Judging by the number of personal e mails and invectives I've received, it seems like the notion that psychologists are not scientists touches some people on a painful nerve. Part of the problem might be that people do not share a common definition of what science is. Under some definitions, psychology is very scientific, while under others, not so. Certain subfields of psychology qualify under the most stringent definitions. Others do not. My concern isn't whether psychology is "really" a science. I get very alarmed when I hear one academic discipline try to disparage another because it "isn't truly scientific." Folks, we aren't the only people this happens to! Physicists have been known to denigrate chemists and practically everyone picks on biology as being too "soft". Even physicists fear the wrath of pure mathematicians telling them their discipline is "elementary." IMHO, usually people who criticize other disciplines for not being scientific a. have no idea what the other discipline really is about and how it works and b. possibly want some of the resources of that discipline. Psychologists are equally guilty. How many of us have denigraded sociologists or, for those of us with a clinical background, psychiatry? My point is that criticism without a definition of terms and without interest in dialogue usually does not have positive intent. Usually, when a more "hard science" colleague harrasses me about psychology being a pseudoscience, I ask them when they took their last psych course. For most of them its been years. A gentle "Well, maybe you need to read up on it more" usually will silence all of those without an agenda. Nothing will diffuse the criticism of the latter.
