Paul E. Meehl
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Paul Everett Meehl (3 January 1920 – 14 February 2003) was an American
clinical psychologist Clinical psychology is an integration of human science, behavioral science, theory, and clinical knowledge for the purpose of understanding, preventing, and relieving psychologically-based distress or dysfunction and to promote subjective well ...
. He was the Hathaway and Regents' Professor of Psychology at the
University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...
, and past president of the
American Psychological Association The American Psychological Association (APA) is the main professional organization of psychologists in the United States, and the largest psychological association in the world. It has over 170,000 members, including scientists, educators, clin ...
. A ''
Review of General Psychology ''Review of General Psychology'' is the quarterly scientific journal of the American Psychological Association Division 1: The Society for general psychology. The journal publishes cross-disciplinary psychological articles that are conceptual, theo ...
'' survey, published in 2002, ranked Meehl as the 74th most cited psychologist of the 20th century, in a tie with Eleanor J. Gibson. Throughout his nearly 60-year career, Meehl made seminal contributions to psychology, including empirical studies and theoretical accounts of
construct validity Construct validity concerns how well a set of indicators represent or reflect a concept that is not directly measurable. ''Construct validation'' is the accumulation of evidence to support the interpretation of what a measure reflects.Polit DF Bec ...
,
schizophrenia Schizophrenia () is a mental disorder characterized variously by hallucinations (typically, Auditory hallucination#Schizophrenia, hearing voices), delusions, thought disorder, disorganized thinking and behavior, and Reduced affect display, f ...
etiology,
psychological assessment Psychological evaluation is a method to assess an individual's behavior, personality, cognitive abilities, and several other domains. A common reason for a psychological evaluation is to identify psychological factors that may be inhibiting ''a p ...
, behavioral prediction,
metascience Metascience (also known as meta-research) is the use of scientific methodology to study science itself. Metascience seeks to increase the quality of scientific research while reducing inefficiency. It is also known as "research on research" and ...
, and
philosophy of science Philosophy of science is the branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. Amongst its central questions are the difference between science and non-science, the reliability of scientific theories, ...
.


Biography


Childhood

Paul Meehl was born January 3, 1920, in
Minneapolis Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...
,
Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...
, to Otto and Blanche Swedal. His family name "Meehl" was his stepfather's. When he was age 16, his mother died as the result of poor medical care which, according to Meehl, greatly affected his faith in the expertise of medical practitioners and diagnostic accuracy of clinicians. After his mother's death, Meehl lived briefly with his stepfather, then with a neighborhood family for one year so he could finish high school. He then lived with his maternal grandparents, who lived near the
University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...
.


Education and academic career

Meehl started as an
undergraduate Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education, usually in a college or university. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, ...
at the University of Minnesota in March 1938. He earned his bachelor's degree in 1941 with Donald G. Paterson as his advisor, and took his PhD in psychology at
Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...
under Starke R. Hathaway in 1945. Meehl's
graduate student Postgraduate education, graduate education, or graduate school consists of Academic degree, academic or professional degrees, certificates, diplomas, or other qualifications usually pursued by higher education, post-secondary students who have ...
cohort at the time included Marian Breland Bailey, William K. Estes, Norman Guttman, William Schofield, and Kenneth MacCorquodale. Upon taking his doctorate, Meehl immediately accepted a faculty position at the university, which he held throughout his career. In addition, he had appointments in psychology, law, psychiatry,
neurology Neurology (from , "string, nerve" and the suffix wikt:-logia, -logia, "study of") is the branch of specialty (medicine) , medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of conditions and disease involving the nervous syst ...
, philosophy, and served as a fellow of the Minnesota Center for Philosophy of Science, founded by Herbert Feigl, Meehl, and
Wilfrid Sellars Wilfrid Stalker Sellars (; May 20, 1912 – July 2, 1989) was an American philosopher and prominent developer of critical realism who "revolutionized both the content and the method of philosophy in the United States". His work has had a profou ...
. Meehl rose quickly to academic positions of prominence. He was chairman of the University of Minnesota Psychology Department at age 31, president of the Midwestern Psychological Association at age 34, recipient of the
American Psychological Association The American Psychological Association (APA) is the main professional organization of psychologists in the United States, and the largest psychological association in the world. It has over 170,000 members, including scientists, educators, clin ...
's Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions to Psychology at age 38, and president of that association at age 42. He was promoted to Regents' professor, the highest academic position at the University of Minnesota, in 1968. He received the Bruno Klopfer Distinguished Contributor Award in personality assessment in 1979, and was elected to the
National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...
in 1987. Meehl was not particularly religious during his upbringing, but in adulthood during the 1950s collaborated with a group of
Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...
theologians and psychologists to write ''What, Then, Is Man?''. This project was commissioned by the
Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...
through Concordia Seminary. The project explored both orthodox theology, psychological science, and how Christians (Lutherans, in particular) could responsibly function as both Christians and psychologists without betraying orthodoxy or sound science and practice.


