Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychotherapy: Network Principles for a Unified Theory

Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychotherapy

Network Principles for a Unified Theory

Warren W. Tryon

Fordham University, Department of Psychology, Bronx, NY, USA

Table of Contents

Cover image

Title page

Copyright

Preface

How to Use

Section 1. Theoretical Unification

Part One. The Problem

Chapter 1. Introduction

Our Explanatory Problem

Preview

Preliminary Issues

Theoretical Disunification

Need For Explanation

Theoretical Issues

Conclusions

Chapter 2. Issues and Impediments to Theoretical Unification

Previous Proposals

Current Trends

Impediments Against Theoretical Unification

Reasons Against Unification

Conclusions

Part Two. A Proposed Solution

Chapter 3. Core Network Principles: The Explanatory Nucleus

Generic Connectionist Neural Network Model

Principle 1: Unconscious Processing Via the Network Cascade

Principle 2: Learning and Memory

Principle 3: Transformation

Principle 4: Activation and Reactivation

Conclusions

Chapter 4. Corollary Network Principles

Principle 5: Priming

Principle 6: Part–Whole Pattern Completion

Principle 7: Consonance and Dissonance

Principle 8: Dissonance Induction and Reduction

Principle 9: Memory Superposition

Principle 10: Prototype Formation

Principle 11: Graceful Degradation

Principle 12: Top-Down and Bottom-up Processing

Network Theory

Conclusions

Chapter 5. Emotion

Historical Overview

Cognitive Perspective

Subcortical Brain Centers

More About Unconscious Emotion

Emotion and Facial Expressions

Circumplex Structure

Basic Emotions

The Circumplex Emotion Color Wheel and Solid

Secondary and Tertiary Emotions

Encoding Emotions in Connectionist Networks

Emotion and Illness

Emotion and Bird Song

Clinical Applications

Conclusions

Chapter 6. Simulating Psychological Phenomena and Disorders

New Tools and Methods

Simulated Phenomena

Psychological Disorders

Conclusions

Part Three. Evaluation: Criticisms & Rebuttals

Chapter 7. Evaluation, Criticisms, and Rebuttals

Criteria for Evaluating Theories

Types of Supporting Evidence

A Comparative Evaluation

Assessing Theoretical Unification

Mathematical Proof

Theoretical Unification

Mature Science

Conclusions

Section 2. Psychotherapy Integration

Chapter 8. Psychotherapy Integration

Psychotherapy Proliferation

Our Training Problem

Empirically Supported Treatment Issue

Motives for Psychotherapy

Need for Empirically Supported Principles (ESPs)

Psychotherapy Integration Via Theoretical Unification

Conclusions

Chapter 9. Clinical Applications of Principle 1

A Brief History of Unconscious Processing

More About Freud3

Unconscious-Centric Orientation

Clinical Implications of Unconscious Processing

Unconscious Processing in Psychological Treatments

Symptom Substitution

Assessing Unconscious Processing

Insight as Psychological Mindedness

Mirror Neuron System

Gandhi Neuron System

Mentalizing Neuron System

Frontotemporal Dementia

Oxytocin

Conclusions

Chapter 10. Clinical Applications of Principle 2

Think Physical not Mental

Emission and Omission Treatments

Learning vs. Conditioning

Conditioning as Cognition

Psychological Behaviorism

Learning Entails Memory Modification

Conditioning as Empirically Supported CBT Principles

Biofeedback

Implications for Clinical Practice

Theoretical Issues

Conclusions

Chapter 11. Clinical Implications of Network Principles 3–12

Clinical Implications of Principle 3: Transformation

Clinical Implications of Principle 4: Reactivation

Clinical Implications of Principle 5: Priming

Clinical Implications of Principle 6: Part–Whole Pattern Completion

Clinical Implications of Principle 7: Consonance and Dissonance

Clinical Implications of Principle 8: Dissonance Induction and Reduction

Clinical Implications of Principle 9: Memory Superposition

Clinical Implications of Principle 10: Prototype Formation

Clinical Implications of Principle 11: Graceful Degradation

Clinical Implications of Principle 12: Top-Down and Bottom-Up Processing

Conclusions

Chapter 12. Psychotherapy Integration

A Brief History of Psychotherapy Integration

Four Approaches to Psychotherapy Integration

Unifying the Big Five Clinical Orientations

Clinical Practice

Conclusions

References

Index

Copyright

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Preface

¹

Psychology is an immature science with a substantial explanatory problem that has set psychologists against one another and created more than 500 psychotherapies distributed across what I refer to as the Big Five clinical orientations: (a) cognitive; (b) behavioral (applied behavior analysis); (c) cognitive-behavioral; (d) psychodynamic (emotion-focused therapy); and (e) pharmacologic, and their variants that corrosively compete for adherents and practitioners. Widespread resistance to using empirically supported treatments caused by these explanatory problems has further fractionated clinical psychologists. Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychotherapy provides psychotherapy integration via theoretical integration in a way that enables psychology to be practiced as a mature science. The topics of theoretical unification, psychotherapy integration, and how psychology can become a mature science could constitute three separate books, but Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychotherapy integrates them. Psychotherapists can only be expected to treat people alike when they share a common understanding of psychological science. Hence, theoretical unification provides the most meaningful way to achieve psychotherapy integration. My focus on causal mechanisms enabled me to show how psychology could become a mature science.

The theoretical unification that I offer is a start, not an end. It provides a theoretical foundation upon which to construct a mature psychological science, not a final end point of perfection. The proposed core and corollary principles provide a way to begin to work together rather than in mutual isolation or at competitive cross purposes, as is presently the case. It enables us to understand how cognition and affect interact to produce behavior that is based in contemporary cognitive neuroscience.

Section 1 provides a novel and creative approach to theoretical unification. The recommended approach succeeds where all others have failed because it focuses on causal mechanisms where theoretical unification presently exists by default because psychological theories have not made any claims regarding causal mechanisms. Hence, there are no conflicting positions to unify.

The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory is not a new theory in the ordinary sense of needing to be tested to see if it can be empirically supported. Only its organization in terms of core and corollary network principles is new. Its content consists of the unanticipated, unarticulated, and unacknowledged implications of well-replicated psychological phenomena that can be explained by accepted neuroscience and connectionist mechanisms plus multivariate statistics. While additional research is always welcome, the existing empirical support for the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory is so substantial that future research will likely further support rather than contradict all 12 proposed network principles. Hence, the Bio↔Psychology Network Theory is ready for use today. Only its presentation in the form of core and corollary network principles is new. That a wide variety of psychological phenomena can be explained by the network principles that constitute the proposed theory means that it brings theoretical unification to psychological science. Hence, the subtitle: Network Principles for a Unified Theory.

