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Three Endorsements and a Question

Commentary on the Wallachs' Paper

Gregory A. Kimble

Duke University, kimble{at}psych.duke.edu

As Lise and Michael Wallach (2001) demonstrate, much social psychological research is gratuitous because, so often, experiments in that discipline merely confirm a set of unfalsifiable presuppositions. In spite of that major flaw, however, social psychological research may make important contributions, by revealing the effectiveness of manipulations that may be either stronger or weaker than common sense suggests, by helping us understand real-life phenomena, and by showing how desired ends may be achieved by practical means. My only quibble with the paper concerns the Wallachs' ideas about the status and functioning of psychological concepts. If they assume, as they sometimes seem to, that concepts are identities with independent existence apart from observation, I take exception. Social psychological phenomena should be treated as expressions of more general principles of a very general psychology that begins with empirical evidence.

Key Words: confirmation • empirical evidence • psychological concepts • social psychology

Theory & Psychology, Vol. 11, No. 4, 475-478 (2001)
DOI: 10.1177/0959354301114002
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L. Wallach and M. A. Wallach
A Response on Concepts, Laws and Measurement in Social Psychology
Theory Psychology, August 1, 2001; 11(4): 489 - 494.
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