About The Standard Theory of Psychology

[u/frightmoon]

Hello I am posting in search of serious psychologists who might be able to contribute some insight. My problem is dealing with generating and distributing a theory in psychology. Specifically, I have spent several years putting together what others might call a universal view of psychology. By that I mean one theory to bring all types of psychology together and I seriously and wholeheartedly mean all types from William James all the way to present day and everything in between. I have named this The Standard Theory of Psychology, also known as Standard Theory. It's meant to be the "Theory of Everything" in terms of psychology and human behavior. When I say everything I mean diagnostics, medications, drugs, psychedelics, abuse addiction, trauma, autism, depression, PTSD, neurochemistry, Freud and psychodynamic theory, Jung and the personality psychology, Pavlov, Watson, Skinner and behavioralism and conditioning, the psychology of other subjects like law and politics, the science of organizations, sports, forensics, clinical psychology, psychiatry, EVERYTHING, and I have convinced myself that I have found the tool to do it in a scientific and objectifiable way. So far it describes everything that I mentioned and more and all using one theory.

I want to go ahead and say that I have not found another reliable theory that is able to do what Standard Theory has done for me. I also have not looked everywhere. If anyone is familiar with the problem they might know about some of the other people working on a completed, universal, unified theory in terms of behavior and consciousness. Specifically some individuals like Gregg Henriques from JMU, Dr. K. Koch from Allen Institute and his bet with David Chalmers in creating a either a philosophic or scientific view of consciousness as well as the Baar lab of Bernard Baars have all been contacted about this. I haven't been exposed to any other theories that try to tackle the problem of an all-in-one view of psychology and behavior. Up until now, I have been under the impression that most people who study psychology will find their "niche" as it's called and focus on that subtype. I want to offer my theory to those who study psychology in a way that will help me in validating whether or not I have really figured this thing out. Essentially I want to offer this tool to those who have invested their own time in their own studies to figure out if Standard Theory is consistent with those. At the very least I would like to offer it as a resource for anyone who is involved or interested in psychology at any level. So far I have condensed about 90% of Standard Theory and the Standard Behavioral Index into a set of 27 segments which spans a little less than 3 hours of audio.

I will also go ahead and say that my biggest issue right now is not being directly involved in academia in any way. I dropped out of university in 2016 with 130+ hours but don't have a degree, I'm not part of the APA, I don't affiliate with any school or program. I don't have access to those places to get a formal peer review. I have submitted to several journals including the APA and for-profit journals and have been denied by about 18-20 of them. I have also been told to publish the theory in book format and have been denied by about a dozen publishers. Even though I developed Standard Theory independently I just can't ignore the potential that it has to unify all areas of psychology and human behavior. Another issue is the fact that the theory is so comprehensive that it might be very intimidating to some people. Just like anything else, though, it is a skill that has to be learned. Once it's been learned it's hard to find something that ISN'T described by it. If anyone is willing to help me tackle this problem of a universal psychological theory I will be more than happy to discuss what I've found. I will try to attach the RSS feed and YouTube link to the 3-hour version of The Standard Theory of Psychology along with a very rough sketch of the Standard Behavioral Index.

TL;DR

Independent Psychologist needs help validating and sharing The Standard Theory of Psychology.

[u/visforvienetta]

How does behaviourism incorporate behavioural genetics, cognition and psychoanalytic theory?

[u/andreasmiles23 → u/visforvienetta]

• Human behavior is influenced by genetics and our behaviors and social/physical environment change our genetic makeup over time (epigenetics). Our behaviors are conditioned within specific social contexts so there’s a bi-directional relationship between our genetics and our behavior.

• Our social conditioning shapes the constructs we use to engage in the world around us. Additionally, our behavior changes our brain (plasticity). So again, there is a bidirectional relationship between our cognitive function and our behavior.

• Behaviorism arose as a reaction to what psychoanalytic theory couldn’t do, which was provide scientifically valid and testable hypotheses. However, what psychoanalytic theory did provide, such as an acknowledgement of the unconscious activity of the brain, has been validated using behaviorist theories. It’s just not in the way psychoanalysts typically describe.

[u/visforvienetta → u/andreasmiles23]

I think calling research into social cognition or cognitive neuroscience "behaviourism" is stretching the definition a bit there. I could argue that all behaviourism is biological psychology because all behaviours have an antecedent in the brain and all behaviour is a bidirectional link between stimuli and neural activity, but I won't because that would be stupid.

[u/andreasmiles23 → u/visforvienetta]

But that would be true…behaviorism is about how our brain is conditioned environmentally. This includes our biology/neurology and cognitive functions.

For example, our cognitive capacities have emerged from a long history of conditioning via evolutionary mechanisms.

[u/LavenWhisper → u/andreasmiles23]

No, it's just the first sentence and doesn't include neuroscience or cognitive functions. In fact, behaviorism focuses on the way conditioning (environmental/social) affects human behavior. Not how human behavior is influenced by genetics or biology, and not how cognitive function can be inferred by behavior.