Chapters 1 and 2 discuss the explanatory problems and impediments to theoretical unification presently faced by psychological science. Chapters 3–6 provide a proposed solution in the form of four core and eight corollary network principles that constitute the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory. Chapter 7 presents criticisms of the proposed solution and rebuttals. It also includes 13 novel features and 7 novel predictions made by the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory, in addition to a call for a paradigmatic shift regarding how we think about psychology. Thinking about psychology and behavior in physical rather than mental terms is what Freud (1895) aimed to do in his Project for a Scientific Psychology but could not achieve due to the neuroscience limitations of his day. This book continues and extends Freud’s original work. The required paradigmatic shift includes changing psychology from a conscious-centric to an unconscious-centric psychology.

Section 2 shows how the shared understanding provided by the theoretical unification delivered in Section 1 integrates the Big Five clinical orientations to psychotherapy by providing each of them with their conceptual ‘must haves’. A novel feature of this section is that it focuses on clinical orientations rather than the theories that generated them. Clinical orientations are much broader than the theories that support them and therefore are easier to integrate. For example, one need not believe everything said by every cognitive-behavioral theorist to have a cognitive-behavioral orientation. Nor does one need to believe everything that has been written by every psychoanalytic author to have a psychodynamic orientation. The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory provides a theoretical basis for a comprehensive clinical practice that incorporates the strengths of each of the Big Five clinical orientations while preserving the requirement that therapies be empirically supported. Therapists’ therapeutic goals will expand to include increasing psychological mindedness and emotional regulation, in addition to symptom reduction/removal. Therapists will base their interventions on the core and corollary principles rather than on manuals. Therapists will customize their interventions to their clients’ needs. Principles of operant and respondent conditioning are reauthorized as cognitive-behavioral interventions. All of these developments nurture the scholarly motive for doing psychotherapy and consequently are expected to facilitate widespread acceptance of empirically supported treatments into clinical practice.

The theoretical unification required to provide psychotherapy integration entails a paradigm shift precipitated by the following two anomalies: (a) all psychological theories lack causal mechanism information because they are functional theories; and (b) there is no psychological substrate for psychological mechanisms to operate on. Hence, psychological mechanisms based on causal mechanisms do not exist because they cannot exist. The proposed solution is to think about psychology and behavior in physical rather than mental terms. This paradigmatic shift carries several consequences. First, it requires us to embrace neuroscience and reductionism because they provide causal mechanisms that operate on a biological substrate. But reductionism constitutes only half of a complete explanation, because even a complete parts list does not explain how those parts produce psychology. Some assembly is always required! Emergence constitutes the second half of a complete explanation. The four core network principles constitute the explanatory kernel of the proposed emergent Bio↔Psychology Network Theory. Second, the resulting paradigm shift requires psychology to transition from a conscious-centric to an unconscious-centric science. This conceptual shift enables us to understand how neural networks transform stimulus microfeatures into psychological constructs; how mind emerges from brain.

Cults, religions, and immature sciences are organized around august individuals. Sciences are organized around principles. This book is organized around core and corollary principles. Principles 1–4 constitute an explanatory core. They characterize every processing cycle. Principles 5–12 are corollary in that they derive from the explanatory core and greatly expand its explanatory scope. Mathematical proof of the adequacy of the proposed network model is provided.

Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychotherapy addresses all psychologists because it provides a way to practice psychology as a mature science. This includes instructors who wish to teach Introductory Psychology or Foundations of Psychology from a coherent principle-based theoretical perspective grounded in cognitive neuroscience. It includes investigators who wish to construct a mature science organized around basic principles rather than persons. It addresses clinical psychologists’ wish to integrate the Big Five clinical orientations and to enter upon an era of truly cooperative and constructive psychotherapy research and practice. It addresses the general population who are, or will be, interested in this paradigmatic shift in psychological science.

The scope of this book is extensive as is required by the comprehensive perspective that it provides. Its content spans multiple fields of general psychology, neuroscience, anatomy, genetics, epigenetics, and some areas of multivariate statistics in a readable and accessible way. Everything that the reader needs to know is explained.

This book is unique in its triple objectives of (a) providing a new perspective, paradigmatic shift, that enables psychology to be practiced as a mature science, that (b) delivers the required theoretical unification (c) to integrate the Big Five clinical orientations regarding psychotherapy in a way that provides a conceptual understanding that supports the scholarly motive for doing psychotherapy, in addition to the need for empirically supported treatments.

I placed the evaluation of the Bio-Psychological Network Theory (BPNT) in chapter 7 as a conclusion to the formal presentation of this theory. When teaching, I skip over Chapter 7 and address it after Chapter 12 because final evaluation of the BPNT depends heavily for clinical psychologists on its contributions to clinical practice that are considered in Chapters 8–12.

I wish to acknowledge Fordham University for providing the four decades of academic freedom and periodic faculty fellowships that enabled me to finally grasp the big picture that I present to you here. I wish to especially acknowledge Elizabeth Tryon, my daughter, who in conversation and editing gave greater focus and clarity of expression to the principles upon which this book is based. Finally, I wish to acknowledge the support of my wife and clinical psychologist colleague Georgiana Shick Tryon.

¹ Additional material added after this book was printed is available at www.fordham.edu/psychology/tryon. This includes an extension to Principle 3: Transformation and a color version of Figure 5.6.

How to Use

The figure above is of a neural network drawn by Sigmund Freud in 1895 while writing a text book for neurologists entitled The Project for a Scientific Psychology. It is reproduced with permission from Spitzer, 1999, page 5. Freud was trained as a neurologist in medical school by the prominent physiologist Ernst Brücke (1819–1892). Rychlak (1973, pp. 43–4) reported that Breuer and Fleiss encouraged Freud to develop a theory of psychology based entirely on biology. Freud (1895b) complied with these exhortations and wrote the first three chapters, but could not complete his Project due to the limitations of neuroscience in 1895.

In this drawing, the left arrow represents incoming energy to the neural network. The small circles represent neurons. The perpendicular double lines represent synapses.

