Staff profile

Biography

A fundamental problem in social psychology is that of relating the characteristics of persons to the social situations, small or large, in which they find themselves. Much of my research has been concerned with exploring aspects of the mutuality of person-person and person-environment relations. In developing this mutualist approach I have been drawing upon ideas from social psychology, ecological psychology, cultural psychology and pragmatist philosophy. As a result of this work, I am ever more convinced that the discipline of psychology needs to reach out to other human science disciplines in developing its concepts, theories and methods.

Together with my former colleague Arthur Still I have for many years been involved in exploring the relevance of this mutualist approach to the human sciences more generally (Still & Good, 1986, 1992, 1998). I have used it in a study of the disciplinary status of social psychology exploring not only the discipline's historical development but also its mutual relations with other human sciences, especially its boundary relations with its parent disciplines, sociology and psychology (Good, 2000, 2022). This approach also has been used in attempts to extend James Gibson’s affordance notion to the perception of human social behaviour (Valenti & Good, 1991; Good, 2007) and in the exploration of social and musical co-ordination between chamber music players (Davidson and Good, 2002). This mutualist view has also underpinned my research on the history and theory of Q methodology (Good, 2003, 2010, 2021; Good & Gauzente, 2020; Good & Wolf, 2022). I am currently working on a monograph on the life and work of William Stephenson, the founder of Q methodology.

• History of the human sciences
• Theory and practice of Q methodology
• Ecological approaches to cognition and distributed cognition
• Psychology of music, especially social aspects of performance
• Ecological social psychology, especially social affordances

• 2024: International Socety for the Scientific Study of Subjectivity: William Stephenson Achievement Award:
• 2018: Q Methodology: The Past, Present and Future: “Q Methodology: The Past, Present and Future”, Keynote Lecture presented at Workshop on Subjectivity As Matter and Instrument, Maison des Sciences de l'Homme Auge-Guépin, University of Nantes, France, 13-17 September. 2018
• 2017: Advanced Workshops on Q Methodology: Co-Presenter (with Professor Steven Brown, Kent State University, Ohio) of Advanced Workshops on Q Methodology at the Annual Conferences of the International Society for the Scientific Study of Subjectivity in Glasgow (2017), Charlotte, NC (2018), Naples (2019) and Kent State, OH (2024).
• 2013: Editor: Operant Subjectivity: The International Journal of Q Methodology:
• 2011: Is the History of the Human Sciences History?: “Is the History of the Human Sciences History?”. Opening Keynote Lecture, 30th Annual Conference of the European Society for the History of the Human Sciences, University of Belgrade, 5-8 July 2011.
• 2002: Chair, History and Philosophy of Psychology Section, British Psychological Society:
• 2001: Leverhulme Research Fellowship:
• 2000: Editor: History of the Human Sciences:
• 1997: President, European Society for the History of the Human Sciences:

Chapter in book

• Good, J. M. M. (2022). Social Psychology: Exemplary Interdiscipline or Subdiscipline. In D. McCallum (Ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of the History of Human Sciences (1005-1034). Springer Nature. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-7255-2_78
• Good, J. (2021). William Stephenson and the U.S. National Institute for Mental Health: Lost Oppoertunity or Springboard for a Revitalized Career?. In J. C. Rhoads, D. B. Thomas, & S. E. Ramlo (Eds.), Cultivating Q Methodology: Essays Honoring Steven R. Brown (18-44). International Society for the Scientific Study of Subjectivity
• Gauzente, C., & Good, J. (2020). Q Methodology, William Stephenson and postdisciplinarity. In T. Pernecky (Ed.), Postdisciplinary Knowledge (165-182). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429058561-10
• Brown, S., & Good, J. (2010). Q Methodology. In N. Salkind (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Research Design. SAGE Publications
• Good, J. (1998). Postmodernity and the Political. In The Politics of Postmodernity (1-18). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139170772.001
• Good, J. (1993). Quests for Interdisciplinarity: The Rhetorical Constitution of Social Psychology. In R. Roberts, & J. Good (Eds.), The Recovery of Rhetoric: Persuasive Discourse and Disciplinarity in the Human Sciences. The Bristol Press/University of Virginia Press
• Good, J. (1993). Persuasive Discourse in and Between Disciplines in the Human Sciences. In R. H. Roberts, & J. M. M. Good (Eds.), The Recovery of Rhetoric: Persuaive Discourse and Discipinarity in the Human Sciences (1-21). The Bristol Press
• Good, J., & Still, A. (1989). Ecological Psychology as a Theory of Social Cognition. In A. Gellatly (Ed.), Cognition and Social Worlds (216-229). Clarendon Press

