[Islam-Online- Psychology]

The essence of logical-positivism or empiricism is observation, measurement, and quantification of sense data available to the observer. In undertaking his observations and quantification, the observer only subjects his object of study to the dictates of natural laws. By doing this, it is assumed and equally believed that he comes up with objective data that are neutral, value-free, and therefore, universal. This is all because, as it is also claimed, the observer has shielded his object of study and his methodology from the influences of all extraneous and confounding variables including his own personal attitudes, values, and biases, by means of rigorous control and conditioning mechanisms.
This assumption of objectivity may be true with regard to the natural and physical sciences, but it is certainly not true with regard to the social and behavioral sciences. In the natural and physical sciences, the data obtained from the observation of nonhuman materials are "dead," unlike those of human behavior which are alive. The elimination of the influence of prior notions, prejudices, and biases in the latter case is far from being possible. This point has been intelligently argued by Al-Faruqi. In the first place, he argues that data of human behavior are not impervious to the attitudes and preferences of the observer. They do not simply and ordinarily reveal themselves as they really are to each and every investigator. He maintains that "attitudes, feelings, desires, judgments and hopes of men and women tend to shut themselves off to the observer devoid of sympathy for them.11
Al-Faruqi further argues against the notion of objectivity in behavioral and social sciences from the viewpoint of axiological perception:

In the perception of "dead" objects, the senses of the observer are passive; they are totally determined by the data. In the perception of values, per contra, the observer actively empathizes or "emotes" with the data, whether for them or against them. Value-perception is itself value-determination. . . . A value is said to be cognized if and only if it has moved, affected and stirred up an emotion or feeling in the observer such as its own nature requires. The perception of value is impossible unless the human behavior is able to move the observer. Similarly, the observer cannot be moved unless he is trained to be affected, and unless he has empathy with the object of his experience. The subject's attitude toward the data studied determines the outcome of the study.12

In light of the above arguments, Al-Faruqi drew the following conclusion:
The humanistic studies of Western man and the social analyses of Western society by a Western scientist are necessarily "Western" and cannot serve as models for the study of Muslims or of their society.13
From the point of view of strict methodological and epistemological criticisms, one would not only agree with Al-Faruqi in this regard, but would also be convinced of the fact that, even in the so-called natural and physical sciences, objectivity may be largely farce or myth. According to Langgulung, research has challenged this traditional realist (empiricist) notion/belief of objectivity, which claims that the physical sciences have always progressed through the accumulation of context-free facts.14
Langgulung further explains that, contrary to what is commonly believed, researchers in the physical sciences have always undertaken their research within the context of an adopted paradigm. Such a paradigm is what Kahn calls a "scientific paradigm" in that it defines the theoretical framework, the way of perceiving and understanding the world of a group of scientists with a particular worldview. According to Kuhn, a scientific paradigm is a socially shared cognitive schema, and just as one's cognitive schema provides each of us with a way of making sense of the world around us, a scientific paradigm provides a group of scientists with a way of collectively making sense of their scientific world.15
It can then be argued that research, even in the physical sciences, has progressed through what Langgulung calls "paradigmatic epistemology," and since paradigms are cognitive schemes that evolve or rather emanate out of particular social contexts, the physical sciences are themselves never completely free of subjectivity and contextuality. This factor casts doubt on the commonly accepted notion that scientific findings are axiomatic truths of universal validity and applicability. Harris actually has argued in exactly a similar way. His arguments are so powerful that they expose clearly the claims of scientific objectivity and universality as farce and false. He says:

Knowing the world, or coming to know the world, is not a matter of learning or coming into possession of a set of facts or truths about the world, which are there in the world, and which the world yields up to those who are able to see them; it is rather, a matter of coming to perceive the world in particular ways from particular perspectives, and from particular view points, which are largely determined by and arise out of one's interactions in and with a particular historical and social context.16

The arguments presented here, even though long, are necessary to refute the claim of universality of the theories and principles of the Western social sciences. While this does not mean that all such claims are false, it must be noted that, as Badri rightly affirms, few Western psychological theories have attained cross-cultural validity;17 rather, a large chunk of them are largely bounded within Western cultural and ideological values. The necessary conclusion is that Muslims must formulate their distinctive perspective of psychology. In this respect, an attempt has been made to expound the Islamic perspective of developmental psychology. Essentially, an effort has been made in postulating its basic paradigm and principles.

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