Section 1

Theoretical Unification

Outline

Part One. The Problem

Chapter 1. Introduction

Chapter 2. Issues and Impediments to Theoretical Unification

Part Two. A Proposed Solution

Chapter 3. Core Network Principles

Chapter 4. Corollary Network Principles

Chapter 5. Emotion

Chapter 6. Simulating Psychological Phenomena and Disorders

Part Three. Evaluation: Criticisms & Rebuttals

Chapter 7. Evaluation, Criticisms, and Rebuttals

Part One

The Problem

Outline

Chapter 1. Introduction

Chapter 2. Issues and Impediments to Theoretical Unification

Chapter 1

Introduction

Abstract

This chapter reveals that psychology has a major explanatory problem. Psychologists do not agree on how to explain their findings. Unlike mature sciences that are organized around principles, psychology is organized around individuals who have proposed different ways to explain psychological and behavioral phenomena. Clinicians have an evidence–theory knowledge gap in that they have developed treatments that work based on their personal and professional lives but cannot explain how they work in principled scientific terms. Some psychologists see this as healthy diversity while others see it as corrosive disunity. Psychologists are as reluctant to use other people’s theories as they are to use their toothbrushes. Psychologists are also theory shy. Moreover, their preferred biopsychosocial model is shown to be a simple list of ingredients that carry no explanatory value. Box and arrow and statistical models impute causality but do not provide causal mechanism information. They can’t because there are no psychological mechanisms because there is no psychological substrate for them to operate on. Psychology can either ignore this anomaly or embrace reductionistic neuroscience and some form of emergent network theory. Reductionism provides but half of a complete explanation. Emergence provides the other explanatory half. The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory combines emergence and reductionism.

Keywords

anomalies; disunification; emergence; explanation; explanatory complement; reductionism

Contents

Our Explanatory Problem 7

Preview 15

Preliminary Issues 17

Clinical Relevance 17

Case Formulation 18

Freud’s Project for a Scientific Psychology 19

Science Relevance 20

Reductionism vs. Emergence 21

Theoretical Disunification 21

Is Disunification Healthy or Corrosive? 21

Dissolution vs. Integration or Unification 22

Models and Mechanisms 25

Need for Explanation 27

Theoretical Issues 28

Three Explanatory Problems 28

Toothbrush Problem 28

Grand vs. Mini-Theories 33

No Mechanism Information 35

Three Defective Psychological Models 37

Ingredient Models 37

Box and Arrow Models 37

Statistical Models 37

Two Theoretical Anomalies 38

Functional Theories Lack Mechanism Information 38

No Psychological Substrate 41

Three Possible Resolutions 42

Recall Request for Mechanism Information 43

Deny Anomalies 43

Ignore Anomalies 44

What Constitutes Legitimate Mechanism Information? 45

Biochemical Pathways 45

Neural Cascades 45

Artificial Network Cascades 46

Integration with Neuroscience 47

Psychology Needs Neuroscience 49

Psychology Needs Some form of Network Theory 51

Resolving Anomalies 51

Learning and Memory 52

Unifying Personality Theory 53

Neuroscience Constraints 53

Informal Network Theories 54

Neural Network Coprocessors 56

Innateness 57

Conclusions 59

Emergence is the Explanatory Complement 59

Cognitive Science, Neuroscience, and Cognitive Neuroscience 62

Mature Science 63

Psychology Departments Change their Names 64

Conclusions 66

Psychotherapy requires one to understand how cognition and affect interact to produce behavior. Psychological science is expected to inform clinical psychologists in this regard but unfortunately it has been of remarkably little help because it has a serious explanatory problem. This problem has prevented psychotherapy integration because it has foiled theoretical unification and precluded psychology from developing beyond its current preparadigmatic state into a mature science¹ (Kuhn, 1962, 1970, 1996, 2012).² Clinical psychologists have had to primarily rely on their personal and professional experience to develop the therapies that they use. Clinical science has mainly focused on testing the efficacy and effectiveness of these interventions.³ Psychological science has not kept pace and this has resulted in an evidence–theory explanatory gap. We cannot explain why our empirically supported treatments work, and I believe this has created resistance to their widespread adoption.

This book is about psychotherapy integration through theoretical unification. I do this using a slightly expanded version of the hybrid cognitive neuroscience⁴ Bio↔Psychology Network Theory introduced by Tryon (2012). It also provides a way to practice psychology as a mature science. Chapters 3–7 aim to close our explanatory gap as much as is presently possible using connectionist network and neuroscience mechanisms along with multivariate statistics. The four core and eight corollary network principles developed in these chapters provide a way to theoretically unify psychological science. They also enable psychology to be practiced as a mature science. Chapters 8–12 use these principles to provide psychotherapy integration through a Hegelian synthesis of the following Big Five clinical orientations:⁵ (a) behavioral (applied behavior analysis); (b) cognitive; (c) cognitive-behavioral; (d) psychodynamic (emotion-focused therapies); and (e) pharmacologic.

The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory is not a new theory in the ordinary sense of needing to be tested to see if it can be empirically supported. Only its organization in terms of core and corollary network principles is new. Its content consists of the unanticipated, unarticulated, and unacknowledged implications of well-replicated psychological phenomena that can be explained by accepted neuroscience and connectionist mechanisms plus multivariate statistics.

Our Explanatory Problem

Mature sciences explain well-replicated facts and phenomena on the basis of accepted principles and/or laws, using a common vocabulary. Immature sciences provide interpretations by individuals. Teo (2012) revealed this explanatory problem when he commented upon a psychological explanation by a prominent psychologist. ‘Lilienfeld (2012) could not rely on general laws or even statistical facts to provide a scientific explanation for this question. What is evident from all we know from the philosophy of science is that Lilienfeld offered us an interpretation’ (p. 807, italics in the original). Psychology presently offers interpretations rather than explanations because, with a few exceptions, it lacks general principles upon which to base its explanations. If you want a psychological explanation, just ask a psychologist. Some interpretations will make more sense than others. Some explanations will be better grounded in research than others. But in the end, one is faced with choosing among interpretations by individuals because no principled explanation is available. This means that the public has every right to view psychology as a secondary science as Lilienfeld (2012) revealed. Take a minute to reflect and ponder the devastating implications of this statement for a discipline that considers itself to be a science.

