Whatever happened to the psyche?: A sociological examination of science, religion and spirituality in psychology and psychiatry

Emile Durkheim (1913/1995) observed that the notion of the soul seems to exist wherever human culture exists. The western disciplines of psychology and psychiatry adopted a version of this notion by taking the "psyche"—variously translated as soul or mind—as their root word. However, as these fields shifted in response to changing ideas about what it means to be scientific, the notion of the psyche fell into disfavor. Psychology turned largely to the study of human behavior and psychiatry increasingly focused on the brain and other somatic causes of human mental states.;This study examines the ways in which the relationship between science and secularity has shaped western psychology and psychiatry. To do so, it focuses on transpersonal psychology, a small movement within those fields, as a case study to understand the ways in which ideas about science, religion, spirituality, and the human self changed over the course of the twentieth century. Transpersonal psychology has placed spirituality at the center of study, and has organized around a critique of the psychological and psychiatric mainstreams for their alleged materialist bias. This study begins by examining the historical context in which both the mainstream and the transpersonal sub-fields developed and changed. Then it compares the literature of the transpersonal movement with the mainstream, as well as the communicative exchange that takes place between marginal group and the mainstream. This comparison is complemented by interviews with nineteenth of the most prolific contributors to the transpersonal literature. It shows the circumstances under which spiritual and religious ideas reemerged in certain areas of psychology and psychiatry, as well as the changing nature of the mainstream responses to such ideas. This project contributes to the sociology of knowledge, science and religion by tracing ideas regarding the notions of the soul, spirit and consciousness that are currently at the margins of the human sciences. As the relationship between science and secularity continues to shift, it is possible—even likely—that such ideas may gain greater currency within the mainstream.