Review of Problems of theoretical psychology.

Abstract

CHARLES W. TOLMAN, FRANCES CHERRY, RENE VANHERZEWIJK, AND IAN LUBEK (Eds.)Problems of Theoretical PsychologyNorth York, ON: Captus University Publications,1996, xiv + 387 pages (ISBN 1-896691-17-X,Cdn$40.00, US$33.50, Softcover)Reviewed by JACK MARTINThis is sixth volume of selected, edited proceedings of biennial conferences of International Society for Theoretical Psychology (ISTP). All of contributions to current volume have been drawn from symposia and papers presented at sixth conference held at Carlton University, May 21-26, 1995. For those unfamiliar with ISTP, it is useful to note consistently influential involvement of Canadian psychologists throughout its brief history. In fact, it was partially as a result of visits to University of Alberta's Centre for Advanced Study in Theoretical Psychology in mid-1980s by psychologists such as Michael Hyland (Plymouth Polytechnic) and Hans van Rappard (Free University of Amsterdam), that idea of Society emerged and developed, culminating in its formal founding and first major conference in Plymouth, UK, in 1985 (Mos & Kuiken, 1998). Since then, a number of distinguished theoretical psychologists working in Canada (William Baker, Leendert Mos, Henderikus Stam, Warren Thorngate, Ian Lubek, Charles Tolman, and Frances Cherry) have served as editors for six volumes of published conference proceedings which have appeared between 1987 and 1996. active, significant participation of Canadian scholars in activities of Society continues in this current volume, with over a third of 56 contributors working in Canada.The 40 papers published in Problems of Theoretical Psychology are grouped into seven sections, first two of which were presented as symposia at Carleton conference. papers in remaining five sections are grouped thematically under headings: Language, Discourse, and Meaning; Cognition and Cognitive Science; Social Psychology; Personality, Self, and Identity; and Methodological and Historical Issues.The first three papers to appear in book are by John Shotter, Kenneth Gergen, and Henderikus Stam, respectively, and were presented in a symposium concerned with The Constructionist Challenge to Metatheory. Oddly enough, all of these pieces, in different ways, challenge very possibility of a theoretical psychology capable of advancing psychological knowledge and practice in ways consistent with what seems to have been initial aims and commitments of Society. According to Tolman (in his Preface to current volume), these founding ambitions were mostly consistent with Sigmund Koch's (1951, p. 295) advocacy of the pursuit of theoretical psychology as defined by a set of modest objectives, geared to a realistic estimate of status of our knowledge. In Tolman's words, These objectives converged on deliberate, intelligent, systematic, and collective effort to improve general understanding of methodological and other foundational problems of psychological theory and to contribute directly to construction of theory in discipline (p. ix).The lead-off papers (especially those by Shotter and Stam) are skeptical of this theoretical project, and represent view that attempts to salvage a traditional epistemological role for theoretical psychology should give way to a less lofty pursuit of clarifying pragmatics and performatives. Two additional papers in first section by Leon Rappoport and Leendert Mos provide critical and elaborative commentary on possibility and implications of these and other conceptions of theory as practice. significance of this first group of papers is nested partly in history of Society itself, but also in larger, later 20th century interpretivist, discursive, and postmodern turns in philosophy of social science. Considered together, these papers emphasize extent to which concern for language, meaning, discourse, narrative, history, phenomenology, hermeneutics, and practice has increasingly replaced, or significantly reconfigured, traditional epistemology and foundationalist metaphysics in theoretical studies. …