Later life and death

In 1995, Meehl was a signatory of a collective statement titled " Mainstream Science on Intelligence", written by Linda Gottfredson and published in the ''
Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
''. He died on February 14, 2003, at his home in Minneapolis of chronic myelomonocytic leukemia. In 2005, Donald R. Peterson, a student of Meehl's, published a volume of their correspondence.


Philosophy of science

Meehl founded, along with Herbert Feigl and
Wilfrid Sellars Wilfrid Stalker Sellars (; May 20, 1912 – July 2, 1989) was an American philosopher and prominent developer of critical realism who "revolutionized both the content and the method of philosophy in the United States". His work has had a profou ...
, the Minnesota Center for the Philosophy of Science, and was a leading figure in philosophy of science as applied to psychology. Arguably Meehl's most important contributions to psychological research methodology were in legitimizing scientific claims about unobservable psychological processes. In the first half of the 20th century, psychology was dominated by operationism and
behaviorism Behaviorism is a systematic approach to understand the behavior of humans and other animals. It assumes that behavior is either a reflex elicited by the pairing of certain antecedent stimuli in the environment, or a consequence of that indivi ...
. As outlined in Bridgman's '' The Logic of Modern Physics'', if two researchers had different
operational definition An operational definition specifies concrete, replicable procedures designed to represent a construct. In the words of American psychologist S.S. Stevens (1935), "An operation is the performance which we execute in order to make known a concept." F ...
s, they had different concepts. There was no "surplus meaning". If, for example, two researchers had different measures of "anomia" or "intelligence", they had different concepts. Behaviorists focussed on stimulus–response theories and were deeply skeptical of "unscientific" explanations in terms of unobservable psychological processes. Behaviorists and operationists would have rejected as unscientific any notion that there was some general thing called "intelligence" that existed inside a person's head and that might be reflected almost-equivalently in Stanford-Binet IQ tests or Wechsler scales. Meehl changed that via two landmark papers. In 1948, Kenneth MacCorquodale and Meehl introduced the distinction between "hypothetical construct" and "intervening variable". "Naively, it would seem that there is a difference in logical status between constructs which involve the hypothesization of an entity, process, or event which is not itself observed, and constructs which do not involve such hypothesization." An intervening variable is simply a mathematical combination of operations. If one speaks of the "expected value" of a gamble (probability of winning × payoff for winning), this is not hypothesizing any unobservable psychological process. Expected value is simply a mathematical combination of observables. On the other hand, if one attempts to make statements about "attractiveness" of a gamble, if this is not observable or perfectly captured by some single operational measure, this is a "hypothetical construct"—a theoretical term that is not itself observable or a direct function of observables. They used as examples Hull's (anticipatory goal response) or Allport's "biophysical traits", or Murray's "needs". "These constructs involve terms which are not wholly reducible to empirical terms; they refer to processes or entities that are not directly observed (although they need not be in principle unobservable)." Such constructs had "surplus meaning". Thus, good behaviorists and operationists should be comfortable with statements about intervening variables, but should have greater wariness of hypothetical constructs.


Construct validity and nomological networks

In 1955, Lee J. Cronbach and Meehl legitimized theory tests about unobservable, hypothetical constructs. Constructs are unobservables, and they can be stable traits of individuals (e.g., "Need for Cognition") or temporary states (e.g., nonconscious goal activation). Previously, good behaviorists had deep skepticism about the legitimacy of psychological research about unobservable processes. Cronbach and Meehl introduced the concept of "construct" validity for cases in which there was no "gold standard" criterion for validating a test of a hypothetical construct. Hence, any construct had "surplus meaning". Construct validity was distinguished from predictive validity, concurrent validity, and content validity. They also introduced the concept of the "nomological net"—the network of associations among constructs and measures. Cronbach and Meehl argued that the meaning of a hypothetical construct is given by its relations to other variables in a nomological network. One tests a theory of relations among hypothetical constructs by showing that putative measures of these constructs relate to each other as implied by one's theory, as captured in the nomological network. This set the stage for modern
psychological test Psychological testing refers to the administration of psychological tests. Psychological tests are administered or scored by trained evaluators. A person's responses are evaluated according to carefully prescribed guidelines. Scores are thought t ...
and set the stage for the cognitive revolution in psychology that focusses on the study of mental processes that are not directly observable.


