Operationism and theory in psychology.

Philosophy of Science, with Special Consideration Given to Behaviorism as the Philosophy of the Science of Behavior

“…Bergmann worked at the University of Iowa, where he published numerous articles on the philosophy of science as applied to psychology with a young faculty member in the Iowa Psychology Department, Kenneth W. Spence (1907Spence ( -1967. However, their work was very different from Skinner's (Bergmann & Spence, 1941;Spence, 1944Spence, , 1948.…”

Understanding the ?cognitive revolution? in psychology

“…Most other behaviorists and neobehaviorists, and famously Hull and Tolman, allowed for the introduction of theoretical terms, or postulated "intervening variables," so long as these were, at least ideally, rigidly and exhaustively defined operationally, via principles or "laws" relating stimulus inputs to internal states and internal states to behavioral outputs (Bergmann & Spence, 1941;Hull, 1943b;Pratt, 1939;Stevens, 1935;Tolman, 1936). It was Kenneth MacCorquodale and Paul Meehl (1948) who recognized the serious inadequacy of this characterization of theoretical terms.…”

MYSTERIES OF THE ORGANISM: CLARK L. HULL'S PRINCIPLES OF BEHAVIOR AND SOME PROBLEMS IN CONTEMPORARY SCHEDULE THEORY1

“…The use of such a system, perhaps more appropriate to an axiomatic area such as 277 1989,51,[277][278][279][280][281][282][283][284][285][286] NUMBER 2 (MARCH) geometry than an experimental science, has been widely criticized (even from within the Hullian camp by Spence, 1956, p. 98, see also Bergmann & Spence, 1941), and has been followed by very few (Voeks, 1950, is a rare example). Skinner's review of the Principles exposes the many failures of this approach in just over five printed pages.…”