Is Psychology real science?

Inspired by another thread !ifrickinglovescience

What's your definition of "real science?" It's not clear what "real science" or even "the scientific method" refers to because the methods employed by scientists are actually quite heterogeneous. For example, is science all about "making testable predictions in advance of falsifying observations?" Well, what about astronomy and anatomy, where a lot of "science" is just... brute empiricism (also known as "just looking").

A lot of psychology is just looking. For example, developmental psychologists watch babies grow up and notice all sorts of interesting things and then just... write them down. For instance, did you know that 3 month old infants will look surprised when they see the law of object permanence violated? Apparently babies come into the world with some organization in advance of experience that allows them to grasp basic physical principles and build up expectations about how objects will behave based on their experiences.

I like what you pointed out that we just have to look sometimes, but it falls apart because of one simple reason... reproducibility. Does the heart always pump blood? Yes, unless the person is dead of course. About 5 liters apparently. This uniformity, this measurement, the near infinitel reproducibility of this observation I would say does make it real science.

What's the difference between you and everyone else who has just started learning about a topic and immediately thinks they know everything about it?

Plus, like, if you think the phrase 'the research suggests' is unscientific I am unsure as to what you think science actually is. You'll find that phrase in papers for every scientific discipline; it's a very scientific phrase. What is the problem here?

https://old.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/82uefr/cmv_psychology_is_not_a_real_science_and_its/

https://old.reddit.com/r/AcademicPsychology/comments/gb0pql/what_are_the_common_arguments_against_psychology/

https://old.reddit.com/r/askpsychology/comments/wyut6j/why_is_psychology_not_seen_as_a_science_by_many/

I think psych as a field is still represented in media by therapy, which is super stigmatized and has an unfortunate history. It is irritating when other science people dismiss psych, because we literally use the same scientific method.

The hard science in Physics in the early stages is based on simple mathematical relationships such as F=ma . This is also easily shown via experiment to be true and is also shown to be correct astronomically throughout the universe.

The hard science in psychology is one of a more statistical nature and also must contain many assumptions. It is more difficult to understand to the layman.

!mathematics thoughts on that?

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/kz43n/dear_reddit_do_you_think_psychology_is_a_science/

I had PTSD. Shit is crazy. Mental illness and the treatments..therapy tactics and meds are very real. I had textbook PTSD and textbook treatment

What are thoughts dramanauts?

What is psychology?

- 117 votes