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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ม.ค. 2013
- Is psychology really a science? (re-upload due to terrible type first time - pls comment again if you want to contribute)
This video features in order of appearance: Luke Jones, Penny Lewis, Daniela Montaldi, Deborah Talmi, Warren Mansell and Ellen Poliakoff.
University of Manchester School of Psychological Sciences: www.psych-sci.manchester.ac.uk/
Videos by Brady Haran
www.bradyharan.com/ - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
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First, as a psychologist myself, I love the questions Brady asks in this series. Second, I am very pleased to see such a capable group defending the field. On this video, though, I am noticing that everyone seems willing to limit psychology to a study of human behavior, et cetera. I think it is broader and has to include a study of all animals.
I've always viewed psychology as a science, just a young one.
1:14 But if psychology is a subdivision of biology then surely biology is just a subdivision of chemistry because we are powered by reactions between molecules and we are made from atoms but if that is true then chemistry must just be a subdivision of physics because all atoms and chemical reactions follow the laws of physics and so why doesn't every scientist call themself a physicist since everything is just a subdivision of that?
I like the quote: "I'm interested in time behaviour" While there's a TARDIS right behind him in that scene.
This channel has a great potential.
Awesome videos so far!
Keep up the great work, Brady!
I agree. I am myself doing a PhD in Medicinal Chemistry. My argument rests on stating that use of the scientific method does not by definition make something a science. There are aspects of psychology which are scientific, by which i mean objective and quantifiable. However far too much of it is subjective and often unfalsifiable. My auntie is a Dr. of developmental psych. We have this argument all the freakin' time.
I really hope you keep up with this channel brady! I love all your stuff but I love psychology stuff!
i'm very happy you made this channel, brady. looking forward to future videos :)
Ultimately, modern psychology is fusing more and more with neuroscience and can often offer causal explanations for many types of dysfunctional behaviors and trace them back to brain malfunctions or learned disorders and often can have quite a bit to say about how to treat them even without medication. In fact, it is quite uncommon to put people on permanent medication because of "chemical imbalance". Psychologists primarily use medication to enable people to get started on therapy.
"I'm interested in time behavior" he says with a TARDIS behind him, haha
Alright Brady!!! Now you have a Physics, Math Chemistry AND Psychology channel!!! :D you have officially made a channel for all my academic interests! THANK YOU!!
This makes me think of chats I have had with my brother-in-law. He tells me about how the psych majors were so laid back at he school because there classes were so easy, but then I compare that to my psych major roomate who was always ether in the library or on the couch studying.
There needs to be more videos on this channel because Psychology is super interesting!
I love your videos Bradly! Are there any more channels to discover besides sixtysymbols, numberphile and this?
Just wanna say, I LOVE the guy with the long hair. He is a great speaker and very thoughtful, and he seems to have already thought about a lot of these questions before. Great video.
best channel yet, brady. keep it coming.
i am really glad that you are uploading more to this channel
I am majoring in Computer Science, and I get this sort of thing ALL THE TIME from people asking me what makes Computer Science a science. People always view it as nothing but learning how to code a program, but there are so many things that can be studied about computers and computational patterns. A great example of this is Conway's Game of Life. Brady, have you ever considered starting a Computer Science based channel by any chance? I think that would be astounding! Any chance of that?
You're really speaking my language. You seem to understand science just the way I do :) Earlier I was getting into arguments with so many people because I made the point that science is defined by subject AND method. I don't think psychology is a science just because it mimics empirical behaviourism and develops statistical quantities.
wow - had to pause vid and check out rosenhan. WOW. that fits with my experience, observations, suspicions, and privately held beliefs. thanks so much for posting that. regards.
Great video! I was only minutely distracted by the Dalek and Tardis on the long-haired professor's bookshelf. Sorry for not knowing his name.
Excellent channel. Thank you! I hope this develops as much as numberphile.