Criticism of null hypothesis testing

After
Karl Popper Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian–British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the ...
's ''
The Logic of Scientific Discovery ''The Logic of Scientific Discovery'' is a 1959 book about the philosophy of science by the philosopher Karl Popper. Popper rewrote his book in English from the 1934 (imprint '1935') German original, titled ''Logik der Forschung. Zur Erkenntnisth ...
'' was published in English in 1959, Meehl counted himself a "Popperian" for a short time, later as "a 'neo-Popperian' philosophical eclectic", still using the Popperian approach of conjectures and refutations, but without endorsing all of Popper's philosophy. Influenced by and in respect of Popper's asymmetry principle, Meehl was a strident critic of using statistical
null hypothesis The null hypothesis (often denoted ''H''0) is the claim in scientific research that the effect being studied does not exist. The null hypothesis can also be described as the hypothesis in which no relationship exists between two sets of data o ...
testing for the evaluation of scientific theory. He believed that null hypothesis testing was partly responsible for the lack of progress in many of the " scientifically soft" areas of psychology (e.g., clinical,
counseling Counseling is the professional guidance of the individual by utilizing psychological methods especially in collecting case history data, using various techniques of the personal interview, and testing interests and aptitudes. This is a list of c ...
,
social Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not. Etymology The word "social" derives fro ...
,
personality Personality is any person's collection of interrelated behavioral, cognitive, and emotional patterns that comprise a person’s unique adjustment to life. These interrelated patterns are relatively stable, but can change over long time per ...
, and
community A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...
). At the same time, although Meehl harshly criticized the overreliance of psychology on
null hypothesis The null hypothesis (often denoted ''H''0) is the claim in scientific research that the effect being studied does not exist. The null hypothesis can also be described as the hypothesis in which no relationship exists between two sets of data o ...
significance testing (NHST), he also noted, “When I was a rat psychologist, I unabashedly employed significance testing in latent-learning experiments; looking back I see no reason to fault myself for having done so in the light of my present methodological views”. He mainly promoted a switch to interval hypothesis testing.


Meehl's paradox

Meehl's paradox is that in the hard sciences more sophisticated and precise methods make it harder to claim support for one's theory. The opposite is true in soft sciences like the social sciences. Hard sciences like physics make exact point predictions and work by testing whether observed data falsify those predictions. With increased precision, one is better able to detect small deviations from the model's predictions and harder to claim support for the model. In contrast, softer social sciences make only directional predictions, not point predictions. Softer social sciences claim support when the direction of the observed effect matches predictions, rejecting only the null hypothesis of zero effect. Meehl argued that no treatment in the real world has zero effect. With sufficient sample size, therefore, one should almost always be able to reject the null hypothesis of zero effect. Researchers who guessed randomly at the sign of any small effect would have a 50–50 chance of finding confirmation with sufficiently large sample size.


Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory

Meehl was considered an authority on the development of psychological assessments using the
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) is a standardized psychometric test of adult personality and psychopathology. A version for adolescents also exists, the MMPI-A, and was first published in 1992. Psychologists and other ment ...
(MMPI). While Meehl did not directly develop the original MMPI items (he was a high school junior when Hathaway and
McKinley McKinley may refer to: People *McKinley (name), a page for people with the surname and given name "McKinley" **William McKinley, 25th president of the United States. Places Philippines * Fort William McKinley (now Fort Bonifacio) in Metro Ma ...
created the item pool), he contributed widely to the literature on interpreting patterns of responses to MMPI questions. In particular, Meehl argued that the MMPI could be used to understand
personality Personality is any person's collection of interrelated behavioral, cognitive, and emotional patterns that comprise a person’s unique adjustment to life. These interrelated patterns are relatively stable, but can change over long time per ...
profiles systematically associated with clinical outcomes, something he termed a statistical (versus a "clinical") approach to predicting behavior.


