Is Psychology Losing Its Foundations?1Donald A. DewsburyUniversity of FloridaI contend that, together with increasing diversity of subject matter, there is a contraction of methods andapproaches in psychology today. There is decreasing room for small, but critical, parts of the field—particularly those in cultural-scientific aspects of psychology, such as the history, philosophy, and theoryof psychology and general psychology. These areas provide the foundations of entire discipline. Thesechanges occur in the context of growing anti-intellectualism in society at large and changing pressuresin universities. I explore these trends at these three levels: society, universities, and psychology, andsuggest some remedies for psychology.Keywords: education, cultural sciences, psychology departments, society, universitiesMuch has been written about the increasing diversity of psy-chology, with greater attention given to such perspectives as racial,gender, sexual preference, and international matters, as well as theproliferation of specialties in psychology. Although these trendsare important and beneficial to psychology, I also see a homoge-nization of the field. The focus on psychology as a science andprofession and as a means of promoting health, education, andhuman welfare, as promulgated by the American PsychologicalAssociation (APA) appears to me to be incomplete. There are partsof psychology that do not fit readily into any of these cubbyholesand they are being squeezed out. These are the academic, nonsci-entific parts that provide the basic foundation for all of psycholo-gy’s other efforts. Neglected parts of psychology concern issuesrelated to the humanities including philosophy, theory, history,literature, the arts, and religions.It is difficult to provide a name for these approaches. Earlier, Icalled these the “Academic, Non-Science Psychologists” (Dews-bury, 2000), a term is both cumbersome and negative. The terms“human sciences” and “humanistic psychology” have been co-opted elsewhere. Perhaps the German Geisteswissenschaften, thatrefers to inquiry in the human or social sciences and that aredifferent in kind from the natural sciences (Naturwissenschaften)fits best. For convenience, here I will use the term “culturalsciences” to refer to the fields of interest, although, according tomany definitions of science, these may not be sciences at all.In no way do I wish to disparage psychology as a science,practice, and service to humanity. I merely suggest that there is animportant, albeit small, part of psychology that is left out with suchconceptualizations; it is these other parts of psychology that Iaddress here.Whatever they are called, I believe that these fields have been anintegral part of psychology at least from its beginning as anindependent discipline and that they have an important founda-tional role in today’s psychology. I explore recent developments atthe levels of society in general, universities, and psychology itselfbecause one needs to understand that they occur in the contextof broader cultural influences. I am surely not the first to writeabout these issues. Indeed, I may be late to the game. Never-theless, I hope to provide a useful overview of the currentsituation as I view it.In SocietyMany authors have bemoaned the anti-intellectualism, or dumb-ing down, of American culture during the 20th century. It seems asthough every generation bemoans the state of contemporary cul-ture and disturbing trends therein. That noted, at least by somemeasures, there appear to be some disturbing trends in today’sculture that do not bode well for the future of values of traditionallearning.Dumbing Down American CultureOne can take one’s choice among the many voices reflectingupon the decline of American culture. Hofstadter (1962), forexample, traced the history of anti-intellectualism in America. Hesaw patterns of cyclical fluctuation over time under the influenceof such factors as evangelical religion, exaggerated egalitarianism,American practical pragmatism, and the McCarthy era. In BAD or,the Dumbing of America, Fussell (1991) addressed the manner inwhich today’s American culture is becoming increasingly dumb or“bad.” He documented the trends in virtually all aspects of societyfrom advertising to the arts:Instead of the Greening of America, we can now speak of theDumbing of America—or, as Christopher Lasch has put it, the Spreadof Stupefaction. It is hardly news anymore that the schools have failedto produce even a half-educated population. Only 42% of 17-year-oldstudents in American high schools can understand a newspaper edi-torial, even in our dumbest papers (p. 194).As the collective attention span is decreasing, in part because ofthe immediacy of modern technology in TV and the Internet,1Based on presidential address to Division 1, the Society for GeneralPsychology, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, August, 2009.Donald A. Dewsbury, Department of Psychology, University of Florida.Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to DonaldA. Dewsbury, Department of Psychology, University of Florida, Gaines-ville, FL 32611-2250. E-mail: [email protected] of General Psychology © 2009 American Psychological Association2009, Vol. 13, No. 4, 281–289 1089-2680/09/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0017760281detailed analyses are replaced by sound bites. The art of conver-sation is getting lost. The penetrating analyses that used to char-acterize the intermission features of Saturday Metropolitan Operabroadcasts have been replaced by the cult of personality. My localpublic radio station is moving from classical music to an all-talkformat. The New York Times is selling WQXR. The Ann ArborNews has folded.Jacoby (2008) analyzed a trend toward “junk thought,” anuncritical acceptance of pseudoscience and pronouncements aboutphenomena without adequate critical evaluation. Berman (2006)pointed to “the dramatic drop in levels of literacy and overallintellectual awareness” (p. xi). He summarized these factors asinternal barbarism of the sort he believes “were crucial to thecollapse of Rome and . . . lie at the heart of the American crisis aswell” (p. xi).The mass media have been dumbed down. “In short, the polit-icized tabloid-news style of Rupert Murdoch has gained ascen-dancy and the traditional news media is in eclipse” (Welch, 2008,p. 195). This may be termed the “USATodayification” of cultureafter the shift from newspapers