Why Psychology is/is Not Traditional Science: The Self-Referential Bases of Psychological Research and Theory

2005 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 358-374 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harry T. Hunt
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self

Conceptual Disruption

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 451-464 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara I. McClelland
Keyword(s):  
Survey Research ◽  
Sexual Satisfaction ◽  
Thematic Analysis ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Research Designs ◽  
Report Data ◽  
Self Report Data ◽  
Cantril’S Ladder

In research using self-report measures, there is little attention paid to how participants interpret concepts; instead, researchers often assume definitions are shared, universal, or easily understood. I discuss the self-anchored ladder, adapted from Cantril’s ladder, which is a procedure that simultaneously collects a participant’s self-reported rating and their interpretation of that rating. Drawing from a study about sexual satisfaction that included a self-anchored ladder, four analyses are presented and discussed in relation to one another: (1) comparisons of sexual satisfaction scores, (2) variations of structures participants applied to the ladder, (3) frequency of terms used to describe sexual satisfaction, and (4) thematic analysis of “best” and “worst” sexual satisfaction. These analytic strategies offer researchers a model for how to incorporate self-anchored ladder items into research designs as a means to draw out layers of meaning in quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods data. I argue that the ladder invites the potential for conceptual disruption by prioritizing skepticism in survey research and bringing greater attention to how social locations, histories, economic structures, and other factors shape self-report data. I also address issues related to the multiple epistemological positions that the ladder demands. Finally, I argue for the centrality of epistemological self-reflexivity in critical feminist psychological research. Additional online materials for this article are available on PWQ’s website at http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/suppl/10.1177/0361684317725985

scholarly journals Losing Hurts: The Happiness Impact of Partisan Electoral Loss

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 44-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lamar Pierce ◽  
Todd Rogers ◽  
Jason A. Snyder
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Election ◽  
Regression Discontinuity ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
Quasi Experimental ◽  
Partisan Identity ◽  
Boston Marathon

AbstractPartisan identity shapes social, mental, economic, and physical life. Using a novel dataset, we study the consequences of partisan identity by examining the immediate impact of electoral loss and victory on happiness and sadness. Employing a quasi-experimental regression discontinuity model we present two primary findings. First, elections strongly affect the immediate happiness/sadness of partisan losers, but minimally impact partisan winners. This effect is consistent with psychological research on the good-bad hedonic asymmetry, but appears to dissipate within a week after the election. Second, the immediate happiness consequences to partisan losers are relatively strong. To illustrate, we show that partisans are affected two times more by their party losing the 2012 U.S. Presidential Election than both respondents with children were to the Newtown shootings and respondents living in Boston were to the Boston Marathon bombings. We discuss implications regarding the centrality of partisan identity to the self and its well-being.

scholarly journals Response latency in social psychological research

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian A. Nosek
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Response Latency ◽  
Close Relationships ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Social Psychological ◽  
Methodological Tool ◽  
Social Psychological Research

With the rise of social cognition, use of response latency as a dependent variable has become common in social psychological research. Response latency has been used by researchers to investigate processes that are not easily testable with other methodologies, such as self-report. Response latency’s usefulness as a methodological tool is notable due to its broad application in social psychology, from research on close relationships and attribution to investigations of the self and attitudes. This paper reviews the breadth of social psychological research that has used response latency to inform about mental representations, cognitive processes, and motivational tendencies.

Turning to Narrative

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Schiff
Keyword(s):  
Meaning Making ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
Psychological Problems ◽  
The Self ◽  
Narrative Psychology ◽  
Narrative Perspective ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Insight Into

Chapter 3 of A New Narrative for Psychology introduces a theoretical framework for a narrative perspective that inspires creative approaches to studying psychological problems. It begins with a history of the “narrative turn” in psychology and outlines the current divisions. Since the 1980s, psychological research calling itself “narrative” has blossomed. However, at the moment, narrative psychology is fragmented, with no clear definition of what narrative is or does. This chapter addresses the definitional problems posed by the current use of the narrative concept in psychology, arguing that narrative psychology is not just a theory or a method but, rather, must encompass both. It reorients narrative psychology to meaning making, the study of how and why persons enact aspects of their lives in time and space. Narrative offers researchers insight into the fundamental psychological problems of how persons interpret the self and experience.

Habits of Transformation

Hypatia ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 535-553 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elena Cuffari
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Neural Plasticity ◽  
Habit Formation ◽  
Coming Of Age ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
Existential Phenomenology ◽  
Ethical Significance

This essay argues that according to feminist existential phenomenology, feminist pragmatism, and feminist genealogy, our embodied condition is an important starting place for ethical living due to the inevitable role that habits play in our conduct. In bodies, the phenomenon of habit uniquely holds together the ambiguities of freedom and determinism, transcendence and immanence, and stability and plasticity. Seeing habit formation as a matter of self-growth and social justice gives fresh opportunity for thinking of “assuming ambiguity” as a lifelong endeavor made up of many small projects and practices of situated resistance to stagnation. Transcendence, understood as ameliorative transformation, is found in cultivating habits of learning from our bodily living. I articulate this argument via a reading of Simone de Beauvoir's The Coming of Age, John Dewey's Human Nature and Conduct, and Ladelle McWhorter's Bodies and Pleasures. I discuss two domains wherein the ethical significance of habit formation appears: cognitive psychological research on neural plasticity, and certain projects of self-cultivation that risk turning into overdetermining “cult of the self” practices that close off possibilities for personal and collective transformation.

