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Discusses the history of psychology in Great Britain in the nineteenth century. British-authored undergraduate writings on the topic of psychology; Comparison of the history of psychology with medicine and psychiatry; Problems in the accessibility and storage of the resource materials on psychology; Developments in the history of psychology by mid-1980s; Fundamental problem with the field of history of psychology in Britain; Factors which affect the process behind institutional change and development of the history of psychology in Great Britain.

Contemporary discussions about operational definition often hark back to Stanley S. Stevens' classic papers on psychological operationism. Still, he was far from the only psychologist to call for conceptual hygiene. Some of Stevens' direct colleagues at Harvard—most notably B. F. Skinner and E. G. Boring—were also actively applying Bridgman's conceptual strictures to the study of mind and behavior. In this paper, I shed new light on the history of operationism by reconstructing the Harvard debates about operational definition in the years before Stevens published his seminal articles. Building on a large set of archival evidence from the Harvard University Archives, I argue that we can get a more complete understanding of Stevens' contributions if we better grasp the operationisms of his former teachers and direct colleagues at Harvard's Department of Philosophy and Psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on submissions of papers for the "Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences."

This paper examines the debates around the "miracle of Maglavit", a shepherd's vision of God that took place in 1935 in Romania and attracted much contemporary popular and intellectual interest. The debates drew in arguments from doctors and theologians, who discussed the psychology of divine revelation and tried to elaborate the implications that such an event could have for the life of the Romanian nation. The paper places these debates in the context of wider contemporary discussions about psychology and religion. I argue that what Maglavit shows is that, in Romania at least, public debates about visionary experience in the 1930s were not only debates about its psychology, but of a psychology thoroughly imbricated with political concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemporary Argentinian psychology has a unique characteristic: it is identified with psychoanalysis. Nonpsychoanalytic theories and therapies are difficult to find. In addition, there is an overt antiscientific attitude within many psychology programs. How should this be explained? In this paper, we claim that a philosophical history of psychology can shed new light on the development of Argentinian psychology by showing that early Argentinian psychoanalysts held positions in the newborn psychology programs and a distinctive stance toward scientific research in general and psychology in particular. In the absence of an explicit and articulate philosophical position, psychoanalysts developed an implicit meta‐theory that helped shape the context that led to the institutionalization and professionalization of psychology in Argentina. Although we do not establish or even suggest a monocausal link between their ideas and the current state of Argentinian psychology, we do claim that their impact should be explored. Finally, we discuss some limitations of our study and suggest future complementary investigations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clark psychology in the post&shyHallian era has attracted little attention from scholars. The only general account, Carl Murchison's ‘Recollections of a Magic Decade at Clark’ (1959), is both partisan and limited in scope. This paper examines the ‘second cycle’ of the Clark department in a period of unusual productivity in research, publication and graduate training from the mid-twenties to the mid-thirties, as well as the internal tensions and constraints that led the department to self-destruct in 1936 and lose its scholarly leadership and professional visibility until the post-World War II era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the founding of the Revue Philosophique de la France et de l 'Étranger by Théodule Ribot (1830--1916) in 1876. Like the English journal Mind, which was launched the same year, this journal introduced the new scientific psychology to France. Its founding increased Ribot's scientific credibility in psychology and led him to be regarded as the most distinguished French specialist in the field. First, we review the state of French philosophy at the time of the journal's founding, focusing on the three main French schools of thought in philosophy and on their relations with psychology. Second, after analyzing the preface written by Ribot in the first issue of the Revue Philosophique, we examine how the journal was received in French philosophical circles. Finally, we discuss its subsequent history, highlighting its founder's promotion of new ideas in psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This section offers news briefs pertaining to the International Society for the History of the Social and Behavior Sciences (Cheiron) as of October 1, 2020. Topics discussed include the virtual Forum for the History of the Human Sciences (FHHS), the winners of the FHHS prizes for the year, and the Cheiron and the European Society for the History of the Human Sciences' virtual meeting held July 9 to 11 which included Susan Lanzoni who reflected on her work "Empathy: A History."

