Talk:Psychology

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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Psychology article.
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Contents

[edit] Archives

[edit] "Drive-by tagging"

Placing the tag "The neutrality of this section is disputed", without providing any comment here on the talk page, is referred to on Wikipedia:NPOV dispute, right in the short introduction, as "drive-by tagging", and is "strongly discouraged". Here's what it says:

If an editor places the tag and doesn't explain why he/she thinks the section lacks neutrality, other editors may have no idea what the perceived problem is. If there is no comment here, I suggest the tags be removed. -DoctorW 16:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)


RE: "Drive-by tagging"

I apologize for my "drive-by tagging". I visited this page yesterday to look for a few simple definitions of the different areas of psychology for a freshman recruitment brochure I was putting together (I am a psychology professor). I was immediately struck by the very biased perspective in this section. I will edit this soon to create a more balanced presentation.

PS: I am new to Wikipedia and not versed in all the rules or even confident in how to post this. Csears77 (talk) 18:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] related articles in question

Could people who watch this page check out Psychohistory? I am not sure if it counts as a pseudoscience or not. Judging from the article it seems to be the invention of one guy, Lloyd deMause (try googling him) and his students/disciples. I am even more concerned about Early infanticidal childrearingSlrubenstein | Talk 14:29, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what to make of it. For one, it does appear to be a small research agenda that is under the primary direction of one person. In addition, several of the article's references are broken and the "Journal of Psychohistory" appears to be a self-published journal that has a website full of spelling errors. On the other hand, it does appear that there are a few college courses out there on "psychohistory" (although several of their referenced courses do not exist), and they are within history departments. Perhaps this is a case of armchair psychoanalysis by historians. As far as I can tell, psychohistory would have no place in the psychology discipline--perhaps you should bring this up over in the history article as well. -Nicktalk 18:30, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I know that there are historians who take a psychological approach (or do "psychohistory") by using Freudian concepts to explain individual motives. But the people I know of are trained historians, yes, perhaps doing armchair psychoanalysis. This article, and the one on EIC, seem entirely unrelated to that literture ... I would bet that those college courses on psychohistory have nothing to do with de Mause, his website, or publications. Perhaps this guy is a psychoanalyst doing armchair history. I asked some psychologist friends of mine if they ever heard of him and they said no. The question is, do these two articles merit speedy deletion (as they are pushing a fringe point of view which does not rise to encyclopedic standards)? here is the thing: a couple of years ago I was involved in a flame war with an editor who worked on these articles. So it would be inappropriate for me to do a speedy delete, I am not even sure I should nominate these articles for deletion, although I seriously question their encyclopedic status. FYI I left a similar question on the History page and perhaps someone there can say whether he is well-known among historians (but I seriously doubt it - I know a good deal of the literature on neolithic societies as well as the non-Western societies refered to in the EIC article and have never seen this concept mentioned, or this guy cited, ever). Since the article claims to be about a psychological theory, I have to defer to editors with some expertise on psychology to decide whether it should be deleted, or whether it so violates NPOV by pushing a fringe view that it requires major overhaul. Didn't Freud and Fromm write books analyzing historical figures (Moses, Da Vinci)? Shouldn't an article on psychohistory provide accounts of those books and how they have been received and viewed by psychologists and historians? Slrubenstein | Talk 20:05, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Those subjects would rather belong to psychobiography. —Cesar Tort 05:36, 2 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] CfD nomination of Category:Psychology societies

Category:Psychology societies has been nominated for deletion, merging, or renaming. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the Categories for discussion page. Thank you. – Cgingold (talk) 10:33, 26 March 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Is Psychology a belief system pretending to be a form of medicine?

