Revisiting Hot Spots in Psychology

In my previous post, I introduced three current debates in the field of psychology. Here I will connect these current debates to the past, to give them a bit of context.

Psychology and Neuroscience: Allies or Antagonists?

Historical connections
Way back in the time of Descartes (1596-1650), he came up with the theory of mind-body duality. Basically, his theory was that the mind was different than the brain itself. His theory prevailed for hundreds of years. In the Enlightenment era, John Locke wrote about psychology in his Essay on Human Understanding, where he argued that all mankind come to Earth with our minds as a blank slate (tabula rasa), and that it is through our senses alone that we perceive and learn things. It has been argued that this line of thought had a great impact in the development of psychological empiricism today. Another theme of the Enlightenment was an emphasis on evaluating human nature, which is still part of psychology today. Later, in the Romantic Era, feelings and emotions became more important to people, and that still makes up a huge part of modern psychology.

Neuroscience is more the study of the physical brain, instead of the mind, and it really began in the Enlightenment Era (which housed the Scientific Revolution). Although there was some speculation about the function of the brain in the times of ancient Greeks (Aristotle argued that the brain was the radiator of the body), real brain studies and examinations didn't happen until much later. In the Renaissance, people used to examine the brains of the deceased to learn more about them. Perhaps the birth of neuroscience could be considered to be in the early 1800s with Franz Josef Gall, the "inventor" of phrenology (the idea that the shape of your skull has everything to do with your personality traits, etc.). When he was challenged by Flourens, who argued that there is no localization of function in the brain (which he attempted to prove by ablating random parts of pigeon's brains), neuroscience really took off. 

• Communication connections
  Honestly, I wonder how much communication happens between the fields of psychology and neuroscience. As a psychology student myself, I hear a lot about psychological studies and schools of thought, but not a lot about neuroscience, even though it is so related to my field. I wonder if we could somehow implement more neuroscience education into the psychology curriculum and vice versa, if this would even be a debate at all.

Ethics in Psychology Research

• Historical connections
  The idea of ethics needing to be regulated within psychology research stems from a couple of notable psychological studies: The Tuskegee Study and Milgram's Obedience Study. In both of these studies, the researcher's didn't really consider human rights and respect for persons (ideas that really came about in the Enlightenment Era), and they eventaully led to the creation of the  Institutional Review Board (IRB), which is the committee that determines if a proposed study is ethical. 

• Communication connections
  One connection a research proposal might have to communication is invention, one of the canons of rhetoric. When a scientist proposes an idea to the IRB, they try to be as persuasive as possible to get their idea through--they make it seem like the benefits outweigh the risks, and it will add something valuable to the existing literature. 

Perceptions of Psychology

• Historical connections
  Back in the time of the Renaissance, the printing press was invented. This allowed many more people access to books and an education, which was a total game changer at the time. Later in the time of the Enlightenment, the public sphere became a big way of communicating ideas, with things like magazines. People could pretty much print whatever they wanted in these publications, and they were spread out to a wide audience. More people could write about whatever they wanted, and pretty much everyone had access to it.
  Fast forward to today, the digital age, when anyone can say anything and it has the potential to reach an worldwide audience. That is a great blessing in a lot of ways, but it is also a good way to spread misinformation. Hence, a lot of what people think of psychology isn't actually what psychology is today.

• Communication connections
  Like I mentioned above, the public sphere is a huge way we get information, be it true or false. I suspect that in an effort to get people to read what they have written about psychology, some people may oversimplify things or make sweeping generalizations that aren't really true. That is a good way to get readers, because not a lot of people want to spend time reading dense scientific papers, so the authors have the audience in mind, but I fear that sometimes they may sacrifice important information in order to get their view count up. I think if we can create a style of rhetoric that is easier to understand than a scientific paper while still keeping all of the valuable information, that would be a big win. 

I still feel like the third topic is the most interesting to me, because it applies to so many people. I would love some help making more connection to communication with the other topics. Psychology and mental health in general have a huge impact on everyone's life, and I think if we can use effective rhetorical techniques to spread accurate information, everyone can benefit.

Image Credit: "Nat's Brain" by nats is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0