This paper reconsiders the work of the Scottish biologist, sociologist, and town planner Patrick Geddes and his most famous intellectual disciple: the American independent scholar Lewis Mumford. It is argued that existing interpretations of their work, ranging from a dismissal of the two men as eccentric polymaths to the speculative emphasis on the importance of psychological theories in Mumford's oeuvre, are fundamentally flawed. Examining their writings and the letters they exchanged during their 17-year correspondence, this paper shows that the only way we can appreciate the scholarly conventions underpinning Geddes's and Mumford's work, as well as the context in which it was produced, is by looking to the principles of classical sociological theory. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at the program for social psychology presented by Floyd Allport in his Social Psychology of 1924. It contextualizes Allport's program in terms of intellectual currents of the time and the views of his teachers at Harvard University, specifically the philosopher Ralph Barton Perry and the psychologists Edwin B. Holt and Hugo Münsterberg. Finally, the paper analyzes responses to Allport's program at the time and later, retrospective responses. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to establish the historical context for the development and publication of Gordon Allport's text, The Nature of Prejudice, and by so doing illustrate the importance of historicizing psychological social psychology. The Nature of Prejudice was, in part, the cumulative result of a decade of Gordon Allport's classroom teaching in a new interdisciplinary unit at Harvard, the Department of Social Relations. This paper chronicles key elements of Allport's course —“Prejudice and Intergroup Conflict”—from 1944 to the mid-1950s. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scientific career of eminent experimentalist and psychological tester James McKeen Cattell (1860-1944) began at the Johns Hopkins University during the year (1882-1883) he held the university's Fellowship in Philosophy. This article opens by sketching the scope of Cattell's lifetime achievement and then briefly reviews the historical attention that his life and career has attracted during the past few decades. It then outlines the origins and evolution of Cattell's 'scientific ideology,' traces the course of events that led to his fellowship, reviews his earliest studies at Johns Hopkins, and analyzes in some detail his initial laboratory successes. These laid the groundwork for his later distinguished work as a psychological experimentalist, both in Europe and America. It concludes, however, that even as Cattell's early experimental achievements impressed others, the personal arrogance he exhibited during his year in Baltimore served to alienate him from his colleagues and teachers. Over the long run, this arrogance and his often-antagonistic approach to others continued to color (and even shape) his otherwise distinguished more than 50-year scientific career. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a list of books on behavioral sciences. "The Matching Law: Papers in Psychology and Economics," by Richard J. Herrnstein; "Mind and Brain Sciences in the 21st Century," edited by Robert L. Solso; "Psychosocial Factors in Pain: Critical Perspectives," edited by Robert J. Gatchel and Dennis C. Turk; "The Oversocialized Conception of Man," Dennis H. Wrong; "Civilization and Its Discontents: An Anthropology for the Future?," by Thomas Parisi.

This paper explores the development and subsequent transformation of a “radical” professional model in American psychology. Its focal point is Goodwin Watson and the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI), an organization Watson helped found in 1936. During the Depression, he and many of his SPSSI colleagues called upon psychologists to abandon value neutrality and political disinterestedness in favor of an explicit set of social democratic goals and left-wing political alliances. Government service and political persecution during World War II led Watson to conclude that his Depression-era calls for sweeping change in psychology had neglected a number of significant political dimensions. Of particular importance was the problematic interface between psychological expertise and policy formation. In response to this concern, Watson encouraged the development of the now familiar model of the psychologist as a disinterested purveyor of value-neutral expertise. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the development in the field of psychology as of October 1990. From October 24-26, 1990 the Netherlands Institute of Mental Health will hold a conference in Leiden, Netherlands, to stimulate the international exchange of scientific knowledge, information, and experience and to give a new impetus to the pursuit of mental health as well as to present current research. The National Women's Studies Association awards several scholarships and fellowships to graduate students and other scholars.

