Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-pftt2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-30T22:07:56.626Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Methodological question-begging about the causes of complex social traits

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 September 2023

John E. Richters*
Affiliation:
Rockville, MD, USA john.richters@gmail.com

Abstract

Burt formulates her critique at a general level of abstraction that highlights the methodological deficiencies of sociogenomics without also calling attention to precisely the same deficiencies in the social science model she seeks to defend against its encroachments. What might have been a methodological bulwark against the excesses of sociogenomics is instead a one-sided critique that merely renews its charter.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bryan, C. J., Tipton, E., & Yeager, D. S. (2021). Behavioural science is unlikely to change the world without a heterogeneity revolution. Nature Human Behaviour, 5(8), 980989.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dalton, T. C., & Bergenn, V. W. (2007). Early experience, the brain, and consciousness: An historical and interdisciplinary synthesis. Psychology Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Edelman, G. M., & Gally, J. A. (2001). Degeneracy and complexity in biological systems. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98(24), 1376313768.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Frey, B. S., & Eichenberger, R. (1991). Anomalies in political economy. Public Choice, 68(1), 7189.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holland, P. W. (1986). Statistics and causal inference (in theory and methods). Journal of the American Statistical Association, 81, 945960.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ingold, T. (2008). When biology goes underground: Genes and the spectre of race. Genomics, Society and Policy, 4(1), 23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levin, Y., & Aharon, I. (2011). What's on your mind? A brain scan won't tell. Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 2(4), 699722.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mason, P. H. (2015). Degeneracy: Demystifying and destigmatizing a core concept in systems biology. Complexity, 20(3), 1221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCaffrey, J. B. (2015). The brain's heterogeneous functional landscape. Philosophy of Science, 82(5), 10101022.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moeller, J., Dietrich, J., Neubauer, A. B., Brose, A., Kühnel, J., Dehne, M., & Pekrun, R. (2022). Generalizability crisis meets heterogeneity revolution: Determining under which boundary conditions findings replicate and generalize. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/5wsnaGoogle Scholar
Molenaar, P. C. (2004). A manifesto on psychology as idiographic science: Bringing the person back into scientific psychology, this time forever. Measurement, 2(4), 201218.Google Scholar
Molenaar, P. C. (2015). On the relation between person-oriented and subject-specific approaches. Journal of Person-Oriented Research, 1(1–2), 3441.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Richters, J. E. (1997). The Hubble hypothesis and the developmentalist's dilemma. Development and Psychopathology, 9(2), 193229.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Richters, J. E. (2021). Incredible utility: The lost causes and causal debris of psychological science. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 43(6), 366405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Waddington, C. H. (1957). The strategy of the genes. Routledge.Google Scholar
Whitacre, J. M. (2010). Degeneracy: A link between evolvability, robustness and complexity in biological systems. Theoretical Biology & Medical Modelling, 7, 617.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Xie, Y. (2011). Causal inference and heterogeneity bias in social science. Information Knowledge Systems Management, 10(1–4), 279289.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed