Psychology in crisis. Dogmatic methodology. Agreements and disagreements

Abstract

Many academic discussions present psychology as a discipline in constant crisis. Strangely, this air of crisis does not seem to extend to the teaching of methodology, especially the teaching of experimental methodology. However, modern studies on science and on philosophy of science and critical analyses of the theoretical and historical foundations of these methodologies have cast considerable doubt on the validity of the methodological approaches applied in our area. If we agree that psychological knowledge finds its justification in the method in which it is acquired, and if the method is dogmatic and thus debatable, the encounter between psychology in crisis and dogmatic methodology is bound to produce some worrying results. In this encounter a key role is played by the pressure that authors feel to publish the results of their research. This pressure means that they are unlikely to ask themselves whether what they are publishing is of value –not to their curriculum vitae, but to the advance of psychology.