The cultural character of psychology

pp. 93-121

in: Carl Ratner, Cultural psychology and qualitative methodology, Berlin, Springer, 1997

Abstract

Now that I have described the power of qualitative methodology to elucidate psychological quality, let us use it to investigate the cultural character of psychological phenomena."The cultural character of psychology" is an unfamiliar phrase. We must explain it in order to clarify the subject matter that our methodology is designed to investigate. Only then will we be able to construct a methodology that is adequate to its subject matter. Clarifying the cultural character of psychology will help to avoid the positivists' error of methodological a priorism, or formulating methodological canons without regard for the subject matter they are designed to investigate. A preoccupation with method, per se, undermines the empirical value of methodology because it does not consider the actual properties of phenomena. The empirical value of methodology is enhanced by first understanding the subject matter that it is designed to investigate.