Book Notes

The Psychological Record -     

Book Reviews

The Psychological Record -     

CONCEPTUALIZING INTELLIGENCE: FROM AN INTERNAL STATIC ATTRIBUTION TO THE STUDY OF THE PROCESS STRUCTURE OF ORGANISM-ENVIRONMENT RELATIONSHIPS

The concept of intelligence is analyzed in this article from the standpoint of social attributions, related to the meanings of intelligence-terms in language. In various non-Western cultures, the meaning of “intelligence ”includes characteristics of social transaction, along with cognitive characteristics. This cultural relativity of the meaning of “intelligence ”pinpoints the difficulties in the building of a general theory of intelligence on the basis of the meaning of “intelligence ”in the common sense of a given culture. Psychology's task is to transcend the limitations of the common sense of the background culture of the psychologists, instead of proposing theories based on the culture-specific common sense. The article outlines three types of causal attributions (internal, external, relationship) and two ways of conceptualizing the causes (static and dynamic). In psychology, as well as in the common sense of laymen from different cultures, intelligence has been traditionally conceptualized in terms of static internal causal attribution. At times, cultures' folkways have provided the basis for attributing intelligence to the personified environment of the person. An ecological reconceptualization of intelligence in terms of a dynamic person-environment causal attribution is proposed in the paper. If intelligence is conceptualized as a dynamic relationship between the actor and the environment, in the activity of goal-directed problem-solving, then it cannot be attributed to either the person, or the environment. This ecological conceptualization of intelligence is based on the theoretical heritage of Lewin, Brunswick, Vygotsky and Köhler. The article emphasizes the necessity of thinking about intelligence within a comparative-cultural perspective.     

Could Presentism in the Histories of Psychology Actually be Futuristic?

Disputes about the origins of psychology in the history of the discipline are functional not for our understanding of the past, but as normative signs that regulate the construction of ideas in the future. We introduce the notion of open-ended normativity that regulates the development of a given discipline towards its future. Hence the question of the cultural origins of psychology becomes contested in the 21st century as an important topic. It proves that the history of psychology is an active participant in the making of psychology, as it is creating its future.     

Integrating Psychology within the Globalizing World: A <Emphasis Type="Italic">Requiem</Emphasis> to the Post-Modernist Experiment with <Emphasis Type="Italic">Wissenschaft</Emphasis>

Since the new beginning in 2007 of Integrative Psychological & Behavioral Science we have brought out to the open both the reasons why the ever-widening research enterprise in psychology has largely failed to produce general knowledge, and to point to promising new directions in the field. The post-modernist turn in psychology is now over, and it is an interesting task to return to creating a universal science of psychology that is context-sensitive, and culture-inclusive. The latter goal entails a renewed focus upon qualitative analyses of time-based processes, close attention to the phenomena under study, and systematic (single-system-based—usually labeled idiographic) focus in empirical investigations. Through these three pathways centrality of human experiencing of culturally constructed worlds is restored as the core of psychological science. Universal principles are evident in each and every single case. Transcending post-modernist deconstruction of science happens through active international participation and a renewed focus on creating general theories. Contemporary psychology is global in ways that no longer can any country’s socio-political world view dominate the field. Such international equality of contributions grants innovation of the core of the discipline, and safeguards it against assuming any single cultural myth-story as the axiomatic basis for the discipline.

Environmental psychology in the U.S.S.R.

A preliminary version of this paper was presented at the 19th National Convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Boston, November, 5, 1987.     

Book Reviews

The Psychological Record -     

Looking Across Cultural Gender Boundaries

This Special Issue on gender brings the issues of feelings about gender role boundaries to the forefront of our inquiries. Boundaries are the domains where psychological processes act- they function as membranes (in the biological sense). The use of boundary notion in psychological theorizing may take the discipline beyond its current projection of essentialist causal agents into the human psyche.     

Scaffolding within the structure of Dialogical Self: Hierarchical dynamics of semiotic mediation

Scaffolding is a notion that allows us to conceptualize direction towards change. As a form of guidance, scaffolding may result in both change and non-change. In this paper I apply the notion of scaffolding by signs (semiotic mediation) to the theory of Dialogical Self (DS). The DS is a construct that brings into psychology a new way of theoretical thought—thinking in dualities. Dualities are systemic units of two opposites that are mutually related by functional dynamic relations. Within the theory of DS, human psychological functioning is explained by transformations of constantly changed I-positions that are mapped both structurally (internal/external) and temporally (past/present/future). Semiotic mediation within the DS guarantees the person's psychological distancing from the here-and-now setting. This distancing is guided by promoter signs—generalized meanings of field-like form that orient the self's transformation. These signs are parts of the semiotic mediating processes where higher-level signs guide the range of openness of the sign hierarchy itself for further transformation when that is needed.     

What Is in a Name? Understanding the Implications of Participant Terminology

The authors discuss the history of research terminology in American psychology with respect to the various labels given to those upon whom we conduct research (“observer”–“subject”–“participant”–“client”). This history is supplemented with an analysis of participant terminology in APA manuals from four historical eras, from the 1950s to the present. The general trend in participant terminology reflects the overall trends in American psychology, beginning with a complex lexicon that admitted both the passive and the active research participant, followed by a dominance of the passive term ‘subject’ and ending with the terminological ambiguity and multiplicity reflected in contemporary psychology. This selective history serves to contextualize a discussion of the meaning, functions, and implications of the transformations in, and debates over, participant terminology.