Why I think Spiral Dynamics is wrong.

[M A J I]

I've been saying something similar for years, this forum is often stuck in its own loops and delusions around many such subjects, but you cannot really help people unless they want help, and then they only want help when the realize they are in a cycle/loop themselves.

[Jwayne]

12 hours ago, ryandesreu said:

I'm wondering what color you might see yourself.

I don't think in these terms at all, or find the model useful in any way. I think its highly reductive rather than clarifying.

It's main purpose is in projecting an ascending hierarchy of psychological evolution with certain cultures and values above (chronologically) others.

When people here say there is no hierarchy nor progressive evolution then I wonder what value they see actually remaining to the categories. Except to pseudo-intellectually reduce complex realities into colors and hence confuse yourself into thinking you have actually accomplished or understood something.

Edited May 2, 2023 by Jwayne

[Carl-Richard]

@Jwayne How do you think SD was created?

[Jwayne]

Just now, Carl-Richard said:

@Jwayne How do you think SD was created?

I'll explain how a similar model should be created to avoid ideological defects.

If you want to understand non-WEIRD psychologies, you must learn their language, participate in its traditions and experience its multi-faceted civilization identity from within (its own literature, art forms and ways of life, etc.). That approach will give you an experiential basis so as to first-hand be familiar with those peoples own phenomenology, so to speak, with their own epistemology. Which of course, won't be stated in such terms, but expressed howsoever that culture sees itself.

Spiral Dynamics is just looking from a culturally and historically-contingent WEIRD perspective, with an obvious linguistic bias, from the outside at the rest of humanity in all its richness. And it assumes - erroneously - objectivity about its conclusions rather than seeing them as obviously self-conditioned.

 

[Carl-Richard]

@Jwayne

I can agree with that. But I think SD is largely on par with other types of WEIRD psychological theories. After all, the stages seem to line up nicely with most other WEIRD developmental stage theories (e.g. Piaget, Kohlberg). So it should be OK to apply it to e.g. people on this forum or US politics.

Edited May 2, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Jodistrict]

Isn’t Don Beck known for expressing support for Donald Trump?   Spiral Dynamics is value laden and provides justification for neoliberal economics.  Indigenous people who are fighting to keep their land from multinational developers are “purple” at the lower end of the spiral, who need to be “civilized” (i.e., accept that there land was stolen) .   Academics don’t take Spiral Dynamics seriously because of the lack of empirical evidence and the heavy reliance on subjective observation.  The theory comes from popular books and articles, and not peer-reviewed publications.      

Edited May 2, 2023 by Jodistrict

[Carl-Richard]

7 hours ago, Jodistrict said:

Academics don’t take Spiral Dynamics seriously because of the lack of empirical evidence and the heavy reliance on subjective observation.  The theory comes from popular books and articles, and not peer-reviewed publications.      

It's true that SD, as far as it's based on Graves' initial data set, is not very empirically rigorous, but there is something to be said for how it correlates strongly with more established developmental stage theories. So why is SD not more popular? Well, firstly, there doesn't seem to be a culture of using developmental stage theories as main stage clinical interventions, which is generally how something becomes popular in psychology. They're mostly used as side pieces that you just learn about and have in the back of your head. There is a reason you haven't heard of something called "Piagetian Therapy" (because it doesn't exist) but you have heard about "Cognitive Behavioral Therapy". Secondly, these theories have traditionally been limited to childhood development. Adult stage development is actually a very obscure concept, which is probably the biggest reason why nobody is paying it much attention.

Edited May 2, 2023 by Carl-Richard