Interactions and suppressors: the K scale

As part of his doctoral dissertation, Meehl worked with Hathaway to develop the K scale indicator of valid responding for the MMPI. During initial clinical testing of the MMPI, a subset of individuals exhibiting clear signs of
mental illness A mental disorder, also referred to as a mental illness, a mental health condition, or a psychiatric disability, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. A mental disorder is ...
still produced normal personality profiles on the various clinical scales. It was suspected that these individuals were demonstrating clinical defensiveness and presenting as asymptomatic and well-adjusted. Meehl and Hathaway employed a technique called "empirical criterion keying" to compare the responses of these defensive individuals with other individuals who were not suspected of experiencing mental illness and who also produced normal MMPI profiles. The empirical criterion keying approach selected items based on their ability to maximally discriminate between these groups. They were not selected based on theory or
face validity Face validity is the extent to which a test is subjectively viewed as covering the concept it purports to measure. It refers to the transparency or relevance of a test as it appears to test participants. In other words, a test can be said to have ...
of the item content. As a result, items on the resulting scale, termed the K (for "correction") scale would be difficult to avoid for individuals attempting to present as well-adjusted when taking the MMPI. Individuals who endorsed the K scale items were thought to be demonstrating a sophisticated attempt to conceal information about their mental health history from test administrators. The K scale is an early example of a putative suppressor variable. The K scale is used as a complement validity indicator to the L (for "lie") scale, whose items were selected based on item content face validity and are more obviously focused on impression management. The K scale has been popular among clinical psychologists, and has been a useful tool for MMPI and MMPI-2 profile interpretation. Meehl and Hathaway continued to conduct research using MMPI validity indicators and noticed K scales elevations were associated with greater denial of symptoms on some clinical scales more than others. To compensate for this, they developed a K scale correction factor aimed at offsetting effects of defensive responding on other scales measuring psychopathology. Substantial subsequent research conducted on the original MMPI clinical scales used these "K-corrected" scores, although research on the usefulness of the corrections has produced mixed results. The most recent iteration of the K scale, developed for the MMPI-2-RF, is still used for psychological assessments in clinical, neuropsychological, and forensic contexts.


Clinical versus statistical prediction


Meehl's proposal

Meehl's 1954 book ''Clinical vs. Statistical Prediction: A Theoretical Analysis and a Review of the Evidence'' analyzed the claim that mechanical (i.e., formal,
algorithm In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm () is a finite sequence of Rigour#Mathematics, mathematically rigorous instructions, typically used to solve a class of specific Computational problem, problems or to perform a computation. Algo ...
ic,
actuarial Actuarial science is the discipline that applies mathematical and statistical methods to assess risk in insurance, pension, finance, investment and other industries and professions. Actuaries are professionals trained in this discipline. In m ...
) methods of data combination would outperform clinical (i.e., subjective, informal) methods to predict behavior. Meehl argued that mechanical methods of prediction, when used correctly, make more efficient and reliable decisions about patient
prognosis Prognosis ( Greek: πρόγνωσις "fore-knowing, foreseeing"; : prognoses) is a medical term for predicting the likelihood or expected development of a disease, including whether the signs and symptoms will improve or worsen (and how quickly) ...
and treatment. His conclusions were controversial and have long conflicted with the prevailing consensus about psychiatric decision-making. Historically, mental health professionals commonly make decisions based on their professional clinical judgment (i.e., combining clinical information "in their head" and arriving at a prediction about a patient). Meehl theorized that clinicians would make more mistakes than a mechanical prediction tool created to combine clinical data and arrive at predictions. Within his view, mechanical prediction approaches need not exclude any type of data from being combined and could incorporate coded clinical impressions. Once the clinical information is quantified, Meehl proposed mechanical approaches would make 100% reliable predictions for exactly the same data every time. Clinical prediction, on the other hand, would not provide this guarantee.


