Christian Anti-Psychology and the Scientific Method

Abstract

Christians are becoming increasingly vocal in their criticism of scientific psychology. In their criticisms Christian anti-psychologists have devalued knowledge gained through research and suggested both that the scientific method is inappropriate for studying human behavior and that the deception inherent in psychological research is immoral. This article examines these concerns and argues that the more subjective alternatives suggested by the critics of psychology suffer from many of the same limitations as scientific psychology and that taking such an approach would amount to substituting uncontrolled error for controlled error and uncontrolled deception for controlled deception.