Psychologists tend to form groups based on their affinity for particular interpretations. These groups are frequently referred to by the most prominent psychologist who either originated or best publicized that particular interpretation. Freud and Skinner are two good examples. Individual psychologists who prefer similar, but not necessarily identical, interpretations of events associate with one another to form professional organizations whose main purpose is to advocate for their particular explanatory approach. These groups continue to divide psychologists into opposing schools and camps whose competitions with one another impede the development of theoretical unification and preclude psychology from becoming a mature science. Adherents to each form of interpretation generate their own vocabulary, methods, and findings. They avoid replicating the work of other investigators to appear original. Students of psychology must choose to align themselves with one or another of these schools because there is no overarching principle-based form of psychology to identify with.

Groups of psychologists who provide similar interpretations tend to cluster together and produce larger professional associations such as the American Psychological Association, the American Psychological Society, the Association for Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies, and the American Psychoanalytic Association, among others. These groups are mainly concerned with expanding their membership through ‘education’ and controlling discourse through journal editorships, grant review panels, and advisory boards. Put bluntly, these groups seem more concerned with perpetuating their particular orientation than advancing psychology as a science.

Mischel (2009) described the reluctance of psychologists to use the work of others as our ‘toothbrush problem’: ‘Psychologists treat other peoples’ theories like toothbrushes – no self respecting person wants to use anyone else’s’ (p. 3). Kruglanski (2013) described our reluctance to move beyond midlevel theories to more comprehensive explanations as our ‘theory shyness’ (p. 871, emphasis added). Gigerenzer (2009) noted that ‘much of the theoretical landscape in psychology resembles a patchwork of small territories’ (p. 22). Gigerenzer (2010) remarked that ‘As a consequence, in some parts of psychology, theories have become replaced by surrogates, such as circular restatements of the phenomenon, one-word explanations, and lists of general dichotomies’ (p. 733). McNally (1992) viewed this theoretical diversity as a sign of scientific health, while Staats (1983) considered it to be corrosive, and Spence (1987) worried that it is tearing psychology apart.

Our explanatory problem extends to clinical practice. The therapies we offer are sometimes diametrically opposed to one another. For example, some therapies are based on theories that emphasize unconscious processing while other therapies are based on theories that minimize or deny its very existence. While clinicians can and do appreciate the benefits of theoretical pluralism, eclectic practice is deeply discouraged for at least two reasons. One reason is that the inherent contradictions among supporting psychological theories appears to put patients at risk. A second reason concerns treatment choice. If you are a clinical psychologist and all of your patients respond fully to your interventions then you may continue in the hope that all will remain as successful as it has been. If, on the other hand, some of your patients do not fully respond to your therapies and/or if some of your patients are unresponsive to your interventions then you will need to rethink what you are doing with them. But as an eclectic therapist, what alternative theoretical orientation will you choose? Your theoretical background will always be your primary resource for understanding what went wrong and/or what else needs to be done. But with contradictory choices what decision shall you make?

Science values parsimony. Ideally, we desire a single theory to explain our facts. We do not have, but currently need, a uniform way to understand psychological phenomena and our empirically supported treatments. Our explanatory deficiencies stem in large part from our lack of mechanism information. Currently we can’t explain why or how psychological phenomena work. We can’t explain why or how our empirically supported treatments work. We lack an understanding of how cognition and affect cause behavior.⁶ We also lack a shared vocabulary and a set of core concepts.

There are currently more than 500 therapies.⁷ Surely they do not work for 500 different reasons. Such diversity has created a serious training problem in addition to a serious science issue. There is no way to teach students or professionals 500 different therapies. Nor do students and professionals want to learn so many different techniques. There is certainly no way for any clinician to develop a professional level of competence in so many different treatments. Such diversity presents potential clients with a confusing array of interventions. How are they to make an informed choice? They expect and deserve greater consensus from psychological science. This book aims to provide theoretical unification in the form of four core and eight corollary network principles that integrate the big five clinical orientations: (a) behavioral (applied behavior analysis); (b) cognitive; (c) cognitive-behavioral; (d) psychodynamic (emotion-focused therapies); and (e) pharmacologic.

MA-level psychologists can be trained to administer structured diagnostic interviews and relevant manualized treatments. If all goes well then no problem exists. If all does not go so well, then the MA psychologist will need to consult with a doctoral-level psychologist whose considerably greater theoretical training may provide helpful suggestions. But which doctoral psychologist should the MA psychologist consult? That depends upon which interpretation the MA psychologist prefers and would like to discuss further. Sadly, psychological science cannot assist because it currently lacks explanatory principles.

Why do we have this explanatory problem? Why has psychological science so long organized itself around august persons rather than principles? I suggest that the reason is that we have been thinking incorrectly about psychology for a long time. It all began with Rene Descartes (1596–1650) who established the concept of mind, which philosophers had long discussed before then, as an entity separate from brain, because he could not imagine, let alone understand, how mind could emerge from brain. His conceptual difficulty became our mind–body problem. Had he had present-day neuroscience knowledge he almost certainly would never have distinguished ‘mind’ from brain. Psychology has suffered from and struggled with this self-inflicted problem in various ways ever since. There is no more reason to believe that the mind exists apart from the brain than there is to believe that our behavior is caused by a small dwarf, homunculus, residing inside us. Modern neuroscience has progressed far beyond what it was in the sixteenth century, when behavior was explained in bizarre ways.

I believe that a potential solution exists to our explanatory problem. The solution is to take seriously the need for and provide the missing mechanism information called for by Carey (2011), Gigerenzer (1998, 2009), Kazdin (2007, 2008), and Squire et al. (1993). This missing mechanism information has been gradually accumulating within neuroscience and within psychology especially since McClelland et al. (1986) and Rumelhart and McClelland (1986) published their seminal work showing that connectionist neural network models could effectively simulate a broad range of psychological phenomena.⁸ These models contain mechanisms that are currently accepted but are not widely known to psychologists. This information caused me to think about psychological phenomena, including psychological disorders, in physical rather than mental terms. The result was a paradigm shift, a major qualitative conceptual change, in my thinking that enabled me to see a way towards theoretical unification, psychotherapy integration, and how to practice psychology as a mature science.

At first I thought mainly about applying this new way of thinking to clinical psychology because I am a clinical psychologist. However, I discovered that my new network orientation has an extensive explanatory scope that covers most, if not all, areas of psychological science. The explanatory scope that I discovered is so large that it includes diverse psychological phenomena that normally would not be discussed together, and that may even appear to be unrelated, random, and disjointed. I did not select these phenomena. Instead, these topics emerged as I explored applications of neural network theory to psychology. I intend to show how these seemingly unrelated phenomena arise from common causes in the form of core and corollary network principles. This extensive explanatory scope is remarkable within psychological science and demonstrates the relevance of this approach to general psychology. It greatly enhances our ability to understand how cognition and affect interact to produce behavior. The diversity of topics covered in this book should be understood as strength rather than as weakness. However, a consequence of this topical diversity is that it poses some transition problems.

