The Human Without the World: Ethical Failures in Isolating Subjects from Context in Psychological Research

AbstractMainstream psychology claims to study “the human mind” or “behavior” as universalproperties of isolated individuals. In practice, it systematically strips subjects from their social,economic, and ecological contexts—reducing complex human experiences todecontextualized data points. This paper argues that such isolation is not a meremethodological limitation but an epistemic and ethical failure. By obscuring structuralcausation, enabling victim-blaming, and exploiting vulnerable populations, psychologyperpetuates harm while claiming scientific neutrality. I propose an Embedded HumanFramework requiring context-integrated research, community benefit-sharing, and structuralanalysis—challenging the field to redefine “validity” as alignment with lived reality.