History of Psychology - What kind of science is psychology?

Forms of Psychology

Psychology exists in three forms: Academic (scientific research in universities), Professional (application of knowledge to real-world problems), and Popular/Public (public beliefs about behavior).

Epistemology

A branch of philosophy concerned with the theory of knowledge. It asks how we know what we know and helps define what constitutes scientific progress.

Karl Popper

Nicknamed "the logician". He argued that science progresses not by proving theories but by attempting to falsify them. A theory must be testable and refutable to be scientific. He considered psychoanalysis unfalsifiable. His view is considered prescriptive, telling science how it should work.

The Problem of Induction

Popper highlighted that generalizing from specific observations (e.g., seeing many white swans) is inductively sound but deductively invalid. However, finding a single counterexample (one black swan) can deductively falsify the general principle ("all swans are white").

Thomas Kuhn

Nicknamed "the sociologist". He proposed that science operates within paradigms—consensual frameworks of theories, concepts, and methods. Science undergoes periods of "normal science" (puzzle-solving within a paradigm) until accumulating "anomalies" lead to a crisis and a "paradigm shift" (a scientific revolution). His view is based on historical analysis of how science has worked.

Imre Lakatos

Nicknamed "the mediator". He sought to reconcile Popper and Kuhn by proposing that science consists of competing "research programs". Each program has a fixed "core" of assumptions and a protective "belt" of auxiliary hypotheses that can be tested and modified. Programs are judged on whether they are progressive (generating novel predictions) or degenerative.

Paul Feyerabend

Nicknamed "the anarchist". He argued against the existence of universal methodological rules in science, famously stating "anything goes". He used historical examples, like Galileo's defense of heliocentrism, to argue that scientists often break methodological rules to achieve progress. This view is known as epistemological anarchism.