Edited book

• Good, J., & Velody, I. (Eds.). (1998). The Politics of Postmodernity. Cambridge University Press
• Roberts, R., & Good, J. (Eds.). (1993). The Recovery of Rhetoric: Persuasive Discourse and Disciplinarity in the Human Sciences. The Bristol Press/University of Virginia Press

Journal Article

• Good, J., & Wolf, A. (2024). Introduction to Quiddity College. Operant Subjectivity, 44(1), 47-49. https://doi.org/10.22488/okstate.22.100503
• Sæbjørnsen, S., Ellingsen, I., Good, J., & Ødegård, A. (2016). Combining a Naturalistic and Theoretical Q Sample Approach: An Empirical Research Illustration. https://doi.org/10.15133/j.os.2016.005
• Harvey, H., Good, J., Mason, J., & Reissland, N. (2015). A Q-methodology study of parental understandings of infant immunisation: Implications for health-care advice. Journal of Health Psychology, 20(11), 1451-1462. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359105313513622
• Good, J. (2014). Valedictory editorial. History of the Human Sciences, 27(5), 3-5. https://doi.org/10.1177/0952695114563820
• Good, J. (2011). Some Contextualizing Notes on William Stephenson's 'Old Age Research'
• Good, J. (2010). Introduction to William Stephenson's Quest for a Science of Subjectivity. Psychoanalysis and History, 12(2), 211-243. https://doi.org/10.3366/pah.2010.0006
• Burt, D., Kentridge, R., Good, J., Perrett, D., Tiddeman, B., & Boothroyd, L. (2007). Q-cgi: new techniques to assess variation in perception applied to facial attractiveness. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 274(1627), 2779-2784. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2007.1037
• Good, J. (2007). The affordances for social psychology of the ecological approach to social knowing. Theory and Psychology, 17(2), 265-295. https://doi.org/10.1177/0959354307075046
• Richards, J., Papworth, M., Corbett, S., & Good, J. (2007). Adolescent motherhood: A Q-methodological re-evaluation of psychological and social outcomes. Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology, 17, 347-362. https://doi.org/10.1002/casp.888
• Good, J. (2003). William Stephenson, Quantum Theory, and Q Methodology
• Davidson, J. W., & Good, J. (2002). Social and Musical Co-ordination between Members of a String Quartet: An Exploratory Study. Psychology of Music, 30(2), 186-201. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735602302005
• Good, J. (2002). On the 'Unsettling of Social Psychology': An End to the 'Crises' of Social Psychology?. History and Philosophy of Psychology, 4(1), 84-92
• Good, J. (2000). William Stephenson and the Post World War II Bifurcation of British Psychology
• Crawley, R., Good, J., Still, A., & Valenti, S. S. (2000). The Perception of Sex from Complex Body Movement in Young Children. Ecological Psychology, 12(3), 231-240
• Good, J. (2000). Disciplining social psychology: a case study of boundary relations in the history of the human sciences. Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences, 36(4), 383-403
• Good, J., & Still, A. (1998). The Ontology of Mutualism. Ecological Psychology, 10(1), 39-63
• Good, J., Aggleton, J., Kentridge, R., & Barker, J. (1997). Measuring Musical Aptitude in Children: on the role of age, handedness, scholastic achievement, and socioeconomic status. Psychology of Music, 25, 57-69. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735697251005
• Aggleton, J. P., Kentridge, R. W., & Good, J. (1994). Handedness and Musical Ability: A Study of Professional Orchestral Players, Composers, and Choir Members. Psychology of Music, 22(2), 148-156. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735694222004
• Good, J., & Still, A. (1992). Mutualism in the Human Sciences: Towards the Implementation of a Theory. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 22, 105-128
• Good, J. M., & Still, A. W. (1992). The idea of an interdisciplinary social psychology: An historical and rhetorical analysis. Canadian Psychology, 33(3), 563-568. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0078731
• Valenti, S. S., & Good, J. M. M. (1991). Social Affordances and Interaction I: Introduction. Ecological Psychology, 3(2), 77-98. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15326969eco0302_2
• Good, J., & Still, A. (1986). Tolman and the tradition of direct perception. British Journal of Psychology, 77(4), 533-539. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8295.1986.tb02218.x