Later research comparing clinical versus mechanical prediction

Meta-analyses Meta-analysis is a method of synthesis of quantitative data from multiple independent studies addressing a common research question. An important part of this method involves computing a combined effect size across all of the studies. As such, th ...
comparing clinical and mechanical prediction efficiency have supported Meehl's (1954) conclusion that mechanical methods outperform clinical methods. In response to objections, Meehl continued to defend algorithmic prediction throughout his career and proposed that clinicians should rarely deviate from mechanically derived conclusions. To illustrate this, Meehl described a "broken leg" scenario in which mechanical prediction indicated that an individual has a 90% chance of attending the movies. However, the "clinician" is aware that the individual recently broke his leg, and this was not factored into the mechanical prediction. Therefore, the clinician can confidently conclude the mechanical prediction will be incorrect. The broken leg is objective evidence determined with high accuracy and highly correlated with staying home from the movies. Meehl argued, however, that mental health professionals rarely have access to such clear countervailing information as a broken leg, and therefore rarely if ever can appropriately disregard valid mechanical predictions. Meehl argued that humans introduce biases when making decisions during clinical practice.. For example, clinicians may seek out information to support their presuppositions, or miss and ignore information challenging their views. Additionally, Meehl described how clinical judgment could be influenced by overconfidence or anecdotal observations unsupported by empirical research. In contrast, mechanical prediction tools can be configured to use important clinical information and are not influenced by psychological biases. In support of this conclusion, Meehl and his colleagues found that clinicians still make less accurate decisions than mechanical formulas even when given the same mechanical formulas to help with their decision-making. Human biases have become central to research in diverse fields including
behavioral economics Behavioral economics is the study of the psychological (e.g. cognitive, behavioral, affective, social) factors involved in the decisions of individuals or institutions, and how these decisions deviate from those implied by traditional economi ...
and
decision-making In psychology, decision-making (also spelled decision making and decisionmaking) is regarded as the Cognition, cognitive process resulting in the selection of a belief or a course of action among several possible alternative options. It could be ...
.


Extensions

Kahneman and Klein (2009) reported that expert intuition is learned from frequent, rapid, high quality feedback. Few professions have such feedback and can be beaten by mechanical rules, as Meehl and others have documented. Kahneman et al. (2021) noted that professionals without such feedback can be beaten by rules averaging several known predictors. With some data, linear regression models work better. With lots of data artificial intelligence models can work better still. Tetlock and Gardner (2015) and Hubbard (2020) have developed methods to help people improve their judgements, citing Meehl's work as a foundation for their own.


Schizophrenia

Meehl was elected president of the American Psychological Association in 1962. In his address to the annual convention, he presented his comprehensive theory about the genetic causes of schizophrenia. This conflicted with the prevailing notion that schizophrenia was primarily the result of a person's childhood rearing environment. Meehl argued schizophrenia should be considered a genetically based neurological disorder manifesting via complex interactions with personal and environmental factors. His reasoning was shaped by the writings of psychoanalyst Sandor Rado as well as the behavioral genetics findings at the time. He proposed that existing psychodynamic theory about schizophrenia could be meaningfully integrated into his neurobiological framework for the disorder.


Dominant schizogene theory

Meehl hypothesized the existence of an
autosomal dominant In genetics, dominance is the phenomenon of one variant (allele) of a gene on a chromosome masking or overriding the Phenotype, effect of a different variant of the same gene on Homologous chromosome, the other copy of the chromosome. The firs ...
schizogene widespread throughout the population, which would function as a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for schizophrenia. The schizogene would manifest on the cellular level throughout the
central nervous system The central nervous system (CNS) is the part of the nervous system consisting primarily of the brain, spinal cord and retina. The CNS is so named because the brain integrates the received information and coordinates and influences the activity o ...
and should be observed as a functional control aberration called hypokrisia. Cells exhibiting hypokrisia should contribute to a characteristic pattern of impaired integrative signal processing across multiple neural circuits in the brain, which Meehl termed "schizotaxia". In response to typical rearing environments and social reinforcement schedules, this neural aberration should invariably lead to a collection of observable behavioral tendencies called " schizotypy". Schizotypy indicators would include neurological soft signs, subtle differences in language usage (" cognitive slippage"), and effects on personality and emotion. Meehl believed many people in society exhibit signs of schizotypy as a result of the schizogene without showing signs of schizophrenia. Schizophrenia would only occur when individuals are carrying other non-specific genetic risk factors ("
polygenic A polygene is a member of a group of non- epistatic genes that interact additively to influence a phenotypic trait, thus contributing to multiple-gene inheritance (polygenic inheritance, multigenic inheritance, quantitative inheritance), a type ...
potentiators") relevant for traits such as
anhedonia Anhedonia is a diverse array of deficits in hedonic function, including reduced motivation or ability to experience pleasure. While earlier definitions emphasized the inability to experience pleasure, anhedonia is currently used by researcher ...
, ambivalence, and social fear. These additional traits would be more likely expressed under stress (e.g., trauma) and inconsistent social schedules from parents. Given these combinations of conditions, decompensation from schizotypy to schizophrenia would result. Meehl's dominant schizogene theory had a substantial influence on subsequent research efforts. His theorizing increased interest in
longitudinal study A longitudinal study (or longitudinal survey, or panel study) is a research design that involves repeated observations of the same variables (e.g., people) over long periods of time (i.e., uses longitudinal data). It is often a type of observationa ...
of individuals at risk for psychosis and family members of people with schizophrenia who may be carrying the schizogene. Meehl's descriptions of schizophrenia as largely a
neurological Neurology (from , "string, nerve" and the suffix -logia, "study of") is the branch of medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of conditions and disease involving the nervous system, which comprises the brain, the s ...
phenomenon and schizotypy as a genetically based risk factor for schizophrenia have been supported. However, researchers have not uncovered strong evidence for a single schizogene, and instead believe the genetic risk for schizophrenia is better explained by polygenic combinations of common variants and rare genetic
mutations In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA. Viral genomes contain either DNA or RNA. Mutations result from errors during DNA or viral replication, mitosi ...
.