What are unconscious inferences in psychology? This article investigates their journey from the early philosophical psychology of Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1920) to the experimental psychology of the American pragmatist Charles S. Peirce (1839–1914). Peirce's reception of Wundt's early works situates him in an international web of 19th‐century experimental psychologists and its reconstruction opens new perspectives on the relation between philosophy, psychology, and epistemology. Moreover, this reception testifies to a heretofore overlooked strand of influence of Wundt on North American experimental psychology. The notion of unconscious inferences, of which Hermann von Helmholtz is usually considered the chief exponent, becomes the backbone of Peirce's theory of perception mostly because of the affinity between Wundt's early philosophy of mind and Peirce's logic‐mediated approach to psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this interview with historian of psychology Saulo de Freitas Araujo, we discuss the aims, challenges, and functions of a new book series in which classic psychological works are translated into Portuguese. The interview highlights the importance of the accessibility of primary source documents to psychology education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper has two aims. The first is to shed light on a remarkable archival source, namely survey responses from thousands of American psychologists during the 1960s in which they described their contemporary research practices and discussed whether the practices were 'ethical.' The second aim is to examine the process through which the American Psychological Association (APA) used these survey responses to create principles on how psychologists should treat human subjects. The paper focuses on debates over whether 'deception' research was acceptable. It documents how members of the committee that wrote the principles refereed what was, in fact, a disagreement between two contemporary research orientations. The paper argues that the ethics committee ultimately built the model of 'the resilient self' into the APA's 1973 ethics code. At the broadest level, the paper explores how prevailing understandings of human nature are written into seemingly universal and timeless codes of ethics. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conventional history of the predominant, research-based model of business education (RBM) traces its origins to programs initiated by the Ford Foundation after World War II. This paper maps the elite network responsible for developing behavioral science and the Ford Foundation agenda. Archival records of the actions taken by central nodes in the network permit identification of the original vision statement for the model. Analysis also permits tracking progress toward realizing that vision over several decades. Behavioral science was married to business education from the earliest stages of development. The RBM was a fundamental promise made by advocates for social science funding. Appraisals of the model and recommendations for reform must address its full history, not the partial, distorted view that is the conventional account. Implications of this more complete history for business education and for behavioral theory are considered. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the 1940s through the 1970s, articles in popular magazines and newspapers presented B. F. Skinner in a wide array of guises, from educational revolutionary and utopian to totalitarian and fascist. Understanding these diverse, and often contradictory, portrayals requires a consideration of the social and political discourses in which they were embedded. In this paper, I suggest that reports of Skinner's work were influenced by a number of cultural categories, from the better living campaign of the 1950s, to the counterculture crusade of the late 1960s. Through this examination, a multifaceted rendering of Skinner's public image that takes into account the nature of his work, the context in which it was produced, and the culture in which it was received is revealed. I propose that the received view of Skinner as maligned behaviorist actually obscures the complexity of his relationship with psychology's public throughout this period. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper traces William James's famous “temperament thesis” according to which the philosophical stance that individuals take depends on their “temperaments.” It seeks to understand James's conception of temperament by locating James within a set of contemporary investigations that linked the sources of mental, and even higher, intellectual processes to the physiological and organic constitution of the individual. The paper argues that James understood temperament along the reflex-arc model and discusses the implications of that physiological account of temperament for James's overall conception of philosophy. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the disciplinary status of social psychology through an analysis of the history of the boundary relations of psychology, sociology, and social psychology. After outlining some research on the nature of scientific disciplines, on the role of rhetoric in the constitution of disciplines, and on “boundary work,” I consider the singular importance of social psychology as a discipline for the analysis of boundary relations, examining its units of analysis and its “disciplining.” The boundaries of the disciplines of social psychology were seen as fluid, contingent, local, and contestable, reflecting the thematic preoccupations, disciplinary origins, and meta-theoretical commitments of social psychologists, of the parent disciplines, and of those who represent disciplinary practices. