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The Importance of Worldviews for Developmental Psychology

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Abstract

This article aims to examine the impact of worldviews on research in developmental psychology. To do so, we use the notion of the epistemic framework and recover aspects of other epistemological approaches to meta-theoretical problems. First, we differentiate the epistemic framework of the split from the relational epistemic framework, which underlie different investigations. We argue in favour of the latter for the promotion of research on knowledge development. Then, we raise the question of ethical and political values and their epistemic significance for developmental psychology. After that, we specify the modalities of the intervention of ontological and epistemological presuppositions and values in the circumscription of the object of enquiry, the formulation of problems, and the definition of methodological aspects. In this respect, we reflect upon the social regulation of the intervention of epistemic frameworks. Finally, we discuss a central question: does giving a relevant space to values in research force us to abandon the objectivity of knowledge or to reformulate it in non-positivist terms?

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Notes

  1. We refer to ideology in a very wide sense, which is not limited to the Marxist version of a legitimization of the social order, but rather that refers to symbols and meanings with which natural and social life is apprehended (for a wider discussion of the different meanings of “ideology”; see Eagleton 1997). It should be noted that, in earlier works, Piaget always showed himself in favour of a conception of science as opposed to ideology. In this sense, it can be assumed that this is a significant change in Piaget’s approach, which originated in the collaboration with García.

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Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank Nicolás Alessandroni, editor of the special section in which this article is published, for his collaboration and suggestions on previous versions of the manuscript. Without his support, these pages would not have been possible.

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  1. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET, Argentina), Godoy Cruz 2290, C1425FQB, Buenos Aires, Argentina

    José Antonio Castorina

  2. Universidad Pedagógica Nacional (UNIPE, Argentina), Buenos Aires, Argentina

    José Antonio Castorina

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Castorina, J.A. The Importance of Worldviews for Developmental Psychology. Hu Arenas 4, 153–171 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42087-020-00115-9

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