What happened to 'PsyPhile' by the way? Was that already taken or something, or is it an intentional pun?
i am currently a science student majoring in psychology. at my university you can get either a science or arts degree in psychology. from looking at how the classes are divided between the two disaplins shows that specific kinds of psychology are arts (social, clinical etc.) where as other are more science (behaviour,etc.)
Great video, Brady!
That's because 'ego' is another layer of abstraction. This contributes to the sheer difficulty of clearing up such confusion--there's so many steps between what we're interested in--the mind--from the tools that we currently have.
I'll do It.
1.) Lack of objective analysis - Not true. It's objective, there is no space for interpretation in a science. Instead, interpretation could be present in Clinical Psychology, maybe, sometimes. But there is a reason, an important one, and I won't deal here with It.
2.) Lack of empirical data - Not true. As a science, It can provide a lot of empirical data with a wide range of instruments (especially technological ones).
In psychology, we deal with great numbers of variables and are often interested in the interaction effects between variables. The difference between psychology and other sciences is often the amount of experimental control available to researchers. The questions asked and the methods used to answer them follows the scientific process. The application of psychology is also scientific when practiced ethically.
I think you're thinking along the lines of counseling psychology from your earlier post, about how people talk to therapists to relieve stress or solve relationship problems. Clinical can be very biology- and behaviour-based. But even something seemingly trivial like relationships are being studied scientifically, often for how the mind works. For example, one study found that people in a committed relationship actually rate attractive potential partners the lowest out of a group of people.
Meditation is a very broad term which includes all kinds of mental exercises, so what do you want to meditate?
But if you want to think about a problem for example, search youtube for John Cleese creativity. You'll get an early 90's video with danish subtitles about how to think creatively with some good tips, maybe that may help you. It basically boils down to taking the time and space to think about a problem without judging the thoughts (they might be intermediate steps).
yes they do have defined terms, especially in the DSM, but those terms are often muddled and misdiagnoses are common. taking a class is one thing, dealing with patients in the real world is not the same, patients are individuals and each one is unique.
"There are also zero scientific instruments involved."
Utterly false. Psychologists perform hard measurements of all kinds of phenomena in their research. Psychometrics has a long history that you apparently are completely ignorant about.
"People that are quick to call Psychology a science typically do not understand what "science" is."
No. The problem here is that you have no clue how broad the field of psychology is. Google "cognitive psychology" and "psychometrics" for a start.
I find their definition of science to be quite interesting. They heavily lean on the whole hypothesis-experiment-evaluation notion. What's funny is that according to this definition mathematics would not be a science, even though nobody ever questions if mathematics is a science. There's more to the definition of science than whats shown in this video.
"Memory" and "purpose" are human abstractions that we use to simplify conversation. They hide a lot of detail, so they can't be used as a basis for understanding the human psyche. In other words, such ideas are experience-far. We need to develop a phenomenology of human experiences first, by paying close attention to how people live in their world (like anthropologists do, but with more intimacy), before we can even contemplate having psychology as a science on the table. That's what we need.
Very common "end-products" related to the "soft" side of psychology are advertisements and marketing practices. From the more scientific side, I would mention brain research, depression- and post-traumatic treatments, education methods, drug research etc.
I subscribed to this channel before even viewing any of the videos simply because it is one of Brady's.
I think that the biggest component they neglected to mention in this video that makes up the biggest reason why other sciences are called science and this one is on the fringe is the recreation of experiments that exhibit the same or fairly similar results. For Psychology it is hard to teach on that classical scientific method of reconstructing experiments and replicating results.
The best example of this is perhaps how anti-depressants can be used to enable people to become more active, get a positive feedback loop going and subsequently not need the drugs after they get their lives in order.
I think what you may be thinking about is cases where parents or lawyers are hounding "psychologists" either for access to drugs or for a diagnosis.
I subscribed to @psyfile since channel looks promising!
More interesting stuff!
Btw, Brady, what's with that logo? Looks quite creepy to me.... (I bet you can come up with a better one ;) :P)
Can you do a video on some of the psychological experiments and advances that had real life implications? I heard of some brilliant experiments but none seemed to be affecting my everyday life as those of physics or chemistry.