I refer to my new conceptual orientation as a Bio↔Psychology Network Theory. It is a hybrid cognitive neuroscience theory that integrates neuroscience and connectionist mechanisms, well-replicated psychological phenomena, and multivariate statistics. It focuses on well-replicated phenomena because no theory should be expected to explain spurious false-positive findings. Faced with terms such as biopsychology and psychobiology, I chose to hyphenate Bio↔Psychology with a double-headed arrow to emphasize the interactive nature of biology and psychology. I chose to place Bio in the first position to emphasize that biology is the base from which Psychology emerges. The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory explains psychological phenomena in physical rather than mental terms using a combination of widely accepted neuroscience and connectionist neural network mechanisms⁹ and multivariate statistics. It constitutes a paradigm shift (Kuhn, 1962, 1970, 1996, 2012) to a mature science because it provides a vocabulary and a set of basic concepts that is common to both psychology and neuroscience. This radical reorientation makes psychology more consilient (Wilson, 1998) with neuroscience. The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory consists of four core and eight corollary network principles. The core principles constitute an explanatory nucleus because they always work together during every network processing cycle and cannot be separated. The neural network cascade is fundamental to the explanatory nucleus. It transforms physical stimuli into psychological concepts. Experience-dependent plasticity mechanisms are activated by the network cascade and physically modify our neural networks, thereby causing them to process differently, thus enabling us to adapt to our physical and social environments. Many such processing cycles generate psychological development. I also formulated eight derivative corollary principles that in various combinations and in conjunction with the explanatory nucleus explain a greater diversity of psychological phenomena than I ever imagined was possible.

Each of these network principles was constructed from well-established neuroscience facts and well-replicated psychological phenomena. The resulting Bio↔Psychology Network Theory is therefore already strongly supported by empirical findings long accepted by experimental psychologists and neuroscientists, and is consequently ready to be used today. While further research is always welcome, no further empirical support is needed to warrant our acceptance and use of these principles today. I understand that science is never finished and that additional research is always needed but the extent of contemporary support for each of the 12 network principles strongly suggests that this future research will only refine rather than reject them.

Castonguay and Beutler (2006) used a lesser meaning of the term ‘principle’ to refer to facts capable of guiding clinical practice such as ‘Age is a negative predictor of a patient’s response to general psychotherapy’ (Beutler et al. 2006, p. 27), and ‘The more impaired or severe and disruptive the problem, the fewer benefits are noted for time-limited treatments’ (Beutler et al. 2006b, p. 112). I counted 216 of these statements across 17 chapters in their book Principles of Therapeutic Change That Work. While useful in guiding clinical practice, these are not scientific principles like Archimedes’s principle or Bernoulli’s principle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_law) because they carry no explanatory power, they cannot explain why things work, and therefore cannot facilitate theoretical unification. Greben (2012) cited the following integrative principles regarding psychotherapy: respect, flexibility, inclusion, attention to common factors, patient–treatment matching, stage–treatment matching, and empiricism. While useful in facilitating cooperation among psychotherapists, these are also not scientific principles like Archimedes’s principle or Bernoulli’s principle. The core and corollary principles presented and elaborated in this book are scientific principles that enable scientific explanation because they carry explanatory force.

Attempts to achieve theoretical unification may seem grandiose and improbable, primarily because theoretical unification is thought to entail an unreachable end-point of near perfection that fully accommodates all conflicting and even contradictory points of view. Clearly, it is not possible to give everyone everything that they want. I therefore now substantially lower this bar, thereby creating a much more modest, realistic, and attainable goal.

It is important for the reader to understand what theoretical unification in psychology is in my view and what it is not. Theoretical unification in psychology need not refer to a terminal state of completely correct knowledge that everyone rigidly believes in to the point where dissenting opinions are unwelcomed and not tolerated by authoritarian overseers. Theoretical unification need not mean that the theory is completely correct. Theoretical unification can and has been wrong as it was when everyone once thought that the Earth was flat, and again when everyone thought that the Earth was the center of all creation. Theoretical unification can also be partly wrong, or partly correct, depending upon one’s perspective, as was the case for Newtonian physics before Einstein. Theoretical unification also does not mean that every idea suggested by every theoretician is included. Some concepts are left behind when a science matures. For example, questions and concepts that were highly valued by alchemists were abandoned when chemistry matured as a science. Theoretical unification need only incorporate well-replicated findings because no theory should be asked to explain spurious false-positive findings. Replication is the only way to ensure that findings are not spurious. Makel et al. (2012) documented that the overall replication rate in psychology is just 1.07%. Chabris et al. (2012) reported that most replications fail. Our exclusive focus on well-replicated psychological findings makes achieving theoretical unification much easier.

Theoretical unification in psychology is about consensus regarding common vocabulary and core concepts that are sufficient to enable a majority of psychologists to start working together rather than in mutual isolation and/or at competitive cross purposes. Theoretical unification can be a beginning as well as an ending point. Whether or not theoretical unification occurs is determined by personal decisions made by individuals like you to adopt a common vocabulary and core concepts. No committee or authoritarian body can make this determination or enforce it afterwards. If a working majority of us can agree on a shared perspective that enables us to work together then theoretical unification will have been achieved.

The first reason why I believe that theoretical unification is possible is because we are already unified in our ignorance regarding how psychological processes work. All contemporary psychological theories have nothing to say about the physical mechanisms that cause psychological phenomena. Therefore they do not have entrenched contradictory positions to resolve. They have nothing to give up. This is a major step towards theoretical unification. The only remaining barrier to theoretical unification is achieving at least provisional acceptance of the four core and eight corollary network mechanisms that constitute the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory.

The second reason why I believe that theoretical unification is possible is because the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory provides the only contemporary way to explain psychological phenomenon, including psychological disorders in physical rather than mental terms. No other psychological theory does this. Absent competition, the quest for theoretical unification simplifies to considering reasons for and against adopting the hybrid connectionist and neuroscience mechanisms presented in this book. I aim to convince you that the reasons for adopting the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory far outweigh the reasons against adopting it.

