Behavioral intervention

Vicente Pelechano

pp. 141-156

in: Arthur W. Staats, Leendert Mos (eds), Annals of theoretical psychology, Berlin, Springer, 1987

Abstract

Multiplicity of paradigms or preparadigms; the rapid birth, growth, and death for models and micro-models and the variety of language expressions for naming identical or similar phenomena are characteristics of contemporary psychology. With the goal in mind to bring together thinking styles and actions the author proposes to articulate a substantive part of academic and professional psychology under the term psychology of intervention. The psychology of intervention discriminates between scientific fashion and scientific progress and emphasizes social validity in the evaluation of psychological methods and results; it proposes to unify psychological assessment and evaluation, behavior therapy, behavioral medicine, community psychology, personality, and ecobehavioral psychology. The following characteristics are true of the psychology of intervention: (i) it is essentially a social science; (ii) it defends a behavioral (not intrapsychic) and environmental intervention; it accepts various levels of analysis (from individual to institutions) which are associated with distinct strategies of operation; (iii) behavioral prevention and the participation of paraprofessionals fill a central position; (iv) epistemologically, we propose the psychology of intervention as a model for intermediate theoretical integration; and (v) a central task for the psychology of intervention is the planification of individual and social change. Finally, the author believes that the psychology of intervention is a project and not an accomplished reality.