[FROM: Dennis Delprato (951218)]
Come Jan. I'll start out another group of 3rd-year-
level psychology majors in a one-term course entitled
"Introduction to Experimental Psychology." I no longer
use a textbook, but instead supply various handouts.
Of note in view of the orientation of CSG-L and one of
its most active participants, is the fact that for several
terms I used a text authored by Bordens and Abbott (The Abbott
of the Bruce variety) but gave up on even this work (prior
to discovering Bruce's respect for PCT) due to its overly
mainstream coverage, e.g., adoption of classical experimental
model with attendant lineal mechanistic postulates.
Over the years, the course per Delprato has evolved--some might
say, devolved--to the point where it is far removed from the
conventional "Experimental" course. Observations in a variety
of areas (e.g., scientific and professional behavior of psycholo-
gists, where students go after they complete the course, history
and current status of the discipline) have led me to reassess just
what would be a worthy outcome for a one-term course such as this.
Students' entry skills seem to be rather limited. Identifying
variables, distinguishing between events and interpretations,
describing relationships, and so on all need to be worked on in
various ways.
Basically, I have concluded that the discipline needs to go
back to the beginning regarding what it means to be scientific
about psychological events and the same applies to students.
I suspect the discipline, although not without admirable
accomplishments, is not as advanced as it could be because
when psychologists were educated, their teachers did not get
to the essentials with sufficient clarity.
Another guideline I try to follow may seem to be inconsistent
with getting to the fundamentals of scientific behavior, but
if one thinks broadly, it ends up "making sense." That is, a major
"theme" of the course is bridging the gap between science and
practice. One of the frequently acknowledged problems with
the discipline is the gap between what used to be called
'experimental psychology' and 'clinical psychology.'
The gap is most visible with the failures for practitioners
to base services on guidelines following from science:
use empirically supported procedures, use data instead of
intuition to monitor and evaluate services, base conclusions
about clients on observation and observational inference.
To help bridge the gap, I attempt to teach the fundamentals
using a good deal of applied/clinical content and illustrations.
For example, I stress observation. One tool for this is a lab
in which students record events from an actual case available
on videotape. Instruction on data and data collection
and psychological measurement is given, in part, with the
aid of having students administer, score, and interpret some
clinically useful self-report assessment instruments.
The classic experimental model is addressed but not endorsed.
It is handled in a less biased way: predictor and criterion
variables, relationships, correlations, predicability,
generalizability of statements of relationships between
variables. Independence and dependence are seen as interpre-
tations (constructs) imposed on the events of experimentation.
Now, although the course is not mainstream with all the
baggage of lineal mechanism, science as separate from the
behavior of people, science as separate from and superior to
practice, and so on, it is not publically a PCT one.
The one major area of the course is taken as methodology
(fundamental ways in which participants in a discipline
discover and evaluate the discipline's knowledge claims).
Although PCT definitely has implications for methodology
in the behavioral sciences, I do not feel that it is
necessary to teach PCT under the conditions in which I
teach "Experimental Psychology." Instead, at this point,
I try to use PCT in many ways without explicitly teaching
it. One rational here is that PCT captures principles
for smoothly running intrapersonal and multipersonal
systems. For example, one does not have to study PCT
to conclude that cooperation is more desirable than
competition, that students and clients are better off
when they are allowed to be active participants in
the world than when they are treated as passive recipients
of environmental stimulation, that coercion has fall out,
that intrinsically-motivated behavior is more enduring
than behavior occurring for external rewards such as gold
stars or good grades. If I can help students arrive at
PCT-compatible points such as these within the context
of studying what is involved in basing psychology on
science, I will be satisfied. [Certainly, study of
PCT will reveal the likely bases for the PCT-compatible
points and may help the student advance further, but
one must walk before they run.... I go so far as to
hypothesize that the best candidates for PCT therapy
(who will deeply understand and use PCT) are those who
have discovered PCT-compatible principles independently of
PCT as opposed to students who have PCT forced upon them.
Would not PCT predict this?]
I have concluded that for the typical member of our
culture (and it seems pretty much the same over the
globe, Eastern philosophies notwithstanding) advance-
ment to the modern behavioral science of the sort
represented by PCT will begin after forthrightly
addressing the fundamental distinction between the
received 19th-century one-way, cause-->effect lineal
mechanism still carrying the day in popular and mainstream
psychology and the radical departure from this in the
form of circular causality, <-->, interdependence (not
independence and dependence), field/system as basic units,
and so on. Up to the present, the movement from lineal
mechanism to the interdependencies of fields/systems
has been implicit for most of the Experimental course. When I
have finally explicitly addressed this rather late in the
term, it has been received with indications of understanding.
I now am inclined to introduce this "up front"; hence,
the next paragraph.
Finally, what is the point of the above long-winded (yet
sketchy) account? I am requesting you to say something
to students as they begin their course in Experimental
Psychology. I would like to e-mail all students a file
with what you see above followed by your appended messages
"TO STUDENTS BEGINNING EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY" (or however
YOU head YOUR message). [The file would even contain this
paragraph.]
From the fellow with an interest in controlling people,
Dennis Delprato
Department of Psychology
Eastern Michigan University
Ypsilanti, MI 48197
psy_delprato@online.emich.edu