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines Floyd and Gordon Allport's early work on “personality” psychology. In the early 1920s, personality was an unorthodox topic, and for the Allports it initially served as an intellectual and personal bond. Floyd proposed the subject to his brother as a dissertation topic, and the two worked closely on developing personality tests. By 1924, however, “personality” had become the site of a dispute between the two brothers over the intellectual and methodological character of American psychology. The present study examines the origins of this dispute, while gauging the personal and professional ramifications of the dispute. On a larger level, this essay explores the role and meaning of “personality” in the academic culture of 1920s America. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper early work of the American rehabilitation psychologist Tamara Dembo (1902–1993) is brought to light. She was highly influenced by the concepts of Kurt Lewin's topological psychology, and she used the framework of topological psychology to analyze her investigations on animal behavior carried out with the Dutch zoopsychologist Frederik J. J. Buytendijk. These investigations have so far been ignored and are being described for the first time making use of archival materials. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting out as a newsletter for radical psychologists, the Dutch journal Psychologie & Maatschappij (Psychology & Society) moved in the past decade toward the theoretical mainstream within psychology. In this paper, the major changes in the journal are described and analyzed, as well as the features that did not change: an emphasis on theory and history, an interdisciplinary approach, and an emphasis on discussion. The main transformations were from psychology as instrumental toward the goals of the progressive movement in the Netherlands, then to extreme criticism of all scientific and professional psychological activities, and finally to adherence to the most advanced approaches within academic psychology. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, attention has been drawn toward an overlooked and nearly forgotten personality type: the ambivert. This paper presents a genealogy of the ambivert, locating the various contexts it traversed in order to highlight the ways in which these places and times have interacted and changed-ultimately elucidating our current situation. Proposed by Edmund S. Conklin in 1923, the ambivert only was meant for normal persons in between the introvert and extravert extremes. Although the ambivert could have been taken up by early personality psychologists who were transitioning from the study of the abnormal to the normal, it largely failed to gain traction. Whether among psychoanalysts, psychiatrists, or applied and personality psychologists, the ambivert was personality non grata. It was only within the context of Eysenck's integrative view of types and traits that the ambivert marginally persisted up to the present day and is now the focus of sales management and popular psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The focus of this article is the mind–body problem in mainstream modern psychology examined from a decolonial perspective. The construction of the idea of the separation of mind and body is a seminal point of division of labor in the history of modern capitalism. This division perpetuated by the mind–body dualism idea was necessary to justify the enslavement of some and employment to others. Colonization processes have had profound importance on the mind, feelings, behaviors, and political settings. Throughout its history, the subject treated in EuroAmerican psychology has sought to deal with the mind–body problem as an individual, a separate entity, not as part of the psyche as a whole. A new perspective where the mind and body play an intertwined role is necessary considering subjectivity in a cultural‐historical approach. The subjective level is defined by the unification between symbolical and emotional cultural processes. The body (emotions) operates in conjunction with the culture and, when amalgamated, constitutes what we entitle as subjectivity. An ontology defines the assumptions that lie under a cosmovision and sustains a way of seeing, feeling, thinking, and acting with oneself, others, and the whole living world. It is what defines the real. The trajectory of this paper is an invitation to shed light from a decolonial perspective on social inequality concerning the present crises of humanity. The consequences of social inequality expressed today indicate the difficulties created by the dichotomy of mind and body. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carl Jung is often cited as the first to use the word association method for the diagnosis of complexes. But was he really the first to do so? The treatment of this issue is examined in several history of psychology and personality texts and other sources. It turns out that Max Wertheimer also performed early studies of the word association method as a technique for the detection of criminal guilt. Published and archival resources make it possible to resolve the occasionally acrimonious controversy between Carl Jung and Wertheimer concerning priority in this use of the method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper identifies the institutional character of pre-1920 psychology at Clark University with founding President G. Stanley Hall's active ‘patronage’ of ‘outsiders,’ argues that the origins of this institutional character can be found in Hall's own personal character and temperament, and traces the influence of this institutional character through much of the psychology done at Clark before 1920. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents developments related to the field of psychology. The library of Karolinska Institutet in Sweden has an extensive collection of material in the history of medicine. The University of Buenos Aires Faculty of Psychology has begun a new program in the history of Psychology Studies in Argentina. The Graduate Program in Psychology at York University, Ontario, Canada, offers an option in which students may write M.A. and Ph.D theses on topics in the history and theory of psychology.