You should also realize that psychology started out as a hard science working out the limitations of human senses using all kinds of objective tools and techniques to acquire the data and this tradition has continued right through fads like Freud. You might want to look up B.F. Skinner's work in Behaviorism as well. While the field ran into methodological limitations and has been superseded by the cognitive approach, it was thoroughly scientific and produced many interesting applications.
First hank green double uploaded a video, and then you did.
For a moment i thought i had traveled back in time...
Cathy I've tried really hard to teach you the nature of physical law and the relationship between theory and history but I can't spend any more time on this. Go ahead thinking what you like.
...and same thing goes for anything to do with processes and things we can't see in general. Given that the human perceptual system is quite limited in scope, we obviously have to augment our senses with instruments which are sensitive to things and processes we animals aren't sensitive to.
(cont3) I also think the guys on the video make some very valid points if you take the broader dictionary definition of science, referring only to systematic knowledge acquired through the 'scientific method'. So, ultimately, the more interesting question is why should we accept one over the other?
Do a video on sociobiology/evolutionary psychology. Please ?
And yes, I pilfered your format. It's pretty handy. :)
(cont2) (psychology, for example, spans everything from clinical psychology to the bit of neurobiology that tries to link the psyche to our very physical brain).
I think you make an excellent argument should we choose to accept your definition (although, like Brady said, it might so happen that one day we'll be able to understand the psyche as an observable enity).
The movement of particles, the huge empirical quantities involved in chemistry (but chemistry is still basically physics), the behaviour of biology, and the actions of animals are components of the physical universe. Even before we go into methodology (positivism, historicism, empiricism, mathematics, praxeology, topology etc) we can see these are subjects to be studied. Once we've exhausted economic and neurobiological analysis I think you're left with consciousness.
I find your argument pretty interesting in that it illustrates, in my opinion, the fundamental problem underlying the whole 'is 'x' a science?' discussion, and it's a problem of definition. Science is, after all, a name we humans give to a human endeavour. It's a name that has a lot of history, and has been in use since before we developed a lot of the methodology that we currently consider essential to science.
I would love to hear what you folks have on your minds about hypnotism. Please give us another video.
i have a massive interest in science, i havent done it to a great level in that ive done all the sciences (including maths) at A level, but no further than that unless you count my hours spend searching the pages of new scientist and the web for more detailed information. i havent heard of a lot of those words before but after looking them up yes i do. Im afraid my expertise have now shifted from science to computers as i spend most of my time learning to program rather than researching science.
How does one "meditate" anyway? Does meditation have any hard beneficial effects or is it a placebo?
It is a soft subject. The hardest part is when they crunch numbers with statistics software (very often using it as a black box) and with data so bendable and being statistics so bendable, you get a subject that is very flexible to the researcher's view. All you need is money to get subjects and make the experiments and you get your results.
But I do agree with you on the lack of unifying theories in psychology. I sometimes find myself disillusioned with the way things progress in psychology, but it is a very young science (less than 150 years since it started using the scientific methods), so I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt.
i believe psychology technically is science in the strictest sense ('science' means the study of the natural order) but it cannot control or manipulate variables as easily without affecting what is statistically measured, i.e. the sentient psyche. this is the crux of the answer. it ought to be a branch of biology, although today it seems like a field of study that forcefully and rather artificially wants to establish itself as a unique pursuit, disparate from sociology or zoology.
It's a Rorschach test with the Greek letter Psi in the middle. I happen to think the logo is perfect.
Do you have a channel like this on medicine?
Amazing! Do you mind if i steal this?
(cont) The only distinction I made between humans and animals was to say that the logical character of our mind is qualitatively different.
There are many things you can quantify in psychology, especially towards the more neuroscience, brain structure and activity-based end. I see this as like a scale, and there are more scientific aspects to psychology and less scientific ones.
