The concept sociogenesisunanimously, has been defined as the study of the social origin of Psychology, that is, the influence of social factors in its constitution as a science and the way in which they influenced at the time as well as continue to influence the different psychological perspectives.
All this raised with a critical approach, questioning the approaches that have supported scientific psychology and raising the biases and assumed truths.
Of relevance, the interdisciplinarity and its criticalityjust like him promotion of reflective posture regarding what has been given to us as absolute and true.
Before entering the concepts of Scientific Psychology, Positivism, Socioconstructivism, an attempt has been made to establish a definition of the concept Science.
The concept of science is, in itself, problematic and its discussion and analysis in depth is a matter of the philosophy of science or epistemology. Various definitions have been given in the debate in this regard, such as “…a way of acquiring and organize knowledge…”, “…the most powerful tool we have to know why things like this happen in our world…like the only valid mode that to date the human being has been able to create to interpret the phenomena that surround us Y establish principles in order to organize our reality, avoiding possible subjectivity…” “…way of making generalizations based on research carried out by observations, analyses, comparisons, hypotheses, trials, experimentsetc…” “…the way of understanding ourselves and the world around us to acquire knowledge based on empirically demonstrable reasons…” “…as a activity that is strongly linked to the environment and to the historical moment, as well as the scientist who performs the activity… their values and beliefs, attitudes, perceptions of reality, strongly influence the direction of their work…”.
There has also been talk of the “Club that proclaims itself to be an elite of thinkers”, which imposes general rules -the scientific method- that determine and circumscribe a path to act in the context in which they are located, using a series of instruments created by themselves that legitimizes them to act as such.
As can be verified, basically, the answer to the question: What is Science for you? has been that is a way to gain knowledgewho becomes a scientist and belongs to the Science, when it is extracted from reality with precise methods and tools, integrating itself into a system of concepts, theories and laws: an ordered system of propositions derived from principles. Although it is clear that all knowledge links (subjective) mental procedures with (objective) practical activities, science seeks the dominance of the objective through consistent explanations, predictions, and control of natural phenomena. Thus, scientific knowledge can be generalized and can be predicted. . This knowledge will resist reality checks, discard metaphysical explanations, and use first-hand sources.
It is undeniable to think that science is an eternal idea, which can be considered with a permanent and eternal content of the world. The sciences are not eternal, but are themselves historical configurations. Nor are they uniform, since there are very different contents, norms, institutions, etc…
At the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, in which new contents and institutions began to take shape, science appears in its modern sense, which is considered Science in the strict sense. Science came to the fore during the 18th and 19th centuries, and in the 20th century, it will be recognized as a fundamental content of our world.
It is at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, when the Positivism, in a field fertilized by the technological changes of the Industrial Revolution, and the decay of the metaphysical and religious sense of knowledge. It is a doctrine that Comte summarizes through his Law of the Three Stages, marking the beginning of the Historicity of Human Knowledge. The term Positivism was first used by Auguste Comte, however, some of the positivist concepts can clearly be traced back to Hume, Kant, and Saint-Simon.
The general idea of the debate regarding Positivism has been that it does not admit other knowledge as scientifically valid, but those who come from experience.
The fact is the only scientific reality and experience and induction are the exclusive methods of Science. It privileges the experimental and statistical method as an element that guarantees the capture of reality in a pure way, excluding the participation of the subjectivity of the scientist. What is not captured by the senses, which is not tangible, would be doing metaphysics. He conceives of “neutral” science, by eliminating subjectivity, the ideal scientist being the one who dispenses with his humanity.
As the most distinctive features of Positivism, the assumption of rationality, the attempt to measure everything, data as the highest expression of scientific truththe experimentation as sole judge, with a clear pragmatic orientation. As a central idea that science should use theories as instruments to predict observable phenomena and renouncing to seek explanations. Only the possibility of scientifically studying the facts, the phenomena, the experiential data, the observable, the verifiable is considered, in an attempt to define it in the most objective way possible, regardless of the subjectivity of the researchers, of the origins and psychological conditions. -social, using at all times the verification in the experience and in the observation of the phenomena.