The Chicago Committee on the Behavioral Sciences occupies a special place in the eponymous movement. Involving prominent figures such as psychologist James G. Miller and neurophysiologist Ralph W. Gerard, this committee embodied the common belief among behavioral scientists that a cross-disciplinary approach using natural science methods was key to understanding major issues facing mid-century American society. This interdivisional committee fell under the jurisdiction of both the natural and social sciences. As such, its flagship project, an institute of mental sciences, had to face the reluctance both of natural scientists who thought it inadequately scientific and of social scientists who regard its efforts as too narrow in scope and too biological in orientation. Though it failed in its main objective to create an institute, the committee was a formidable instrument of intellectual stimulation and socialization for its members. It provided them with an opportunity to familiarize themselves with each other's scientific backgrounds, practices and jargons, realize the significance of academic cultural differences and learn ways to accommodate them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

H. Glenn Penny. Objects of Culture: Ethnology and Ethnographic Museums in Imperial Germany. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2002. 281 pp. $24.95 (paper). ISBN 0-8078-5430-1. G. Richards. Putting Psychology in Its Place: A Critical Historical Overview, Second Edition. New York: Routledge, 2002. 368 pp. $25.95 (paper). ISBN 1-84169-234-4. Robert M. Lindner. Rebel Without a Cause: The Story of a Criminal Psychopath. New York: Other Press, 2003. 296 pp. $16.00 (paper). ISBN 1-59051-024-0. Jens Rydström. Sinners and Citizens: Bestiality and Homosexuality in Sweden, 1880–1950. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2003. 416 pp. (paper). ISBN 0-226-73257-6. Jerome A. Winer and James William Anderson (Eds.). The Annual of Psychoanalysis 31: Psychoanalysis and History. Hillsdale, NJ: The Analytic Press, Inc. 2003. 288 pp. $49.95. ISBN 0-88163-399-2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ernest B. Hook (Ed.). Prematurity in Scientific Discovery: On Resistance and Neglect . Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 2002. xx + 378 pp. $80.00 (cloth). ISBN 0-520-23106-6. Margaret P. Munger (Ed.). The History of Psychology: Fundamental Questions . New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. xi + 514 pp. $69.95 (paper). ISBN 0-19-515154-2. James Moor (Ed.). The Turing Test: The Elusive Standard of Artificial Intelligence . Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003. ix + 445 pp. $37.00 (paper). ISBN: 1-4020-1205-5. John P. Jackson Jr. (Ed.). Science, Race, and Ethnicity: Readings from Isis and Osiris . Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2002. 452 pp. $50.00 (cloth). ISBN 0-226-38934-0. $27.00 (paper). ISBN 0-226-38935-9. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The American-Canadian psychologist Mary Ainsworth (1913-1999) developed the Strange Situation Procedure (SSP) to measure mother-child attachment and attachment theorists have used it ever since. When Ainsworth published the first results of the SSP in 1969, it seemed a completely novel and unique instrument. However, in this paper we will show that the SSP had many precursors and that the road to such an instrument was long and winding. Our analysis of hitherto little-known studies on children in strange situations allowed us to compare these earlier attempts with the SSP. We argue that it was the combination of Ainsworth's working experience with William Blatz and John Bowlby, her own research in Uganda and Baltimore, and the strong connection of the SSP with attachment theory, that made the SSP differ enough from the other strange situation studies to become one of the most widely used instruments in developmental psychology today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Provides an update on behavioral sciences as of summer 2002. Details on a conference organized by the International Society for the History of Medicine; Agenda of the meeting entitled "Science and Beliefs: From Natural Philosophy to Natural Science"; Information on a Web site established by John van Wyhe.

Presents several books on psychology. "The Self in Social Theory: A Psychoanalytic Account of Its Construction in Plato, Hobbes, Locke, Rawls and Rousseau," by Fred C. Alford; "Early Modern Witchcraft: Centres and Peripheris," edited by Bengt Ankarloo and Henningen Gustav; "Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspectives," by John Hedlwey Brooke.

The article presents news briefs for Cheiron: The International Society for the History of the Behavioral and Social Sciences as of the Fall of 2013. Calls for nominations for the 2014 Cheiron book prize are issued, along with a brief history of the award. The report of the 45th annual meeting, held at the University of Dallas, Texas in June 2013 is also presented.

