On the incongruence of theory and practice in behavior research: What can and should be done about it

Abstract

On December 10, 1904, at the Nobel Prize ceremony, Professor Count K.A.H. Mörner introduced I.P. Pavlov, recipient of the prize for Medicine, as follows: Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Ladies and Gentlemen, The medical sciences are mutually interdependent. Progress in one field is often closely associated with development in others….It is not always such progress, as immediately are useful and of benefit, which should be considered as especially important; this character can also be attributed to those which are themselves less spectacular but form the basis for others which are then only a further development of it. The aim of science is the acquisition of knowledge, the value of which should not be measured by the ease with which it can be brought immediately into practical usefulness…’