The General Psychological Crisis and its Comparative Psychological Resolution
General Material Designation
[Article]
First Statement of Responsibility
Tolman, Charles W.
SUMMARY OR ABSTRACT
Text of Note
The crisis in general psychology is identified as one of theoretical indeterminacy. An important source of indeterminacy is the form of generalization that emphasizes classification and common characters and identifies the general with the abstract. Determinate theory requires a form of generalization that identifies the general with the concrete and emphasizes genesis and interconnection. In order to overcome its crisis, general psychology thus requires the kind of evolutionary methodology that comparative psychology is, historically speaking, best prepared to provide.