Taxometrics

With the help of several colleagues, Meehl developed multiple statistical methods for identifying the presence of categorical groupings within biological or psychological variables. Meehl was a critic of the checklist ("polythetic") structure used to categorize mental illnesses in diagnostic manuals such as the
DSM-III The ''Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders'' (''DSM''; latest edition: ''DSM-5-TR'', published in March 2022) is a publication by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) for the classification of mental disorders using a c ...
. Although many DSM-defined psychiatric syndromes can be reliability identified in clinical settings, Meehl argued that the categorical nature of mental illnesses assumed by these diagnoses (i.e., a person is either sick or well) should be tested empirically rather than accepted at face value. Meehl advocated for a data-driven approach that could, in the words of
Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born  BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...
, "carve nature at its joints", and determine when it is most appropriate to conceptualize something as being categorical or continuous/dimensional. In his writings, Meehl advocated for the creation of a field called "taxometrics" to test for categorical groupings across diverse scientific disciplines. Based on this approach, latent "taxons" would be conceptualized as causal factors leading to true differences in kind within a population. Taxons could include many types of biological and psychosocial phenomena such as expression of an autosomal dominant gene (e.g.,
Huntington's disease Huntington's disease (HD), also known as Huntington's chorea, is an incurable neurodegenerative disease that is mostly Genetic disorder#Autosomal dominant, inherited. It typically presents as a triad of progressive psychiatric, cognitive, and ...
), biological sex, or indoctrination into a highly homogenous religious sect. Meehl envisioned applying taxometric approaches when the precise underlying latent causes are currently unknown and only observable "indicators" are available (e.g., psychiatric conditions). By mathematically examining patterns across these manifested indicators, Meehl proposed that converging evidence could be used to assess the plausibility of a true latent taxon while also estimating the base rate of that taxon.


Coherent Cut Kinetics and L-Mode

Coherent Cut Kinetics is the suite of statistical tools developed by Meehl and his colleagues to perform taxometric analysis. "Cut Kinetics" refers to the mathematical operation of moving potential cut points across distributions of indicator variables to create subsamples using dichotomous splits. Then, several metrics can be applied to assess if the candidate cut points can be explained by a latent taxon. "Coherent" refers to the process of using multiple indicators and metrics together to make a case for convergence about the categorical or dimensional nature of the phenomenon being studied. Meehl played a role in developing the following taxometric procedures: MAMBAC, MAXCOV, MAXSLOPE, MAXEIG, and L-Mode.


Application, influence, and criticism of taxometric methods

Taxometric analyses have contributed to a shift away from the use of diagnostic categories among mental health researchers. In line with Meehl's theorizing, studies using taxometric methods have demonstrated how most psychiatric conditions are better conceptualized as being dimensional rather than categorical (e.g.,
psychopathy Psychopathy, or psychopathic personality, is a personality construct characterized by impaired empathy and remorse, along with bold, disinhibited, and egocentric traits. These traits are often masked by superficial charm and immunity ...
,
posttraumatic stress disorder Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental disorder that develops from experiencing a Psychological trauma, traumatic event, such as sexual assault, domestic violence, child abuse, warfare and its associated traumas, natural disaster ...
, and clinical depression). However, some possible exceptions have been identified such as a latent taxon representing the tendency to experience maladaptive dissociative states. Since Meehl's death, factor mixture modeling has been proposed as an alternative to address the statistical weaknesses of his taxometric methods.


