representative of the discipline.
And..
Untrue. Look at the application facets of Social or Industrial/Organizational psychology. They apply psychological theory and scientific findings to the "real world" and get pretty good results.The_root_of_all_evil said:
its strange because due to the human condition humans can't be quantified with people claiming this as their main arguement. so rather then a objective nature of most sciences it becomes mostly subjective and science and maths can't give leeway to peoples opinions.
however since psychology does make an effort to make the best of a bad situation by trying to convert most subjective results into objective ones and does use scientific method as means of testing and discovering new ways to help cure diseases of the mind and understanding how and why the mind works.
also to take word origin of science it simply means knowledge in latin and is psychology not a pursuit of knowledge same as chemistry, physics, biology and maths.
so my answer is that psychology is a science based on humans who arn't as simple as a single chemical compound or can't be boiled down into a series of maths equations and how they think and work so inevitbly most information found will be subjective due to the very nature of humans. so it is the science of how humans behave think and act
p.s on freud yes we did a topic on him but this was the very first ideas of psychology and in essence some of them could be true but most are farfetched, outdated and throughly disproven. the reason why psychology has so many conflicting theories is that its still in its infancy. i mean it wasnt until galileo that we knew the earth orbited the sun and not the other way round. that and the fact that the earliest germ theory didnt actually come from pascal or the like but infact a roman (or greek maybe) scientist who got laughed out of the scientific community for his crazy germ ideas. in short science isnt perfect and the only reason why chemistry biology and physics are much more exact then psychology is because they have been around longer and have had their knowledge consolidated upon so much already. at the moment calling psychology not a science is the equivalent of calling a small toddler not a human.
however since psychology does make an effort to make the best of a bad situation by trying to convert most subjective results into objective ones and does use scientific method as means of testing and discovering new ways to help cure diseases of the mind and understanding how and why the mind works.
also to take word origin of science it simply means knowledge in latin and is psychology not a pursuit of knowledge same as chemistry, physics, biology and maths.
so my answer is that psychology is a science based on humans who arn't as simple as a single chemical compound or can't be boiled down into a series of maths equations and how they think and work so inevitbly most information found will be subjective due to the very nature of humans. so it is the science of how humans behave think and act
p.s on freud yes we did a topic on him but this was the very first ideas of psychology and in essence some of them could be true but most are farfetched, outdated and throughly disproven. the reason why psychology has so many conflicting theories is that its still in its infancy. i mean it wasnt until galileo that we knew the earth orbited the sun and not the other way round. that and the fact that the earliest germ theory didnt actually come from pascal or the like but infact a roman (or greek maybe) scientist who got laughed out of the scientific community for his crazy germ ideas. in short science isnt perfect and the only reason why chemistry biology and physics are much more exact then psychology is because they have been around longer and have had their knowledge consolidated upon so much already. at the moment calling psychology not a science is the equivalent of calling a small toddler not a human.
Pseudoscience is defined as performing experiments on hypotheses that can either not be proven wrong, (ie set up to never fail) or performing experiments on hypotheses and then equivocating the results such that the answer is always in favor of the theory.Kenko said:
Psychology, as a whole, does not do this. There is plenty of scientific literature that has been proven wrong, just like many other scientific disciplines, and there is much that is based on solid research.
Just because you think one thing (ie Psych is a lot of guesswork) doesn't mean its true.
I could site my schools psych text book and the chapter "Is Psychology a Science" in which it explains why psych is considered a social science because it relies on subjective and observational theories as much as the scientific methodSexual Harassment Panda said:
Anthropology and Sociology are also social sciences, yet they use data and analyses to answer questions and to study societies and historical/ancient societies. In regard to being products of our environment sociology also answers this question and it says that not only are you a product of your environment but your environment (or society that you live in) dictates the majority of the decisions you make. The close you put on this morning were picked out by society because society says they are appropriate. Your education is dictated by the culture you live in.lukemdizzle said:
It's true that psychology deals with abstract themes and ideas and it is open to interpretation but this is a by product of the fact that performing a psychology experiment is very difficult. It requires lots of money, time, people, and help to do a psychology experiment whereas as chemistry just needs supplies and a lab. Also the "hard sciences can also be open to interpretation and deal with abstract things, just look at astrophysics.
