British Clinical Psychology and Society

Abstract

British clinical psychology is now 60 years old and its trajectory has been shaped overwhelmingly by that of the NHS. As a small, new profession, within that structure, its character also emerged initially with the epistemological stamp of the features of British psychology as an academic discipline. Empiricism in general and methodological behaviourism in particular, defined the epistemological possibilities and legitimacy of the early stage of professionalisation. Deviations from that orthodoxy have been driven partially by disciplinary shifts (particularly the displacement of behaviourism by cognitivism and the spread of constructivist ideas more widely in the human sciences). Challenges for teachers in the profession are discussed in the second part of the paper, in the light of disciplinary reductionism.