Overly ambitious critics and the Medici Effect: a reply to Kampen and Tamás

The critical audit of Q methodology by Kampen and Tamás contains many errors of fact and understanding—indeed, a resistance to understanding that is compared to the Medicis’ stance toward Galileo. Following a brief historical summary of similar ill-advised critiques of Q methodology in the 80 years since its introduction, responses are presented to various of the points raised: on the nature of subjectivity, the universe of subjective communicability (concourse) and samples drawn from it, the role of factor analysis and factor interpretation, the forced Q-sort distribution, the ratio between the number of participants and the number of statements in the Q sample, and sources of researcher bias