Epistemological borders, the discursive production of social psychological knowledge

Abstract

This document represents an attempt to critically examine current social psychological research practices by placing them in historical context. My main objective in the first three chapters is to persuade the reader of the fundamentally social character of knowledge production. Chapter one focuses on criticisms of academic psychology at the institutional, methodological and rhetorical levels. Chapter two reviews psychology's early methodological development, focusing on the gradual institutionalization of the multiple groups experimental research design. The establishment of a 'psychological ' social psychology during the same period is examined within this context. Chapter three examines the "crisis" in social psychology during the 1960s and 1970s. The focus is on the self-criticisms of psychologists and social psychologists regarding experimental approaches to social research. My main objective in the final two chapters is to account for the maintenance of an experimental approach to knowledge productionthrough an examination of educational practices. Chapter four highlights the social character of educational and research practices. Chapter five focuses on aspects of both past and current educational practices of the Department of Psychology at the University of Manitoba from an institutional ethnographic perspective. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)