Philosophical Debates in Psychology

Philosophical Issues and Debates Psychology

Philosophical debates discuss the nature of reality and the human condition. Although philosophy might seem abstract at first, it has important implications for how we approach life. Therefore, it's important to keep in mind what philosophical assumptions are promoted by psychological research and what are the implications for all of us.

The key philosophical debates you need to know when evaluating psychological theories include:

• Free will vs. determinism

• Nature vs. nurture

• Reductionism vs. holism

• Idiographic vs. nomothetic approaches

We'll look at the meaning of each of these concepts, and how to spot them in psychological theories

What is the Free Will and Determinism Debate?

Psychology as a scientific discipline is very much interested in determining the causes of human behaviour. Psychology aims to understand the factors that predict behaviour and other psychological outcomes. This approach makes many psychological studies fall closer to the deterministic side of this spectrum.

An example of a free-will argument is that no matter the external factors, we have free choice when it comes to our actions.

While a deterministic perspective looks at the factors that predict violence (e.g. upbringing, genetics, emotional state) and proposes that these influences can predict or determine violence. Thus, if someone commits violence under such conditions, it might not have been truly their choice.

Free Will and Determinism in Psychology

One approach in psychology, which stresses the importance of a free will, is the humanistic approach. Humanistic psychology states that while external factors can influence us, ultimately, we have the final say in whether or not we take the action.

On the other side of the spectrum, we have Freud’s psychodynamic approach. This approach sees behaviour as a result of unconscious memories, emotions and conflicts, stemming from childhood experiences. According to this theory, we're governed by forces we're not even aware of and our past is bound to influence our current actions and states.

Within determinism there exists:

• Hard determinism
• Soft determinism
• Environmental, biological, and psychic determinism

What is the Importance of Nature and Nurture?

Another philosophical debate that comes up in psychology is the nature vs. nurture debate. Nature vs. nurture has become an important issue because if we can identify where our behaviours come from, we can effectively modify unhelpful behaviours either through biological or environmental interventions.

Nature vs. Nurture in Psychology

Chomsky’s (1965) nativist theory of language attributes language development to an innate biological mechanism. This theory proposes that we are equipped with a neural structure called a ‘language acquisition mechanism’, which is the encoder for language.

• Thus, the ability to acquire language is an innately present and hard-wired mechanism, which is also why children can learn a language so easily.

On the other hand, behaviourism stresses the importance of the environment in shaping our behaviours. A basic assumption of behaviourism is that we are born as a ‘tabula rasa’ (a blank slate). This approach suggests that humans acquire all behaviours the same way any other animal does, through interacting with the environment.

• We learn to engage in behaviours that are rewarded by our environment, and seize behaviours that are punished.

Fig. 2: The nature and nurture debate aims to identify what types of factors influence our behaviours.

General Conclusion of the Nature vs. Nurture Debate

As you can imagine, the causes and correlates of human behaviour, development, personality or psychological outcomes are incredibly complex. The answer is rarely just the genes or just the environment. In most cases, psychological phenomena are caused by a complex interaction of both influences.

What Is the Reductionism vs Holism Debate Psychology?

Reductionism is a common scientific approach which aims to understand complex phenomena by breaking them down into smaller and smaller parts. Chemists break things down into elements, physicists into atoms, biologists into cells and neuroscientists into synapses.

The assumption is that by understanding the parts, we can understand the whole system.

Holism argues that to understand the system, we need to look at it as more than just a sum of its parts. They recognise that the components of each system are interconnected, they influence and regulate each other, and we can't study these interactions when we only look at single components.

Reductionism and Holism in Psychology

An example of a reductionist approach in psychology is behaviourism.

An example of a holistic approach in psychology is social psychology.

Fig 3: Reductionism is common in science, it involves breaking systems down into their individual components.

What are the Idiographic vs. Nomothetic Approaches?

The idiographic vs. nomothetic approaches debate is concerned with whether we should aim to identify the universal principles or classifications of human behaviour, or whether individual people are unique and cannot be understood using general concepts.

Idiographic vs. Nomothetic Approaches in Psychology

In the study of personality, Freud's psychodynamic theory of personality is an example of an idiographic approach. When conceptualising the personality of his patients, Freud looked at each of them individually, in the context of their personal experiences and their feelings in response to these experiences.

Freud used case studies to demonstrate his theory. Using qualitative studies is in line with the idiographic approach, while quantitative studies are often associated with the nomothetic approach.

In contrast, the Big Five Model of Personality is an example of a nomothetic approach. This model argues that everyone's personality can be described in relation to predefined personality traits like openness to experience, extraversion, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and agreeableness.

Summary: Current Debates in Psychology

In summary, you consider studies, theories, or approaches in psychology in the context of all four of these debates when evaluating them. It's important to note that theories are rarely purely on one side of the debate, they can fall anywhere on the spectrum between the two extremes.

Moreover, just because a theory is reductionistic or deterministic doesn't mean it's necessarily bad. However, we need to consider its limitations and what the implications are if we accept it.