I do not claim completeness, because I know that there is much more to learn than what I offer in this book. I present a Bio↔Psychology Network Theory, not the Bio↔Psychology Network Theory. This is why I ask only for provisional acceptance of the core and corollary principles, although I think that the evidence I will present warrants full acceptance now. The empirical base supporting each principle is so substantial that subsequent research is unlikely to undercut or falsify any of them. The neuroscience and connectionist mechanisms that I have selected have been firmly established and are currently accepted without question. I therefore believe that the 12 network principles that constitute the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory meet the modest standard that I have set for theoretical unification and warrants contemporary consensus as a mutually beneficial starting point to better understand how cognition and affect interact to produce behavior and to develop psychology into a mature science.

I view this book as a beginning; a start in a new direction; an example of how we should be thinking about psychology and about how cognition and affect interact to produce behavior in physical rather than mental terms. This caveat is aimed mainly at readers who might reject this orientation because of its incompleteness rather than its potential. Instead, I ask that they consider whether or not progress to date and promise of more to come warrants their support.

I also aim to change the way psychologists identify themselves. For example, adopting the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory will enable clinical psychologists to identify with principles of psychological science rather than with people. Religions, philosophies, cults, and preparadigmatic sciences identify with people. Mature sciences identify with principles. Psychologists will also have no further need of ‘isms’, such as behaviorism and cognitivism. They can refer to themselves as clinical psychologists NOS (not otherwise specified) or as clinical science psychologists. I aim to restore clinical psychology to a principle-based practice from its current manual-based practice while preserving its evidence-based approach. I aim to provide a perspective that helps us to better understand how cognition and affect interact to produce behavior.

I am a clinical psychologist and much of this book is therefore directed towards the professional practice of psychology. Clinicians who understand psychology and psychopathology from the same perspective are more likely to treat their clients in similar ways. I aim to provide sufficient mechanism information to provide the required common understanding for psychotherapy integration to occur. I also address general issues that should concern all psychologists because I ground clinical psychology in psychological science.

Preview

In this section terms that refer to major section headings are emboldened and italicized terms refer to minor section headings contained in the remainder of this chapter. Chapters 1 and 2 jointly establish the breadth and scope of our explanatory problem and discuss previous efforts to address it. The main purpose of this first chapter is to convince you that psychological theories lack causal mechanism information capable of explaining psychological phenomena in physical rather than mental terms. This includes our ability to explain why and how our empirically supported treatments work. A related purpose of this first chapter is to document and discuss our present state of theoretical disunification and several serious resulting problems in order to show why we need a more unified psychological theory. More than 40 years of teaching graduate clinical psychology students has convinced me that to accomplish these goals I must discuss a variety of preliminary issues. My aim in this preview is to provide reasons why I need to address these topics.

The first preliminary issue concerns the clinical relevance of my Bio↔Psychology Network Theory because I expect that most of my readers are interested in clinical psychology and this is the first topic that comes to most of their minds. The second preliminary issue concerns reductionism and its explanatory complement emergence because reductionism is such an emotional issue that the mere hint of it is enough to put off some readers. Therefore I take this opportunity to emphasize that emergence saves us from the ravages of reductionism; emergence is the antithesis, co-equal, and explanatory complement of reductionism.

I document theoretical disunification within psychological science and clinical psychology to emphasize the shabby state that we are currently in with regard to theory construction. I assume that most psychologists are aware of this mess, but I discuss this topic because I understand that some psychologists don’t see any problem here at all. Unless a reader is concerned over disunification they have no motivation to fix it. I therefore need to generate the required motivation.

The section on our need for explanation is aimed at showing that people, including psychologists and their clients, have an inborn strong desire/need to explain phenomena and that this need drives interest in theory construction, theory selection, and mode of clinical practice. I subsequently show that the way empirically supported treatments are practiced and marketed interferes with the scholarly motive for doing psychotherapy and are consequently resisted by many clinicians.

The section on theoretical issues is where I discuss 13 topics that stem from and relate to our theoretical disunification. I elaborate upon three explanatory problems: (a) our toothbrush problem; (b) our mini-theories with their narrow explanatory scope; and (c) the absence of causal mechanism information that seriously limits our ability to explain psychological phenomena and why empirically supported treatments work. I identify three defective psychological models that are commonly used and mistaken for providing legitimate mechanistic explanations of psychological phenomena. They are: (a) ingredient models; (b) box and arrow models; and (c) statistical models. These considerations reveal two theoretical anomalies: (a) that our functional theories lack mechanism information; and (b) there is no psychological substrate for psychological causes to operate on. I consider three possible resolutions of these anomalies: (a) recall the request for mechanism information that revealed the anomalies in the first place; (b) deny that the anomalies are anomalous; and (c) ignore the anomalies and continue with psychological science as usual. Then I consider what constitutes legitimate mechanisms. This leads to a discussion about integration with neuroscience and my case for why psychology needs neuroscience or at least why psychology needs some form of network theory. Neuroscience entails reductionism because it identifies biological mechanisms. However, even a total understanding of these mechanisms constitutes but half of a complete explanation. Psychology must show how mind and behavior emerge from brain function. Emergence is the antithesis and co-equal of reductionism. Emergence is the explanatory complement of reductionism. I compare and contrast cognitive science, neuroscience, and cognitive neuroscience, favoring the latter perspective.

Finally, I document that psychology departments are changing their names in response to the integration of psychology and neuroscience. I take this as serious evidence that psychology is changing in fundamental ways that are discussed and promoted in this book.

Preliminary Issues

Clinical Relevance

While it is the goal of all sciences to understand the unity of nature, many of my clinical colleagues seem to be more focused on what concrete practical benefits might result from theoretical unification. I am frequently asked: what will my clinical practice look like if I endorse the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory? How will my clinical practice change? How can the Bio↔Psychology Network Theory help me to become a better therapist? I briefly state my responses here and elaborate them in Chapter 12.

1. The way that you think about yourself, your primary professional identity, will change. You will primarily identify with principles rather than persons such as august psychologists like Freud, Skinner, Rogers, Beck, Ellis, etc. You will dissociate yourself from all ‘isms’, such as behaviorism and cognitivism.

2. You will start thinking about psychology and your client’s problems in physical rather than mental terms. This understanding will make seeking treatment more socially acceptable to your clients. It will also increase their tolerance of family members with psychological and/or behavioral disorders. Psychologists who practice in medical settings can now correctly claim to provide biological treatments.

