De experimentele methode in de sociale psychologie

Samenvatting

Behavioral scientists, like McDougall, Le Bon, Freud, etc, were the first to point at the importance of group phenomena as an object of social research. Their speculations, however, were more devoted to undifferentiated mass phenomena than to the smaller groupings. The psycho-analytic School took more interest in the biological classifying principle than in the more specific social-psychological: structures of sympathy and influence relations. Only of late was the group chosen as an object of study. Moreno's inquiry on sociom structures in a girls' institute meets the requirements of a methodological research, though he does not clarify the proper nature of his concepts of attraction and repulsion. His method leads to exact, measurable results in contrast with recent psycho-analytic group theories like Bion, where interpretation and feeling takes the place of measurement. The application of the experimental method meant a big forward step in the study of group phenomena. The characteristic of this method is the operation with independent variables through which knowledge of the forces working in groups is obtained by adding or varying certain forces. This kind of new behaviorism does not suppose a direct connection between stimulus and reaction, but postulates a psychic intermedium. The advantage of the experimental method is obvious, when one looks at the experiment of Schachter, who proves that expulsion of a person out of a group happens, when that person deviates from the average opinion in the group with respect to a relevant point of view. Here more content is given to the concept of repulsion which Moreno handles. The application of the f and direction of verbal contact is one of the most interesting points in Schachter's exp. 3 methods: the record of attraction, of influence-relations and the registration of contacts will give a backbone to the investigation of group phenomena. In addition, the application of mathematics will give a better possibility of putting the structures thus found into algebraic formula. Differences in interpretation make it difficult to accept a connection between stimulus and reaction. These differences are responsible for the sterile impression which the published experiments in social psychology still make. M.O.L. Klein.