Can you make a video about meditation and hypnosis?
I guess what I'm trying to say is that while it is true that you cannot put the abstract "mind" under a microscope, it doesn't mean you cannot derive conclusions for and from it. I'll put this in the context of physics. You can't put the "physical world" under a microscope, yet by looking at the behavior of its components you understand more about the mechanics that make it function. (I'm not done yet, unfortunately the character limit on youtube is quite.. err.. limiting)
The one who appears last in the video (they're mentioned in order of appearence)
You can get a glimpse of how vastly the laws of the living are more complex than laws of physics simply by trying to program physincs engine and an AI. While physics can be written as few self emergent equations, the AI as like a large spiderweb of relationships and dynamic prorities. But it is not said that such cannot be fully explored and understood.
You should do next one on hypnosis and how it works, my grandpa is a hypnotist and i never met him so I'm a little curious on how it works.
lets hear about HYPNOSIS. Its something that i have found interesting ever since i saw it performed the first time.
Would you mind provide me examples in which Keynesianism is a pseudo-economics?
One of the errors is not doing a separation between Psychologies. Each psychology have a method, a epistemology and an object of study specific (well, they should have it). So, it's not the same between behaviorism and psychoanalysis, they are so different they shouldn't being in the same boat just because it's more easy that way.
i agree mate :D I'm doing physics at uni, its the best science then comes chemistry then biology/medicine
Have there been studies a sequencially elliminate other environment clues that we might be used as a clock such as us using a sound that occurs at regular intervals, to set the tick tick tick in our head.
Its the pursuit of psychologists to investigate questions such as what is happiness and how may we interact with it how may we measure it?
Man I love all your channels, but just because this is about psychology you don't need to zoom so close and fill the whole frame with their face as if they want to jump out and stare at you, leave some space around them, I feel tension all the time watching and can't concentrate on the content, still very good man. keep up the good work.
Actually, I do. May I suggest a book recommendation? I became interested in such matters before university, by reading Steve Keen's book "Debunking economics". Ever since then, I have been quite skeptical of economists when they pretend to understand how the economies of the world operate, since they rely on such shoddy logic, such as the idea that we can just add up the behaviours of individual demand curves to yield an aggregate demand curve that's also sloping downwards.
please do a video about the jung types!
Have you ever taken a class in psychology? They do have defined terms and the things you just wrote, albeit slightly modified so that its relevant to its respective field.
well, they can do psychological experiments, like the famous marshmallow experiment. they actually measured the time it took for those kids to give up (and take the marshmallow in front of them instead of resisting and getting another five, in case you dont know what i'm talking about) and then looked at the rest of their lives and could directly correlate their lack of patience at such a young age with later addiction problems, adultery etc. that's a psychological experiment
The psychology is not made totally of science, although a part of it can be considerate as science. Since there is no unifying theories and many times they jump into conclusions, so the part when they analysis the data is where can be a problem, a solid theory of what Consciousness actually is may take us to a new level of psychology.
If I could recommend everyone here watch two lectures they would both be by Feynman. One is called the character of physical law, the other one is just on heuristics. Computers are just filling systems. They don't actually "compute" anything. I can't stress enough though; I'm not making a theological argument. My emphasis is on physical law and the subject and method of proper science.
So how would you define the word 'science'?
Yes, I was thinking in Freud, but I wasn't trying to diminish the value of psychology.
(cont) You're right though. My entire point is really that science is defined by a physical subject not the mimicking of method. I accept real economics and neuroscience. But I reject positivism, historicism, relativism and most empirical methodology from subjects like human action. And I don't even know how you would apply any methodology to the mind itself. The brain is a separate physical subject.
No physics. But I love science. If you wanted to boil down my point I was really talking about the relationship between subjects. All "science" as I understand the word is physical. The methodology of each varies. Some are more empirical than others, some are more "positive", but all science is observable. (but science ISN'T measurement). The sciences I accept as value free and sound are physics, chemistry, biology, and economics. I don't know how you could ever observe the nature of psyche.