3. Your clinical practice will become more comprehensive in at least the following four ways. (a) Your therapeutic goals will expand to include increasing psychological mindedness and emotional regulation in addition to symptom reduction/removal. (b) You will be open to all ESTs regardless of the orientation from which they were developed. (c) You will use multiple ESTs as necessary. (d) You will have a theoretical basis for this eclectic practice.

4. You will base your interventions on the core and corollary principles introduced in Chapters 3 and 4 rather than on manuals. You will customize your interventions to your clients in the way described by Paul (1967) during the early days of behavior therapy. Greene (2012) cited the contemporary trend to replace manuals with principles as an important rapprochement between investigators and clinicians.

5. Interventions based on operant and respondent conditioning will be reauthorized as cognitive-behavioral therapies.

Case Formulation

The following case is intended to illustrate what it means to think about psychological problems in physical rather than mental terms. I consulted on a case where a 16-year-old girl was arrested because of a physical altercation with her father at home. This led to her being placed in a local institution for delinquent youth under court order where she was diagnosed with conduct disorder. Her father was angry with her on the basis that she was just being difficult with him and defiant of his authority. Her father’s anger at her, his insensitivity towards her was based on his misunderstanding of her problem in mental rather than physical terms. He thought that her behavior towards him was something she could just change because it was mental not physical. Given her explosive outbursts and major mood swings I recognized that she was suffering from borderline personality disorder.

Her father asked me what was causing her to behave this way. Notice, I said that he asked me for an explanation of his daughter’s condition. Fortunately, I had just developed the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory to a point where it enabled me to tell him that his daughter likely had a mirror neuron deficit that gave rise to alexithymia; a condition where people have feelings without words for them. He could see that having feelings that she could not describe, or talk about was very frustrating for her. It was also the basis of her not being able to work conflicts out the way normal people do. Talking to her about feelings is like discussing what color to paint a wall with a color-blind person, or talking about intentions with a person who has Asperger’s syndrome. Rendering her condition in physical terms enabled her father to see that she was not just being oppositional because she was a teenager. He became more patient, and stopped blaming her when he realized this was an involuntary physical problem on her part. He could also see that her problem was more general and not specific to him. This insight enabled him to be much more understanding of her disability and to calm down in his approach to her. It also reframed her condition from an acute problem to a chronic illness. It enabled him to understand and accept that she needed dialectical behavior therapy and that such treatment typically takes a long time. Like social skills treatment for children with Asperger’s, the best outcome that could be expected is that she would be better able to constructively cope with her mirror neuron deficit and resulting alexithymia. Once the correct assessment was provided, she was able to receive the appropriate treatment for her condition and her father was able to take a productive and supportive role because of his new understanding of her condition. Now her family is on board with her treatment and she seems to be responding positively.

Freud’s Project for a Scientific Psychology

It seems to be little known that before developing his famous theory, Freud attempted to explain psychology in physical terms. This was a natural course of action for him because Freud was trained as a neurologist in medical school by the prominent physiologist Ernst Brücke (1819–1892) who then led the scientific movement known as Helmholtz’s School of Medicine. Jones (1961) reported that in 1842 Brücke pledged a solemn oath along with his colleague Emil Du Bois-Reymond (1818–1896) to accept and provide only natural science explanations. Brücke strongly influenced Freud’s approach to medicine. Rychlak (1981b, pp. 43–44) reported that Breuer and Fleiss also encouraged Freud to develop a theory of psychology based entirely on biology. Freud (1895b) complied with these exhortations and wrote the first three chapters of The Project for a Scientific Psychology between September and October of 1895. Lothane (2006) tells us that Freud characterized his book as ‘a psychology for neurologists’ (p. 48) which also included neuroscientists. Freud mailed his manuscript to Fleiss in October of 1895 and never spoke of it again (Rychlak, 1981a, p. 176). Freud could not complete his Project due to the limitations of neuroscience in 1895.

Centonze et al. (2004) documented that Freud was aware of the work of Camillo Golgi, whose stain allowed single neurons to be visualized for the first time in 1873, and the work of Ramon y Cajal who proved the existence of synapses in 1873. Centonze et al. (2004) also reported that Freud anticipated the now well-documented fact that memory is based on synaptic modification. Spitzer (1999, p. 5) presented a figure of a neural network drawn by Freud in 1895.⁹a I believe that the book you are reading now is the book that Freud wanted to write but could not due to the scientific limits of his day. This book also describes psychology in physical rather than mental terms that were unavailable to Freud. Hence, this book continues Freud’s original work.

Science Relevance

Psychologists engaged primarily in research may already appreciate the value that theoretical unification brings to every science, including psychological science. It is the goal of every science, to discover the unity in nature. However, some psychologists may worry that the theoretical unification I aim to bring will disrupt and conflict with the research that they wish to pursue. I am sometimes asked: How will theoretical unification change the psychological science that I am interested in and already doing? My general answer is that the fact-finding nature of psychological research can continue unchanged with one major exception. Methodological replication will be needed to be funded and published much more than is presently the case if psychology is to become a mature science. I mainly seek to change that part of psychological science that concerns explanation. I seek to change how we explain the facts and functional relationships that psychologists find and replicate. I also seek to introduce new methods aimed at understanding how psychology emerges from biology (see Chapter 6).

Reductionism vs. Emergence

Students frequently ask ‘Is your Bio↔Psychology Network Theory a reductionist theory?’ My answer is yes and no. The proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory recognizes that the first half of a complete explanation entails identifying the biological parts, processes, and mechanisms that mediate psychological phenomena. But a complete catalog of such things cannot explain how they produce psychological phenomena. Some assembly is always required. Isolated biological facts cannot explain how psychology emerges from biology. Emergence is the explanatory complement of reductionism. Emergence is the science of understanding how complexity arises from the interaction of simple parts. For example, the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory considers how conditioning and cognition arise from networks of interconnected layers of simple neurons. Emergence provides a way for existentialists to endorse the proposed Bio↔Psychology Network Theory because it deals with transcendence; how psychology transcends biology in ways studied by human science. I have more to say about this crucial topic in Chapter 2.

Theoretical Disunification

Psychology was a disorganized science when William James published his Principles of Psychology in 1890 and little progress has been made to date. I expect that many readers of this book agree with this claim and therefore my burden of proof here is light because the evidence of the fragmentation of our science and profession is both extensive and obvious. But not all readers think that disunification is bad. Some readers even think that disunification is good and should be preserved, and that theoretical unification should be opposed.