Subjectivity Revisited Sartre, Lacan, and Early German Romanticism

1999 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Frie
Keyword(s):  
Subjective Experience ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
German Romanticism ◽  
Recent Philosophy ◽  
Daniel Stern

AbstractThis article examines and elaborates the nature of subjective experience by drawing on a variety of perspectives in recent philosophy, psychology, and psychoanalysis. The question of subjectivity has been much debated in each of these disciplines. In contrast with postmodern thinkers who wish to discard subjectivity altogether, I discuss alternative ways to understand and conceptualize subjectivity, or self-consciousness. I consider a tradition of thinkers that includes Sartre, Fichte, and the early German Romantics, who conceptualize self-consciousness as a "being-familiar-with-oneself" that is prior to all reflection. I argue that a developmental corollary to this approach can be found in the psychological research of Daniel Stern, who attributes to infants a "simple non-self-reflexive awareness," while Jacques Lacan's discussion of the specular misrecognitions of the self complicates any simply rendering of "mirroring." By thus combining epistemological, developmental, and phenomenological treatments of the self, I believe it is possible to achieve a conception of subjectivity that avoids the snares of Cartesian essentialism.

scholarly journals Supporting Human Autonomy in AI Systems: A Framework for Ethical Enquiry

2020 ◽  
pp. 31-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rafael A. Calvo ◽  
Dorian Peters ◽  
Karina Vold ◽  
Richard M. Ryan
Keyword(s):  
Personal Growth ◽  
Autonomy Support ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
Ethical Imperative ◽  
Future Design ◽  
Psychological Wellness ◽  
Downstream Effects ◽  
Human Autonomy

Abstract Autonomy has been central to moral and political philosophy for millennia, and has been positioned as a critical aspect of both justice and wellbeing. Research in psychology supports this position, providing empirical evidence that autonomy is critical to motivation, personal growth and psychological wellness. Responsible AI will require an understanding of, and ability to effectively design for, human autonomy (rather than just machine autonomy) if it is to genuinely benefit humanity. Yet the effects on human autonomy of digital experiences are neither straightforward nor consistent, and are complicated by commercial interests and tensions around compulsive overuse. This multi-layered reality requires an analysis that is itself multidimensional and that takes into account human experience at various levels of resolution. We borrow from HCI and psychological research to apply a model (“METUX”) that identifies six distinct spheres of technology experience. We demonstrate the value of the model for understanding human autonomy in a technology ethics context at multiple levels by applying it to the real-world case study of an AI-enhanced video recommender system. In the process we argue for the following three claims: (1) There are autonomy-related consequences to algorithms representing the interests of third parties, and they are not impartial and rational extensions of the self, as is often perceived; (2) Designing for autonomy is an ethical imperative critical to the future design of responsible AI; and (3) Autonomy-support must be analysed from at least six spheres of experience in order to appropriately capture contradictory and downstream effects.

The Psychological Sequelae of Miscarriage: A Critical Review of the Literature

1996 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Frost ◽  
John T. Condon
Keyword(s):  
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
Personal Identity ◽  
Early Pregnancy ◽  
Pregnancy Loss ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
Review Of The Literature ◽  
Psychological Sequelae ◽  
In Pregnancy

Miscarriage, although a common event in pregnancy, has been frequently overlooked in psychological research. This paper reviews the literature on the psychological sequelae of miscarriage, including the shortcomings of that literature. Best understood against the background of psychological changes in early pregnancy, the literature reveals aspects of grief specific to miscarriage. Important components of this grief comprise high levels of guilt, the loss of part of the self and a large impact upon personal identity. The psychological sequelae impact upon other family members, including partners and surviving children. Psychiatric consequences include depression, anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorder. Given the potentially serious nature of these sequelae, it behoves the psychiatrist to enquire routinely about pregnancy loss in all female patients.

scholarly journals The True Self: A Psychological Concept Distinct From the Self

2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 551-560 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina Strohminger ◽  
Joshua Knobe ◽  
George Newman
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Research ◽  
The Self ◽  
True Self ◽  
Psychological Concept

A long tradition of psychological research has explored the distinction between characteristics that are part of the self and those that lie outside of it. Recently, a surge of research has begun examining a further distinction. Even among characteristics that are internal to the self, people pick out a subset as belonging to the true self. These factors are judged as making people who they really are, deep down. In this paper, we introduce the concept of the true self and identify features that distinguish people’s understanding of the true self from their understanding of the self more generally. In particular, we consider recent findings that the true self is perceived as positive and moral and that this tendency is actor-observer invariant and cross-culturally stable. We then explore possible explanations for these findings and discuss their implications for a variety of issues in psychology.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document