Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, social psychologists diagnosed their field as suffering a state of disci-
plinary crisis. The crisis was a multifaceted one, but issues of methodology, social relevance, and disci-
plinary, philosophical, and theoretical orientation were the primary areas of concern. Given that these
issues have been prominent ones throughout the history of the social and behavioral sciences, it becomes
necessary to look to the immediate context of the 1970s crisis to understand how and why a disciplinary
crisis came to be diagnosed. The present analysis suggests that the crisis reflected the larger crisis in
American society and also drew on the language of crisis prevalent at the time. Employing this language
may have offered the field a method of making sense of, reframing, and redirecting internal and external
critiques of the discipline.