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Comment by air7 | Hacker News Reader

I actually don't see this is as too problematic.

The entire field is murky because it's very hard to scientifically measure human psychology and behavior, and the tools of the trade seem almost laughably simplistic (like the aforementioned 5 point rating questionnaires). So our body of knowledge doesn't even reliably describe WEIRD people. Rather its a crude proxy, that just might contain some elements of truth warranting further investigation.

But better crude tools than no tools, and better locally available subjects than no subjects (because most studies don't have the budget to go to Zambia). Similarly in other fields, research is done on rats pigs and monkeys with conclusions drawn to humans. Obviously not perfect, but again it's at best a starting point for later studies.

I think the real problem is the over-zealous interpretation of study results as "truth".

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I disagree.

If you're trying to measure a target 1cm across from 1 mile away with a ruler and a squint anything you say is not only likely wrong, but woefully deceptive.

My view is that this shouldn't even be attempted because it just generates superstitious theories. Psychology is the skinner box pidegon.

There's a fallacy here that's hard to pin down clearly but roughly: to measure inaccurately isnt to measure approximately. Its to measure totally in error.

The errors in social psychology are not just "second decimal place", they're angels pushing stars.

Most people I know believe and expect that some form of talk therapy is an important part of a mental health safety net. Now, how should we train these therapists? That's the utilitarian reason why we need something like a study of psychology.

Unfortunately, much like with more physically oriented doctors, opinions and practices will vary widely (including going against established research for whatever reason)-- and those seem to be particularly diverse in this field. The replication crisis clearly shows a strong need for reform at the research level as well.

In my opinion, the way we approach these issues should be 99% focused on what we know facilitates better outcomes (short and long term) for actual patients in a cost effective way. Theorizing about fun new methods is exciting, but what we need most these days is more disciplined and well trained pragmatists in the field, who can put their world views aside for a while to provide basic care for the (emotional equivalent of) bleeding gunshot wounds in front of them. How we get there is a big question, but one part of it is always going to be recruiting and properly equipping a certain percentage of incoming students to do the work.

Talk therapy is a different case than research social psychology.

I take talk therapy to be a kind of practical skill in regulating the emotions of another human being through narrative & interpersonal contact. That requires a lot of practical training, and is in fact, mostly practical training + high empathy.

Research social psychology does not inform this at all, being a totally different area.

"Psychoanalytical research" is even more BS than social psychology, but that's rather pre-advertised. And somewhat defensible as providing a "training ground" for learning the practice of talk-therapy rather than any kind of genuine explanatory framework.

But under this view how is talk therapy not more bullshit than research, or vs more evidence based psychiatry?

Riding a bike isnt a theory of classical mechanics. Talking to another person isnt a theory of human psychology.

Both require something to be true, but have no content on what that is.

I concur. Psychology isn't hard science by any mans, and extrapolating it to people outside your subjects' samples across the entire world into other cultures and things is obviously ridiculous. But we can still use tools and find patterns to help people.

Surely, the solution isn't to throw up our hands in the West and be like "we can't find any help for the mentally ill because some subject might not apply to our discoveries from around here!"--but of course, if they are extrapolating those results to other cultures, that's worrisome and inaccurate in many studies.

Human behavior has some universals, but a lot we figure are universal aren't.

I think the 'better crude tools than no tools' claim is false. The history of the 20th century is littered with an embarrassing number of stupendous tragedies that can all be laid at the feet of a lack of scientific rigor. Eugenics, leaded gasoline, thalidomide, DDT, lobotomies, and many, many others all stemmed from people who felt that it was expedient to draw conclusions based upon either insufficient data or reasoning they knew was not iron-clad.

There will always be a conflict between what we can know with confidence and the decisions that we need to make to handle situations that arise. But it has been shown that having someone in the position of authority as a 'scientist' giving their approval to something based upon insufficient evidence or reason tends to often lead to the most severe and large scale suffering. So I'd have to recommend against giving any credence to any crude tool.

Especially considering inherent conflict of interests:

"Of the authors who selected and defined the DSM-IV psychiatric disorders, roughly half have had financial relationships with the pharmaceutical industry at one time"

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_M...

Would you rather know nothing about something, or know something about it that is probably wrong? This should be a rhetorical question as the answer is self evident. The psychology replication crisis started off when it was illustrated that only 36% of studies published in highly regard psychological journals could be successfully replicated. And, unlike psychology studies, that discovery can and has been replicated. One can only imagine the rate in less well regarded journals.

The point of this is that the average study in psychology is much more likely to be wrong than right. And so by indulging psychology you are not giving yourself a crude tool for understanding, you are actively misinforming yourself! Imagine I wrote a newspaper where 64% of the articles were fake or misleading. If you'd like to be as well informed as possible, you'd be better off never reading that paper, even if there are some true things in it.

Science is not a 0 or positive game. Bad science can and does send societies and progress backwards.

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