FREUDIAN THEORY AND SCIENCE

To What Extent can Freudian Theory be Considered Scientific?



To What Extent can Freudian Theory be Considered Scientific?

Introduction

Freudian theory can be considered science because since its origins, psychoanalysis has been inextricably linked with the history of twentieth-century social theory. Maccoby (2003) mentions Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, responded to unprecedented events in his own political culture, particularly World War I, the resurgence in Austria of anti-Semitism, and the rise of Nazism, fascism, and other mass movements, and applied his developing science to a theory of society. Psychoanalysis is predicated on a fully elaborated set of postulates concerning ...