Psychology defined and unified
By Jeremy Dean, of PsyBlog. Human psychology
“Is psychology a coherent scientific discipline and can its existence be effectively defined?” Henriques (2004:1218).
Neither defining terms, nor unity of knowledge have ever been strong points of psychological science. Many psychologists, faced with bringing order to psychology’s diversity, or even offering a definition of psychology, have excused themselves and gone for a lie down.
Gregg Henriques’ (2004) ‘Psychology Defined’ spearheads a bold move to both unify and define the discipline. Henriques (2004) argues that psychology’s epistemological fissures can be healed by accepting that psychology has two main subject matters: psychological formalism and human psychology.
Psychological formalism is the science of mind and includes the cognitive, behavioural and neuro- sciences. Henriques thinks ‘mind’ can be conceptualized as the set of ‘mental behaviours’ in a manner that unites and bridges the schisms between the behavioural and cognitive sciences.
Human psychology is a sub-discipline of psychological formalism essentially dealing with how humans differ from other animals. To explain the separation, Henriques puts forward the ‘Justification Hypothesis’, which holds that humans are marked out from other animals by a capacity to justify their own behaviour. Read more here.
Human psychology Psychological formalism Humans Animals Human psychology Psychological formalism Humans Animals Human psychology Psychological formalism