What is rarely raised is the criticism that modern psychology is merely a belief system that has the same bizarre dogma and "faith" has religion. If Pychology was a genuine science or medicine then why can they not cure/reduce psychopathy? Or Schizophrenia? Why does psychiatry (especially in the US) rely too often on "chemical manangement" to make patients docile? For all the supposed "research" and badly formed studies it doesnt help mental health issues in a coherent universal fashion. To me the child psychiatrist that proscribes prozac or ritalin for a 7 year old child is no different from the witchdoctor in a third world country performing an exorcism on a ill child who is "possessed" by supposed demons. At least the witchdoctor can claim ignorance, But the clinical psychiatrist cannot. Psychology is a flawed belief system that has the same faults has religion.--Redblossom (talk) 20:20, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

I am including an article from the Guardian newspaper that shows the obscene unjustifiable practice of clinical psychiatrists giving anti depressants to 6 year old children, all under the guise of the supposed "science" of psychology. To me this borders on child abuse.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/apr/07/mentalhealth.drugs --Redblossom (talk) 06:57, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Psychology is the study of the brain and behavior. It is not a belief system. Although there is dogma inherent in any area of study, it is up to the individual to decide what is true and what is not. Your beef seems to be with examples of poor practices within psychiatry. As for treating mental illnesses, psychotherapy can be helpful, but sometimes people do not respond to this alone, and that is a reason therapy is oftentimes coupled with "chemical management". I tend to think this "chemical management" is administered too often in psychiatry, and especially too early after a diagnosis made. Thankfully, this is likely something I won't have to worry about in my career, since I'm going into social psychology. As to your question about psychology being a genuine science: Though not necessarily an exact science, psychology is indeed a science, since it uses the scientific method in its process of acquiring knowledge. Of course, not all areas within psychology are studied in the same way. For instance, research in neuropsychology will be quite different from research in evolutionary psychology. As for why psychology can't yet cure disorders like schizophrenia, there are multiple reasons, namely that research is still filling in our gaps of knowledge in regards to disorders, especially in regards to etiology and finding effective treatment. The human brain has been said by many people to be one of, if not the most complicated structure in the universe. This, combined with the fact that it is merely part of a larger, similarly complicated structure of the human body, which is also a part of a complicated social world, combined with the fact that psychology oftentimes involves the use of qualitative research, makes progress and gains in knowledge in psychology seem relatively slow for some, and understandably so. I hope this answers your questions/concerns. If you have any proposals to improve this article, feel free to make a suggestion. --Ubiq (talk) 07:56, 7 April 2008 (UTC)
Redblossom, please note that this page is a discussion on the psychology wikipedia article, and not on psychology itself. (Also, your comments seem to be about psychiatry, and not psychology; they are not the same thing.) If you have specific suggestions for improvement of the article, please post them. -Nicktalk 07:27, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Clearly, psychology is a pseudoscience.[citation needed] It is a hodgepodge of opinions.[citation needed] There is nothing which is agreed up on within psychology.[citation needed] There is no accepted theoretical framework.[citation needed] It produces no cures in excess of any other superstitious practice.[citation needed] Assertions to the contrary by "psychologists" are irrelevant, and are invariably similar in tone to priests blathering in defense of their dogmas.[citation needed] This viewpoint is widely understood[citation needed] and bears mention in any impartial discussion of "psychology". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.208.100.224 (talk) 01:30, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

There we go. :) -Nicktalk 03:29, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Chomsky review of Verbal Behavior

I added some more detail about Chomsky's review of Verbal Behavior. Could someone have a look at that paragraph. ----Action potential t c 23:53, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

I cut this text as it could not be verified. This does not seem correct... ", largely due to the creation of conditioning theories as scientific models of human behavior, and their successful application in the workplace and in fields such as advertising and military science.[citation needed]" ----Action potential t c 23:56, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Controlling codes in languages

I have written a series of articles on a theme which may have slight relation to human behaviour. The first of the series can be seen on this link. [1] The rest can be seen in the same Forum Pages. It is not a continuation of any particular school of psychological theories. --Ved from Victoria Institutions (talk) 06:13, 11 May 2008 (UTC)