Implicit Epistemology Research Articles

The Development of Implicit Epistemologies During Early and Middle Adulthood

This study examined the development of implicit epistemologies of Finnish adults during the last ten years. It was hypothesized that specific adult experiences are stimulating for development. Moreover, a person's exploratory orientation was hypothesized to be related to development. Kitchener and King's model and method of Reflective Judgment provided tools to study adolescents' and adults' epistemologies and their possible development. Participants (N = 59) were given initial (1986–1988) and follow-up (1993–1994) Reflective Judgment interviews. The age range was from 24–50 years in the follow-up groups. The Reflective Judgment mean stage scores clearly increased during the two study periods (M1 = 4.64,M2 = 5.10; F(1, 58) = 32.82, p = .000). Education, in particular education beyond a person's primary profession/occupation, was a strong predictor of development. Also, encountering diversity and exploratory orientation were related to development, but their connections were more complicated. No gender differences were found. The results support the idea that positive changes in thinking and reasoning take place during adulthood.

Owning the Story: Ethical Considerations in Narrative Research

This article argues that traditional, regulative principles of research ethics offer insufficient guidance for research in the narrative study of lives. These principles presuppose an implicit epistemology that conceives of research participants as data sources, a conception that is argued not tenable for narrative research. The case is made by drawing on recent discussions of research ethics in the qualitative and narrative research literature. This article shows that narrative ethics is inextricably entwined with epistemological issues--namely, issues of narrative ownership and the multiplicity of narrative meaning. Finally, practical recommendations are made for the ethical treatment of research participants in narrative research. The article concludes by situating our approach with respect to the broad range of contemporary perspectives on research ethics.

Activity, apprenticeship, and epistemological appropriation: Implications from the writings of..

Cultural psychology stresses the inexplicable relation between situational context and activity. By being engaged in an activity, individuals appropriate not only the explicit mediational signs and artifacts (participatory appropriation), but also the implicit contextual cultural beliefs and epistemologies held by the social individuals (referred to as epistemological appropriation). The appropriation of hidden "rules of the art" (Polanyi, 1964), such as beliefs, has not been emphasized in sociocultural studies, and the aim of this article is to describe the regulatory behaviors for epistemological appropriation. Polanyi's (1964) work on apprenticeship suggests some important regulatory behaviors for the learner-submitting to authority, following your master, and commitment to practicing-for epistemological appropriation. In this article, these self-regulatory processes have been referred to as submitting, mirroring, and constructing, and these processes are contrasted with the other-regulatory processes of scaffolding, modeling, and coaching, respectively. The article concludes with directions for future research.

What is Real? Speculations on Hood's Implicit Epistemology and Theology

Hood's article on Mysticism, Reality, Illusion, and the Freudian Critique of Religion is examined from a constructivist point of view. Hood's misinterpretation of Freudian statements and of recent developments within psychoanalysis are due to an outdated conception of "reality." We suggest that Hood's use of Freud might serve an apologetic, theological purpose. Hood has written a remarkable article that, after reading and rereading, leaves us confused. Whereas, in the empirical study of religion, Hood has produced fine scholarship, we find it difficult to catch the point he wants to make with this text. One must appreciate, of course, that he claims attention for Freud's theories of religion and enters a dialogue with recent authors in the psychoanalysis of religion, but it is doubtful whether he has done justice to Freud or Freud's successors. Moreover, Hood seems to have missed the essence of the present development of constructivism and contextualism in philosophy and psychology, and his argument rings an apologetic bell.

Misrecognition and Knowledge

Explanation and knowledge have traditionally been guided by and judged in terms of the ideal of the neutral reflection of reality. Kuhn's work on the sciences, and Bourdieu's and Kenneth Burke's discussions of knowledge and society, suggest that this ideal and the implicit epistemology that goes with it are in error. Their writings suggest instead that such an ideal masks the inadequacy of its own implicit epistemology by misrecognizing the effects of that inadequacy. That is, their writings suggest a sort of collective self‐deception by members of the knowledge community. The knowledge of brain damage among culturally deprived children is used to illustrate how this misrecognition and masking take place.

B. F. Skinner and the Technological Control of Social Behavior

Humanist critiques of B. F. Skinner have made valuable contributions to our understanding of his thought, but more attention needs to be paid to his work as potential empirical theory. To evaluate the theoretical merits of Skinner's approach, this paper examines his methodological postulates, his implicit epistemology, and some underlying normative assumptions. It is argued that Skinnerian behaviorism commits a serious error in allowing a methodological presupposition (reduction of the subject matter to observable behavior of the organism) to become a de facto ontology that prematurely forecloses the incorporation of potentially valuable hypothetical constructs at the level of social theory. This theoretical difficulty is critical because the inherent safeguards of science that Skinner proposes as a humane safeguard against misuse would be unlikely to apply to an actual technology of behavior control as employed by political and administrative authorities.