Quantum change: Toward a psychology of transformation.

Ernest Lawrence Rossi

Ivan D. London

Craig E. Richards

Abstract This article explores one of the profound complementarities in quantum physics and psychology: the reflexive nature of observation both on the objective (physics) and the subjective (psychological) side. It seeks to provide a logical chain of evidence from quantum mechanics to quantum effects in biological systems, to quantum effects in neurological systems. It then discusses the implications for psychology and pedagogy. Should quantum theory become the dominant paradigm for explaining consciousness, the implications for psychology are profound indeed. However, neuroplasticity, whether explained by classical or quantum effects, has already launched a revolution in our understanding of how changing one's intentions and thoughts affects both behavior and the brain.

George S. Musser

Masanao Ozawa, Andrei Yu. Khrennikov

Recently, quantum formalism started to be actively used outside of quantum physics: in psychology, decision-making, economics, finances, and social science. Human psychological behavior is characterized by a few basic effects; one of them is the question order effect (QOE). This effect was successfully modeled (Busemeyer–Wang) by representing questions A and B by Hermitian observables and mental-state transformations (back action of answering) by orthogonal projectors. However, then it was demonstrated that such representation cannot be combined with another psychological effect, known as the response replicability effect (RRE). Later, this no-go result was generalized to representation of questions and state transformations by quantum instruments of the atomic type. In light of these results, the possibility of using quantum formalism in psychology was questioned. In this paper, we show that, nevertheless, the combination of the QOE and RRE can be modeled within quantum formalism, in the framework of theory of non-atomic quantum instruments.

Rachida Aïssaoui, John Amis