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Updated: Jun 16, 2026

A Cognitive Paradigm to Investigate Interference in Working Memory by Distractions and Interruptions
Published on: July 16, 2015
Time for paradigmatic substitution in psychology. What are the alternatives?
1Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, 7491 Trondheim, Norway. arnulf.kolstad@svt.ntnu.no
Abstract:
This article focuses on the "machine paradigm" in psychology and its consequences for (mis)understanding of human beings. It discusses causes of the mainstream epistemology in Western societies, referring to philosophical traditions, the prestige of some natural sciences and mathematical statistics. It emphasizes how the higher psychological functions develop dialectically from a biological basis and how the brain due to its plasticity changes with mental and physical activity. This makes a causal machine paradigm unfit to describe and explain human psychology and human development. Some concepts for an alternative paradigm are suggested.
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