Is Disunification Healthy or Corrosive?

McNally (1992) asserted that theoretical diversity is a sign of health rather than illness and noted that contemporary diversity within psychology is analogous to speciation within biology; i.e., where variation produces new viable forms. While diversity can be a sign of vigor and good health, too much of a good thing can be bad. Diversity for the sake of diversity justifies as many theoretical positions as there are, or will ever be, psychologists. If they all share nothing in common there will be no field of psychology. At some point seeking diversity must give way to finding common ground. To be for theoretical unification is not to be against diversity. It is to be for sufficient common ground that psychologists can begin to work together constructively rather than at cross purposes. Left unchecked, our current course of more and more separatism without limit may completely dissolve our field. Staats (1983) wrote a book regarding the corrosiveness of the current commitment to diversity and separatism.

Psychology has so many unrelated elements of knowledge with so much mutual discreditation, inconsistency, redundancy, and controversy that abstracting general meaning is a great problem. There is a crisis, moreover, because the disunification feeds on itself and, left unchanged, will continue to grow (Staats, 1991, p. 899).

These comments are over two decades old, and little if any progress has been made to fix this problem. Instead, professional incentives continue to foster separatism to a point where separatism has become corrosive and theoretical unification is actively opposed (see Staats, 1983; Sternberg & Grigorenko, 2001).

Dissolution vs. Integration or Unification

Nearly three decades ago Janet Spence (1987) remarked upon the conclusion of a major doctoral training conference:

The theme that seems to have almost spontaneously emerged for this conference on graduate training is the issue of centrifugal versus centripetal tendencies in psychology. Whether psychology is a unitary discipline with a strong central core or a series of relatively independent areas is a question that has implications not only for graduate training but also for the American Psychological Association (APA) as an organization and for psychology as a whole (p. 1052, emphasis added).

Her comments were published just a year before many research-oriented psychologists, including many clinical psychologists, left the American Psychological Association to form the American Psychological Society in 1988, resulting in a major fractionation of organized psychology and evidence that centripetal forces are tearing psychology apart. The subtitle of Spence’s (1987) article ‘Will the center hold?’ is especially revealing today. I expect that the answer most psychologists would give today is ‘what center?’ Spence did not specify what center she was talking about, but having obtained her Ph.D. from the University of Iowa in 1949 where in her dissertation she investigated the effects of anxiety on learning and performance I expect that she was referring to human and animal learning as core psychology. This view is supported by my personal experience where as a first-year graduate student in clinical psychology at Kent State University in 1966 I was required to take ten core courses including a course in animal learning and another in human learning. Learning also featured prominently in other required core courses in abnormal psychology, social psychology, and developmental psychology. Learning was central to the then-new field of behavior therapy. Hence, learning was core psychology for me as it was for the profession in the 1960s. But psychology divorced itself from the study of learning around 1968 (see Tryon, 1995). Learning was subsequently presumed rather than studied by psychologists. How people cognitively processed information became the major focus of study. Inquiry into the basic processes of learning and memory by psychologists was largely abandoned and left to neuroscience. Contemplating Spence’s question regarding ‘Will the center hold?’ the answer now seems quite clearly: ‘No, it has not held’.

A physics analogy is informative. The cosmos is expanding; galaxies are receding from one another at an accelerated rate. One scenario is that this process will continue unabated. The end result is that galaxies will become so distant from one another that light from one will not reach any of the others; i.e., each galaxy will be completely isolated from all others. The American Psychological Association currently has 56 divisions. Division 12 has ten sections. Should all divisions become so fractionated, APA could end up with 560 or more specialized fields. Diversity in methods and findings distance each specialized field of psychology from all others. Unchecked diversity could expand psychology to where each of the potential 560 or more little groups of psychologists are so different from each other that they will have become irrelevant one to another. Readers who view such a result as both extreme and unlikely should perform the following experiment. Select an article from the main journal of any APA division and tally the number of citations that come from the remaining 55 APA divisions. The consistent result is that psychologists rarely cite the work of other psychologists who work outside of their specialized domain. The results are the same if one starts from any article published in any psychology journal. The inescapable conclusion is that psychologists have already become largely irrelevant to each other. Further fractionation does not seem to bode well for the future of psychology as a mature science.

Gardner (1992), Scott (1991), and Slife and Williams (1997) have argued that dissolution of psychology will be the natural end of psychology should the current trend of separatism and fragmentation continue unabated. Kukla (1992) valued the goal of theoretical unification, but questioned whether psychology could be unified using the following hypothetical scenario:

For example, consider the empirical lore belonging to the ill-advised science of bology, which studies the properties of things that begin with the letter b. There is no shortage of empirical work for bologists. They can ascertain whether bisons are benevolent, whether barium is denser than barley water, et cetera. But no one would seriously propose that we apply the philosophy of unified positivism to this domain. The theoretically progressive step in this instance would be to dissolve the discipline of bology and to reapportion its empirical results to other sciences that carve nature more closely to its joints (p. 1055, italics in original).

Is psychology like bology? So disparate, fragmented, and diverse that it is ripe for dissolution and the redistribution of its findings to other disciplines because there is no hope of unification? Or, alternatively, will other sciences appropriate psychological findings into their disciplines before psychology can reach maturity as a coherent science with a common vocabulary and knowledge core? The choice to dissolve psychology may not be ours. Our drive towards separatism could do the job for us. Spence (1987) noted:

In my worst nightmares, I forsee a decimation of institutional psychology as we know it. Human experimental psychologists desert to the emerging discipline of cognitive science; physiological psychologists go happily to departments of biology and neuroscience; industrial/organizational psychologists are snapped up by business schools; and psychopathologists find their home in medical schools. Clinicians, school psychologists, and other health care practitioners have long since gone, training their own in freestanding professional schools or schools of education. Only personality-social psychologists and certain developmental psychologists would have no place else to go. In universities with doctoral programs, departments of psychology would be pale shadows of their former selves, their members outnumbered and outclassed by the natural sciences on the one hand and the humanities on the other hand (pp. 1052–3).

Does any of this sound familiar? The development of new centers to study learning and memory that are unaffiliated with psychology departments is evidence that this shredding and redistribution process is already underway. The following links are to three such programs.¹⁰

Cacioppo (2007) argued that