science needs a paradigm

• What is a paradigm?

  This is a set of rules and assumptions that govern how the subject is investigated.
• Kuhn (1962): 'Psychology is pre-paradigmatic'
• Psychology not a science 


  • There is no single paradigm (i.e. a shared set of assumptions)
  • Has several paradigms or approaches like biological and behaviourist
  • Psychologists may claim that their discoveries are facts, but this might be risky if the facts are not actually correct
• Psychology has several paradigms or approaches


  Unlike other sciences like biology or physics which have a united set of assumptions
• The biological approach believes behaviour is based on nature and behaviourist believe that it is nurture
• This challenges the notion that psychology is a science because there are many different theories so there is no common method of investigation for behaviour, meaning that psychology cannot fit the criteria to be a science, as there is no single paradigm or united set of assumptions
• Valentine (1992): 'Behaviourism can be regarded as at least coming close to a paradigm. Behaviourism has led to a massive influence on psychology through its insistence that psychology is the study of behaviour, and behaviour should be observed in a controlled environment. It had great influence through its theoretical assumptions that the study of learning is important within psychology, and learning can be understood in terms of conditioning principles.'
• Behaviourist approach and every one that followed


  Has been studied objectively, such as in labs
• Behaviourists valued scientific methods to study behaviour, which has since been followed by others, making psychology more objective and likely to meet the criteria for being a science
• This supports the view that psychology is a science
• mini conclusion


  Psychology partially meets the requirements of having a paradigm to be a science. It does not meet it completely as other sciences do. However, it cannot meet these requirements fully because psychology has to maintain flexibility as human behaviour is also flexible. It adapts its paradigms to changing behaviour. However, we could argue that each approach within psychology has the same aim, to understand human

  behaviour.