New Books in Psychology Uljana Feest, "Operationism in Psychology: An Epistemology of Exploration" (U Chicago Press, 2025)
May 10, 2025
Uljana Feest, a philosophy professor at Leibniz University in Hanover and author of "Operationism in Psychology: An Epistemology of Exploration," dives deep into the historical ties between psychological concepts and research methods. She discusses the challenges of defining abstract phenomena like memory and its connection to folk psychology. Feest advocates for clearer operational definitions to improve measurement in psychology, while addressing the replication crisis and the need for a more integrated understanding of how psychological constructs relate to real-life behaviors.
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Feest's Academic Journey
- Uljana Feest studied psychology and philosophy, seeking to understand what psychology actually does and its assumptions.
- Her early curiosity about operational definitions grew into a lifelong research project culminating in this book.
Epistemically Blurry Research Objects
- Objects of research in psychology are epistemically blurry, meaning we believe they exist but understand them only unclearly.
- Operational definitions serve to make this blurry object into something more experimentally accessible.
Linking Phenomena and Objects
- Psychological objects like memory are clusters of phenomena linked by folk psychology concepts.
- Phenomena act as evidence for objects of research and are interconnected explananda and explanantia.