This conception expanded to all branches of knowledge, including social facts that are also treated as things.
In regards to the Psychologyone of its biggest problems, as a particular discipline, has been that it lacks a natural and proper object, unanimous or at least widely accepted.
According to the concept of science, the claim to make scientific knowledge the only valid knowledge worthy of being considered as such is what has pushed Psychology to try to find a way to carry out its activity within the parameters accepted as scientific, as It is Positivism. In this context, the cultural and historical aspect, which we cannot deny, has disturbed psychology and has sown confusion.
As Heidbreder E. already said: “At all times, especially in the United States, psychology has tried by all means to be science; and in principle, science abstains from all speculation not penetrated and consolidated by the facts. However, in all psychological science there are not enough facts to found a single and solid system.“. (“Psychologies of the XX century”, p. 17.).
In this way, the Psychology scientific Positivistwhich is instituted in terms of true knowledge as it has been raised in the debate, has rejected any concept that does not come from experience, Being the made the only scientific reality. Through observation and experimentation, he tries to explain reality by formulating laws, establishing generalizable connections between variables, using the hypothetical-deductive method. One of the characteristics of Positivist Scientific Psychology, which in my opinion is highly critical, is the fact of denying the investigated objects their social content, following the guide of scientific rationality for which particularity and concreteness do not exist, in a search for general explanations.
It does not deal with emotions, motivations or conscience, with an eminently subjective and unobservable weight, being eliminated as an object of study. All these eliminations can be interpreted as a means to establish a method as “scientific” as possible or as close to what is called “scientific” in its struggle to establish itself as experimental science.
As an example of positivist scientific psychology, the objective psychology of Pavlov and Bejterev’s Russian reflexology, Throndike with the law of effect and his stimulus-response theory, and Behaviorism have been mentioned. A behaviorist will say: “what I cannot account for in empirically observable terms (scientifically) is not part of my inquiry as a scientist“.
By way of example, Watson affirmed the need to completely get rid of concepts such as consciousness and mind because they lack meaning in terms of the requirements of the scientific method and replace them with others that do meet them, such as behavior; he said: “If psychology wants to become a science it must follow the example of the physical sciences, that is, become materialistic, mechanistic, deterministic, and objective.“. This way of studying behavior denies the really important factors in the understanding of human behavior, emptying knowledge of reflection and turning it merely into a descriptive discipline with the sole purpose of being able to be applied.
From these sectors, typically positivists and experimentalists, the character of science is denied to psychoanalysis (and its variants), phenomenological-existential, comprehensive, humanistic and transpersonal psychology. Everything that does not respond strictly to the scientific parameters of positivism is generically qualified, from this particular perspective, as “speculative”, “aprioristic”, “non-empirical” and “non-verifiable”.
It has been said in the debate that it is “logical” to continue being a positivist scientist, among other reasons, for reasons of professional recognition and to be considered a truly scientific person. In positivism there are no hidden or non-measurable variables, which is why the union of scientists only admit these facts as true, with validity and reliability when the test can be repeated with the same results. Quantitative psychology is much simpler than qualitative psychology, but human beings are not only made up of mathematical or logical and experimental systems, but go much further.
In this sense, there has been a consensus.
The Socioconstructionism, which is not presented in the article by Tomás Ibáñez, was defined by Kenneth Gergen as a “movement”, a set of theoretical elements in progression, loose, open and with changing and imprecise contours, rather than as a strongly coherent and theoretical doctrine. stabilized. It privileges its instituting dimension over its instituted dimension, its process character over its product character, more or less finished.
Knowledge is not in the mind of individuals, nor are words the reflection of the mind or of a pre-existing nature. Following Gergen, “the main source of the words we use about the world lies in the social relationship. From this angle what we call knowledge is not the product of individual minds, but of social exchange; It is not the fruit of individuality but of…