Carl,
As I understand it, phenomenological psychology considers the "life-space" as
more important than the "foreign hull," to put it in Lewinian terms--it
"explains facts about social phenomena in terms of facts about individuals,"
to put it in the words you're using in your paper about individualistic
psychology. Much humanistic psychotherapy adopts the same standpoint: It is
believed that the cl;ient-therapist relationship is of the utmost importance
in that it is within this (supposedly corrective) interpersonal relationship
that meanings fostering dysfunctional behaviors in the patient can be
renegotiated, and change can occur. Have I gotten it right? So, when you talk
about "individualistic psychology," do you also include phenomenological
psychology (a la Giorgi)?
In your critique of the individualistic view, you say: (1) "Behaviors and
thoughts which the cultural psychologists claim to be unique personal
constructions are actually selective assimilations of prevalent social
practices and values" (p. 4) and (3) "social institutions, structures,
behaviors, and dynamics are substantive 'emergent' entities which structure
people's psychology (cf. Kleinman, 1999). They structure psychology by
imposing rules of behavior, benefits, and punishment" (p. 5).
I have been wondering if what you are alluding to bears any relation with
what some sociologists have called "scripts." Several years ago, I became
curious about this notion of "script" (so dear to the late Bill Simon, who
was to me a teacher, a mentor and a good friend, in addition to co-chairing
my dissertation committee) and decided to test it. To do this, I chose to
study the sexual experiences of 5 women with various physical disabilities,
congenital or acquired. I employed Carspecken's critical ethnography scheme
which allows to identify cultural phenomena (what Bill called "cultural
scenarios" or "scripts") that condition human action internally (through the
transmission of values that influence human volition) and the system's
phenomena external to human volition, such as the resources and the
constrains of the economic and political situation.
Briefly, the results of this qualitative empirical study indicate that,
regardless of the disability, subjective states and sexual and social
behaviors were influenced by paradigmatic domains or conditions such as: (a)
the culture of the family of origin, (b) religion or theology, (c) peer
culture, (d) media, (e) psychology education and psychotherapy, and (f) other
socialization factors including social support and physical environmental
support. The 5 women exhibited striking patterns of similarity and
differences in "norm" or "meaning" appropriation and/or negotiation and/or
production or reproduction, depending on the extent to which "consistency" or
"discrepancy" characterized the culture of their family of origin, which
seemed to be primordial in limiting or enhancing the influence of the other
factors.
Results also demonstrated that "subjectivity," like identity, is not a static
entity but a dynamic process sensitive to the continuous evolving
circumstances over time; that (in agreement with some other theorists'
contentions) it is not a private "inner world" that is insulated from the
outer, material and discursive world. Rather, it arises out of engagement in
the social world, such that subjectivity and intersubjectivity penetrate each
other with subjectivity always interpreted through intersubjectively
constituted frames (Habermas, 1987). Furthermore, to the extent that
participation in the community discourses and practices does occur, different
modes of belonging engender different subjectivities. Would that be an
example of your point (1)?
Two of the 5 women came from dysfunctional families and were also the ones
who reported a lifelong pattern of dysfunctional social and sexual
relationships about which they spontaneously expressed great dissatisfaction
and even distress. Paradoxically, these two women were also the only ones who
had been exposed to psychological education (both had a college degree in
psychology) and psychotherapy. The basic effect of psychotherapy and
psychology education on them had been, much like media's, to incite and feel
the reprocessing of the narrative of the self and its reconstruction through
the reinterpretation of past experiences. The way psychology education and
practice had helped them reinterpret their life situation, consonant with the
fundamental principles of individualistic psychology, reinforced in them the
view of a bounded, masterful, self-actualizing self which, paradoxically,
experiences a significant absence of family, community, tradition, shared
meaning, and its consequences, as a lack of personal convictions (i.e.,
values) and worth (i.e., self-esteem). Ultimately, it brought more fuel to
the two women's already present egocentrism. Would that be an example of
points (3), (5) and (7) of your article?
I am hoping that others will join this conversation.
Doris.
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