David W. Carroll et al.
108
In addition to teaching students to think critically about the data of history, instructors
can encourage critical thinking about other problematic aspects of course material:
(a) how to do history despite the problems with data, (b) how to decide when the history
of psychology begins, and (c) the problem of why we study history at all. Another
opportunity for critical thinking in the history of psychology is how to understand the
many schools and systems of psychology.
Robert Watson’s Prescriptions
Robert Watson (1967) made a contribution toward understanding schools and systems of
psychology in a classic paper on psychological prescriptions. Watson’s work influenced the
scholarship and teaching of the history of psychology and also provided a way to construct
a new, critical history of psychology (e.g., Brennan, 2003). Watson argued that psychology
is a preparadigmatic science because the competing schools and systems differ dramatically
in terms of what psychologists should study and how psychologists should conduct
research. Watson made this point forcefully by comparing and contrasting schools and
systems in terms of 18 prescriptions displayed in the table in Appendix 1 as polar adjective
with explanations. The 18 prescriptions address four aspects of a psychological system:
● Content (e.g., conscious mentalism vs. unconscious mentalism)
● Method (e.g., quantitativism vs. qualitativism)
● Philosophy (determinism vs. indeterminism), and
● Orientation (e.g., functionalism vs. structuralism).
One can characterize a school or system in terms of its positions on the 18 prescriptions.
Keniston uses Watson’s (1967) prescriptions to teach students how to thinking critically
about historical psychological perspectives. Different assignments require students to
(a) characterize the key issues addressed by systems of psychology; (b) compare and
contrast systems, (c) derive a sense of psychology’s core purpose and unity, and (d) iden-
tify students’ convictions about the subjects and methods of psychology. The prescrip-
tions provide one way to infuse critical thinking into the tapestry of a history and
systems course.
Survey. Keniston uses Watson’s (1967) prescriptions in a pretest and posttest survey. On
the survey students indicate their views on a four-point scale for each of the 18 dichoto-
mous prescriptions starting with (conscious mentalism–unconscious mentalism) and
ending with (staticism–dynamicism). At the start of the course the instructor distributes
the pretest survey to students who indicate their position on each prescription once they
understand the meaning of the terms. After the pretest, the instructor informs the class
that they will use the prescriptions to learn about course content and to compare and
contrast the schools and systems of psychology throughout the course. In other words the
prescriptions will be part and parcel of the entire course. Near the end of the semester
student complete the posttest. Use of a posttest survey provides a way to study changes in
students’ thinking over the course of the semester (Chang, Wojtanowicz, & Keniston,
2005; Vitulli, 1995).