Shaping of the science

Analyzes the development of psychology from the perspective of scientific disciplines as conceptual paradigms shaped over the course of their history by both internal (conceptual, methodological) and external (social, political) factors. Psychology is analyzed as a search for knowledge, as a role for which people are educated, and as an expert skill to be used in the service of society. The impact of both internal and external factors on the shaping of the discipline of psychology is noted. It is stressed that the interplay of these factors in the development of psychology is inevitable, and that its continuing vitality rests on the maintenance of a variety of paradigmatic perspectives. (15 ref.)