Introduction

During the latter part of the 1970s academic psychology underwent a rather ragged paradigm shift. It is clear enough what the shift was away from; it was away from behaviourism. The paradigm shift was the consequence of some obscure change in sympathies, rather than of formal disconfirmation of stimulus–response (S–R) psycholog. Psychological behaviourism, with the sole exception of E. C. Tolman’s ‘purposive behaviourism’, has been steadfastly opposed to purposivism, interpreting the goal-directedness of behaviour as the causal consequence of past contingencies of reinforcement rather than the anticipation of future consummations. Most social psychology is permeated with some variant of utilitarianism, assuming that its actors cast up the costs and benefits of the various options available to them and elect the course that maximises satisfaction. Complacency about the problems of determinism in psychology is made easier by the unchallenged currency of the term ‘behaviour’.