Applied clinical views and work

Meehl practiced as a licensed and board-certified
clinical psychologist Clinical psychology is an integration of human science, behavioral science, theory, and clinical knowledge for the purpose of understanding, preventing, and relieving psychologically-based distress or dysfunction and to promote subjective well ...
throughout his career. In 1958, Meehl performed
psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...
on
Saul Bellow Saul Bellow (born Solomon Bellows; June 10, 1915April 5, 2005) was a Canadian-American writer. For his literary work, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the 1976 Nobel Prize in Literature, and the National Medal of Arts. He is the only write ...
while Bellow was an instructor at the University of Minnesota. He identified as "strongly psychodynamic in theoretical orientation", and used a combination of
psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...
and rational emotive therapy.


"Why I Do Not Attend Case Conferences"

In 1973, Paul Meehl published the
polemic Polemic ( , ) is contentious rhetoric intended to support a specific position by forthright claims and to undermine the opposing position. The practice of such argumentation is called polemics, which are seen in arguments on controversial to ...
"Why I Do Not Attend Case Conferences".. He discussed his avoidance of case conferences in mental health clinics, where individual patients, or "cases", are discussed at length by a team, often as a training exercise. Meehl found such case conferences boring and lacking intellectual rigor. In contrast, he recalled numerous interesting illuminating case conferences within
internal medicine Internal medicine, also known as general medicine in Commonwealth nations, is a medical specialty for medical doctors focused on the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of diseases in adults. Its namesake stems from "treatment of diseases of ...
or
neurology Neurology (from , "string, nerve" and the suffix wikt:-logia, -logia, "study of") is the branch of specialty (medicine) , medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of conditions and disease involving the nervous syst ...
departments, which often centered around
pathologist Pathology is the study of disease. The word ''pathology'' also refers to the study of disease in general, incorporating a wide range of biology research fields and medical practices. However, when used in the context of modern medical treatme ...
reports and objective data about patients'
pathophysiology Pathophysiology (or physiopathology) is a branch of study, at the intersection of pathology and physiology, concerning disordered physiological processes that cause, result from, or are otherwise associated with a disease or injury. Pathology is ...
. In other words, case conferences outside mental health disciplines were benefiting from including objective evidence against which clinical expertise could be compared and contrasted. Meehl argued for creating a psychiatric analogue to the pathologist's report. Additionally, he outlined a proposed format for case conferences beginning with initial discussion of clinical observations, and ending with a revealing of a subset of patient data (e.g., psychological testing results) to compare with attendees' clinical inferences and proposed diagnoses. Meehl also elaborated upon the issue of clinical versus statistical prediction and the known weakness of unstructured clinical decision-making during typical case conferences. He encouraged clinicians to be humble when collaborating about patient care and pushed for a higher scientific standard for clinical reasoning in mental health treatment settings. Meehl directly identified several common deficiencies in reasoning that he had observed among his clinical colleagues, and to which he applied memorable names: * '' Barnum effect'': Making a statement that is trivial and true of nearly all patients, but which is made as though it is important for the current patient. * ''Sick-sick ("pathological set")'': The tendency to generalize from personal experiences of health and ways of being, to the identification of others who are different from ourselves as being "sick". * ''Me too'': The opposite of sick-sick. Imagining that "everyone does this" and thereby minimizing a symptom without assessing the probability of whether a mentally healthy person would actually do it. A variation of this is ''Uncle George's pancake fallacy''. This minimizes a symptom through reference to a friend/relative who exhibited a similar symptom, thereby implying that it is normal. * ''Multiple Napoleons fallacy'': "It's not real to us, but it's 'real' to him". "So what if he thinks he's Napoleon?" There is a distinction between reality and delusion that is important to make when assessing a patient and so the consideration of comparative realities can mislead and distract from the importance of a patient's delusion to a diagnostic decision. "If I think the moon is made of green cheese and you think it's a piece of rock, one of us must be wrong". For this, pointing out that the deviated cognitions of a delusional patient "seem real to him" is a waste of time. So, the statement "It is reality to him", which is philosophically either trivial or false, is also clinically misleading. * ''Hidden decisions'': Decisions based on factors that we do not own up to or challenge. An example is the placement of middle- and upper-class patients in therapy while lower-class patients are given medication. Meehl identified these decisions as related to an implicit ideal patient who is young, attractive, verbal, intelligent, and successful ( YAVIS). He argued that YAVIS patients are preferred by psychotherapists because they can pay for long-term treatment and are more enjoyable to interact with. * ''The spun-glass theory of the mind'': The belief that the human organism is so fragile that minor negative events, such as criticism, rejection, or failure, are bound to cause major trauma—essentially not giving humans, and sometimes patients, enough credit for their resilience and ability to recover. * ''Crummy criterion fallacy'': This fallacy refers to how psychologists explain away the technical aspects of tests, using inappropriate and 'crummy' criterion that is observational instead of scientific, rather than incorporating the
psychometric Psychometrics is a field of study within psychology concerned with the theory and technique of measurement. Psychometrics generally covers specialized fields within psychology and education devoted to testing, measurement, assessment, and rela ...
aspects into the interview, history, and other material being presented at case conferences. * ''Understanding it makes it normal'': The act of normalizing or excusing a behavior just because one understands the cause or function of it, regardless of its normalcy or appropriateness. * ''Assumptions that content and dynamics explain why this person is abnormal'': Those who seek psychological services have characteristics associated with being a patient/care-seeker, but also characteristics of being human. Meehl argues that it is problematic to view a patient's normative life dysfunction to their psychopathology. For example, no individual is maximally effective in all aspects of their life. This will be true of non-patients and patients alike, and must be distinguished by the clinician from those aspects of the patient's life which are pathological and dysfunctional. * ''Identifying the softhearted with the softheaded'': The belief that those who have sincere concern for the suffering (the softhearted) are the same as those who tend to be wrong in logical and empirical decisions (softheaded). * '' Ad hoc fallacy'': Creating explanations after we have been presented with evidence that is consistent with what has now been proven. * ''Doing it the hard way'': Going about a task in a more difficult manner when an equivalent easier option exists; for example, in clinical psychology, using an unnecessary instrument or procedure that can be difficult and time-consuming while the same information can be ascertained through interviewing or interacting with the client. * ''Social scientists' anti-biology bias'': Meehl argued that social scientists like psychologists, sociologists, and psychiatrists have a tendency to react negatively to biological contributors to abnormal behavior, and therefore tending to be anti-drug, anti-genetic, and anti- ECT. * ''Double standard of evidential morals'': When one is making an argument and requires less evidence for him or herself than does so for another.