Oh, thank you for being nice and explaining my error, instead of being jerks like the rest of the people who replied! I have since realized my mistake.
Yes, indeed. The Stanford Prison Experiment is a classic example of this, but it draws on the importance of the background social environment which makes individuals more likely to be cruel to others. This included no oversight of what's happening, the very constrained environment of the prisons, even the use of numbers rather than people's names make a difference.
New channel devoted to doing outrageous things!
Called-Chaz Challenge
I agree that the study of the human psyche does seem to have a rather philosophical nature to it, but I think that stems from our lack of access to it. We can observe neurons firing and measure electrical impulses, but at this point we can't quantify consciousness. I do think, however, that the psyche can be analyzed quantitatively through its causality with the right tools, just like study particle physics through causality (as you know better than me).
thanks for the videos
I know I shouldn't say anything without knowing the full details, or risk looking like an idiot, like I did. But If we have to know everything before we speak, no one could say anything. Thank you for being civil. I have seen the error of my writing and I hope people will see my apologies in comments before they take a poke at my mistake.
I think the question really means 'how should we study the mind?'
Notice at the beginning how both psychologists look up and to the left when told psychology is not a science. The man moves his head to the right but the woman leans hers to the left. What is the psychology behind looking to the top left? And does the direction they lean there heads mean that the woman is left handed and the man right handed? (sorry I didn't know there names)
Richard Feynman once called psychology "Cargo Cult Science" ... But I think had he lived by us for a few more decades, he'd appreciate the extent to which (parts of) psychology have advanced :)
Economics is not axiomatic deduction, contrary to your statement...unless you think that the economy can be only described in such terms. Unfortunately, the SMD theorem demonstrates that the axioms used to describe the law of demand do not result in a downward-sloping curve in the aggregate, for instance, this undercutting one of modern economics' main bedrock assumptions about the relationship between quantity and price. So these axiomatic foundations are on shaky ground.
"I don't know how you could ever observe the nature of psyche."...YET. For now psychology is limited to observations mostly. The main fields of study that are growing are neuroscience and neuropsychology. It will all eventually boil down to physics in some way. At least I think it will.
No the word 'science' refers to the study of phenomenon which can be objectively observed and quantified. Many branches of psychology lack these aspects. That is, much of the methodology is based on subjective tests and often unfalsifiable theories. Some branches of psychology do address problems objectively, so one cannot say psychology is devoid of 'science'. But for the most part it falls into something closer to philosophy. (In truth, so does string theory, so I wouldn't feel too bad)
Y U NO MAKE MORE VIDEOS???
Psychology is more of a proto-science. We have some of the mechanisms of a scientific discipline down, but we've still got a long way to go before we can be truly considered a science (the "Toothbrush problem" being a prime example of why this is the case).
Of course, the relative lack of mathematics in (American) psychology, even with the "emphasis" on statistics (which is often little more than how to use SPSS or SAS) is also a big issue.
I suppose so, but what I find interesting is that economics departments these days don't have much interest in the history of economic thought, let alone teach that. Non-mainstream economists are more likely to investigate this sort of thing.
There are, indeed, departments of political economy that exist today, including one at the University of Sydney, from which I saw that difference clearly. I also learned about economics as well, and the two areas of inquiry are different.
For anybody out there thinking of taking a psychology degree, I think you need to consider the fact that there are thousands of 'psychologists' graduating every year, and there are very few psychology related positions available. You are told that you can also find careers in many other fields (basically: management or actuarial work). Life teaches you more about psychology than the degree course, so study something useful that will get you a job. Love psychology? Just buy a book on it....
Please by all means expand what about the fact that an observer and the observed are different leads to psychology is or is not science or it's relevance?
Well my only point was on the character of science. It's subject and method, the relationship between theory and history etc. I wasn't saying psychologists should do anything. I'm only really interested in Physics, biology, economics and history. I've given you your answer on "physical" now btw ;)