OH and out of curiosity what class did you take and where did you take it?
Saying that there are conflicting theories is not sufficient proof to say that it is not a science. Physics for example has lots of conflicting theories. And its not like once you get below the threshhold number of conflicting theories then you suddently become a science. Doesn't work like that. QED.lacktheknack said:
I think in this situation, people use "hard" and "soft" as synonyms for "has a lot of equations" and "not so many equations".sharkinz said:
While it looks very different from say, chemistry or physics, it doesn't look too different from say, zoology. While the rules are a lot looser than the "hard" sciences, we have to remember that for the early part of chemistry's and physics' histories consisted largely of people mixing things together and seeing what happened. It was a while before the larger pictures started coming into view and theories started emerging. I think we have definately got to that stage at least, in the last 20 years or so.
Psych deals with abstracts as well as the scientific method which is why it is considered social science. so ya what you said. and I took it (basic psych) my senior year of high school but it was a class for collage credits. I don't claim to be an expert. psychs not my major. I just remember that it was a social science. there was a whole lecture about itsharkinz said:
Technically, it isn't a true science since the scientific method can't be applied fully to psychology at its current state of development. This is because it is currently impossible to completely isolate factors and generate mathematically expressible results for psychological phenomenon.
They are trying, though. It is by no means a hopeless effort, like say, philosophy.
They are trying, though. It is by no means a hopeless effort, like say, philosophy.
I can see what you mean, but I believe when you distinguish "hard" and "soft" sciences you are drawing a line in the sand and saying that some sciences are better, more valuable, or more scientific then others. Though if your interpretation of "hard" and "soft" are how we are distinguishing the sciences then I would agree with you, though psychology and sociology have more math then you might expect.the Dept of Science said:
No, it is not a science.
Mental problems are caused by irradiated alien space-ghosts that were killed by the evil lord Xenu 70 billion years ago.
Or something.
Just pay the church of scientology $120,000 and all your problems will disappear.
Mental problems are caused by irradiated alien space-ghosts that were killed by the evil lord Xenu 70 billion years ago.
Or something.
Just pay the church of scientology $120,000 and all your problems will disappear.
Yes it is certainly a science. Just because part of it deals with abstract concepts doesn't mean it isn't a science. You wouldn't be able to have scientific papers published on such a wide variety of topics within the field if it wasn't a science.
social science doesn't mean science. The truth is this whole debate is active amongst the scientific community so there is no real answer but right now because psych relies on both the scientific method and abstract concepts that cant be measured it is regarded as social science which means kind of science but not completely. In order to be science you need to be able to measure it. there are parts of psych that are immeasurable. so it is not fully regarded as science.Island said:
In psychology there are numerous theories that have little to no empirical evidence, like, for example, most of the theories that aren't biological. Seriously, most of its based around conjecture and the subjective interpretation of fairly vague data. Some, such as the psychodynamic approach, have literally no support whatsoever. Which is, to my mind, unscientific.bojac6 said:
yeah, that isn't science. Not everything thought up based on the info at hand is science. the whole ancestor's thing isn't science because it wasn't based on empirical observation, it was based on conjecture as to the afterlife and the nature of stars. By your logic, religion and the supernatural would be scientific.bojac6 said:
Conjecture is not science and it is this reason that makes psychology not a science for me. Psychology is a prescience because they have the empirical data, but any interpretation of said data at this point is largely conjecture.
Well, from what I learnt of it, it still is.
O no there definitely not. I think they are extremely important and are only not regarded as science because they don't fit into the strict definition of science. thats not to say they aren't extremely scientific, nor any less important than official sciencessharkinz said:
"The social sciences are the fields of academic scholarship that explore aspects of human society. "Social science" is commonly used as an umbrella term to refer to a plurality of fields outside of the natural sciences. These include: anthropology, archaeology, economics, geography, history, linguistics, political science, international studies and, in some contexts, psychology."lukemdizzle said:
You're simultaneously right and wrong. Aspects fit, but others clearly don't. You were just a little too forceful and definitive with your assertion...that's all.