Metascience

According to Faust "One of eehl'smost important, but less widely known potential contributions is the co-development, and the extension and elaboration of meta-science, or the science of science." Meehl coined the term ' cliometric metatheory', where meta-theory is defined as the empirical theory of scientific theorizing. He published several articles criticizing the weak use of hypothesis tests. Together with Lykken he coined the term 'crud factor' which expresses the idea that "everything is more or less correlated with everything in the social sciences", which makes null hypothesis tests for correlational effects uninteresting. He also discussed better approaches to tests of theories in psychological science based on the work by Imre Lakatos.


Selected works

* Originally published in '' Journal of Clinical Psychology'', 1, 296–303. Also republished as: * * Reprinted in . * A case history handbook for professional uses of the
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) is a standardized psychometric test of adult personality and psychopathology. A version for adolescents also exists, the MMPI-A, and was first published in 1992. Psychologists and other ment ...
. * Reprinted with new preface in 1996 by
Jason Aronson Jason Aronson was an American publisher of books in the field of psychotherapy. Topics dealt with in these books include child therapy, family therapy, couple therapy, object relations therapy, play therapy, depression, eating disorders, per ...
() and in 2013 by Echo Point Books & Media (). * Reprinted in Also reprinted in and . * Reprinted in and . * Reprinted as Also reprinted in and . * Reprinted in Also reprinted in and . * * Reprinted in . * Reprinted in a couple of edited collections. * Reprinted in Also reprinted in . * Reprinted in and . * * Reprinted in and . * * * Reprinted in *
Version including initial dictation
that was not included in the published version. * * Reprinted in . * * Reprinted in Also reprinted in . * * Reprinted in . Additiona
remarks by Meehl
replying to
memo from L. R. Goldberg
*
Appendices
* Reprinted in . * Reprinted in . * * Originally published by
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Taylor & Francis Group is an international company originating in the United Kingdom that publishes books and academic journals. Its parts include Taylor & Francis, CRC Press, Routledge, F1000 Research and Dovepress. It is a division of I ...
. * * * * *


References

* * * *


Notes


External links


Paul E. Meehl website
including full list of publications and complete videos of Meehl teaching his course in Philosophical Psychology in 1989 at the Psychology Department of the
University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...
. {{DEFAULTSORT:Meehl, Paul University of Minnesota College of Liberal Arts alumni University of Minnesota faculty 1920 births 2003 deaths Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Presidents of the American Psychological Association American people of Norwegian descent Behavior geneticists 20th-century American psychologists 20th-century American zoologists American clinical psychologists James McKeen Cattell Fellow Award recipients