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David Faust

Publications and source records attributed to David Faust.

6 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2006

Paul Meehl as methodologist-philosopher of science: the formulation of metascience.

Paul Meehl's contributions to methodology and the philosophy of science extend well beyond his widely known writings in such areas as construct validity and statistical significance testing. I describe one of Meehl's less well-known, but potentially most important, methodological undertakings: his work on metascience, or the science of science. Metascience could ultimately revolutionize our conceptualizations and understanding of science and provide considerable help to practicing scientists and scientific endeavors, including efforts to advance the development and appraisal of theories in psychology.

Famous Persons↗
PubMed2005

Why Paul Meehl will revolutionize the philosophy of science and why it should matter to psychologists.

Paul Meehl was a person of remarkable genius who made many seminal contributions to psychology and other fields. One of his most important, but less widely known potential contributions is the codevelopment, and the extension and elaboration of meta-science, or the science of science. Meta-science involves applying more rigorous methods (than are usually used) to the study of episodes in the history of science, or the historical track record, in order to address long-standing questions in the philosophy and history of science, aid in the selection of optimally effective methodology, and assist the scientist in higher level and complex integrative judgments (e.g., theory evaluation). Psychologists, given their methodological sophistication, can be major contributors to meta-scientific efforts and to the development of this field.

History, 20th Century↗
PubMed2003

Holistic thinking is not the whole story: alternative or adjunct approaches for increasing the accuracy of legal evaluations.

There are a number of very helpful, but often underutilized, principles and procedures that can augment decision making in clinical and legal settings. Psychologists often restrict their range of decision-making strategies and options--at the cost of maximizing diagnostic and predictive accuracy--in part as the result of "ontological-epistemological one-worldedness" (O-E O-W). However, no philosophical, logical, or scientific necessity demands strict consistency between views regarding the nature of psychological phenomena and views about how to best assess or learn about those phenomena. Relaxing this unnecessary and largely psychologically-based O-E O-W may promote greater comfort with and utilization of the methods that are discussed in this article for increasing judgmental accuracy.

Decision Making↗
PubMed2002

Iatrogenic symptoms in psychotherapy. A theoretical exploration of the potential impact of labels, language, and belief systems.

Although the mental health professions are effective in ameliorating personal distress, treatment can sometimes have negative consequences. The authors explore causal mechanisms for iatrogenic symptoms in therapy by discussing the processes by which clients may be socialized into therapy and the potential impact that psychiatric labels and language may have in influencing clients' self-perceptions. The authors review research that has examined possible negative effects of psychiatric labels and then examine other forms of language, categorization, and conceptualizations that may contribute to negative effects in therapy. Iatrogenic symptoms may originate through the over-reliance on a belief system within which therapists interpret, reinterpret, or label clients' characteristics or distress as pathological. Therapeutic communication that emphasizes pejorative language may introduce clients to this belief system. Iatrogenic symptoms may also provide clients and therapists with secondary gains. Possible approaches for minimizing iatrogenic symptoms are explored.

Culture↗