Towards a Reflexive Psychology: Embracing Interdisciplinarity,Intersectionality,and Decolonial Perspectives

Abstract

The production of mainstream scientific knowledge in Psychology has long been guided by positivist paradigms that universalize constructs and processes based on WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) populations. This has contributed to establishing normative standards that marginalize or render invisible individuals, groups, and societies whose subjectivities, conduct, and corporeality diverge from dominant epistemologies. Consequently, psychologists may still inadvertently reproduce stigmatizing frameworks in their practices, reinforcing existing social inequalities. In postcolonial contexts such as Brazil, these dynamics become even more pronounced, as psychological theories and practices remain largely permeated by individualistic frameworks that overlook broader sociocultural and geopolitical dimensions of experience. Grounded in Cultural Psychology of semiotic dynamics and centered on the unit of analysis between subjectivity and culture, this theoretical paper argues for interdisciplinary, intersectional, and decolonial approaches to reconfigure knowledge production in Psychology. Our aims are: (a) to explore the heuristic value of these approaches within Psychology, particularly in postcolonial contexts as Brazil; and (b) to demonstrate how they enrich critical understandings of psychological and social phenomena. Thus, the paper contributes to global critical debates in Psychology, while also responding to local challenges by advocating for a situated, and socially responsible discipline committed to transformation.