Well, as a social psychologist I'm biased, but my favorite brief description
of the role of theory is Kurt Lewin's (1940) chapter "Formalization and
progress in psychology" that is included in the book _Field theory in social
science_ (1951) that was edited by Dorwin Cartwright. Another, more general
classic is Campbell, N.R. (1920/1951). The structure of theories. In H.
Feigl & M. Brodbeck (Eds.) _Readings in the philosophy of science_. I like
this a lot, but my grad students found it hard to follow, probably because
the examples were not psych ones. I'd love to see a summary of all the
suggestions.
Marty Bourgeois
University of Wyoming
> ----------
> From: Petersik, Tim[SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Friday, April 16, 1999 8:55 AM
> To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
> Subject: Theory query
>
> Good Colleagues:
>
> Can anyone recommend a good, relatively short, article or chapter that
> attempts to explain
> Theory? Ideally, this article would both provide a useful definition of
> theory and some philosophical discussion of the the role of theory in
> psychology and its limitations. This would be for use by senior
> psychology
> majors who have to design research projects that address a theory in some
> way. I'm finding that they really have no clue about what Theory is
> despite
> the fact that they've been introduced to several.
>
> Thanks in advance for your ideas,
>
> J. Timothy Petersik
> Professor, Department of Psychology
> Ripon College, Ripon, WI 54971
> e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> web: www.ripon.edu/faculty/petersikt
> *************************************
> * Computers are useless.
> * They can only give you answers.
> * --Pablo Picasso
> *************************************
>
>