Around the end of the 1920s, Vygotsky introduced his integrative framework for psycho-logical research to the Soviet Union. This framework was not abandoned and forgotten until its rediscovery in Russia and America in the 1950s, as some claim. In fact, even after his untimely death in 1934, Vygotsky remained the spiritual leader of a group of his for-mer students and collaborators, who became known as the Kharkov School. This paper reconstructs the early intellectual history of Vygotskian psychology, as it emerged, around the time of Vygotsky's death, in the research program of the Kharkov School. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increase in interest for German scientific psychology followed the rise of liberalism in late nineteenth-century Spain. This paper deals with Spanish scholars' endeavors to participate in German psychology: It outlines the intellectual and institutional background of Spanish preoccupation with German philosophy and psychology, and deals with the personal experience and testimony of two Spanish philosophers, Eloy Luis André and Juan Vicente Viqueira López, who traveled to Leipzig, Berlin, and Göttingen between 1909 and 1914 to gain firsthand experience in the nascent science of psychology in Germany at that time. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nude psychotherapy is one of the most flamboyant therapeutic techniques ever developed in American psychology. Largely forgotten today, the therapy was an academic and popular sensation upon its introduction in 1967. Developed by psychologist Paul Bindrim, the therapy promised to guide clients to their authentic selves through the systematic removal of clothing. This paper explores the intellectual, cultural and ethical context of nude therapy and its significance as a form of unchurched spirituality. Although nude therapy has an indisputable tabloid character, it is also rooted in a long-standing academic search for authenticity and ultimate meaning through science. Bindrim's career demonstrates the historically long-standing interweaving of spirituality and science within American psychology while simultaneously highlighting the field's extraordinary capacity for adaptive reinvention. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the transplantation of psychoanalysis from Europe to Los Angeles and the similarities and differences in followers, cultural attitudes, institutional organization, and patient symptoms. Psychoanalysis in both places attracted psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, artists, writers, and movie people, all committed to “modernism” and cultural change. But special American conditions created greater institutional rigidity, medicalization, and a more diffuse patient symptomatology centered on the maternal relationship. Such conditions also fostered bitter disputes over modifications of psychoanalytic theory and practice which have only recently become less acute as the status of psychoanalysis has declined in America. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between 1930 and 1960, experimentation became the premier form of knowledge generation in social psychology. In journals, texts, and handbooks, experiment was now conceived as the active manipulation of an independent variable, and the sole method for the discovery of “causes.” Understanding this change requires further investigation of the fine-grained discursive strategies used to promote experimentation during the 1930s and 1940s. In this paper we use discourse analysis to contrast the cautious rhetoric used by Gardner Murphy and Lois Murphy and the more enthusiastic, unhedged arguments for experimentation employed by Kurt Lewin. We argue that analysis of changes in discourse justifying experimentation can illuminate the processes by which methodological consensus was constructed. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gordon Allport's account of the development of social psychology in the 1954 Handbook of Social Psychology became, de facto, a standard or official historical reference for researchers and apprentices. His history also provided the field's ontological center point with a definition of social psychology that would become predominant. The revised and updated chapter appeared posthumously in 1968, was then reprinted (lightly edited) in 1985, but was removed from the 1998 Handbook. In 1966, Allport prepared a parallel evaluation of six decades of the history of social psychology, for a conference on graduate education in social psychology. This paper was critical of “elaborate mendacious experimentation” and ended with a plea for an interdisciplinary cross-cultivation. It was rarely cited. Ironically, it was Allport's “official” history, his justificatory Handbook account, that often was used for graduate mentoring rather than the more critical history, specifically written to address issues of graduate education. Other “official” Handbook historical chapters that succeeded Allport's displayed less breadth of geographical and transdisciplinary coverage and offered a shorter temporal, more presentist, and more selective personalist historical perspective. In contrast to more contextualist accounts, these Handbook chapters are constrained in a number of ways that raise questions about the success, functions, and professional consequences of such “official” histories, and who should write them. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates three conflicting reconstructions of the historical relationship between personality and social psychology and addresses questions they raise regarding the subdisciplinary status of personality in the 1920s and the way in which the field gradually emerged as a separate area of psychology. Contesting claims that Floyd Allport first connected social psychology to a separate “branch” of personality psychology in the 1920s, I argue that he drew upon earlier work of psychologists and sociologists who treated personality as a central topic of social psychology. I compare Floyd Allport's views with those of Gordon Allport, who endeavored to establish personality as a separate subdiscipline. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to traditional French historiography, French scientific psychology was born when it differentiated itself from philosophy. This split between the two disciplines is attributed to Taine and Ribot, who, consequently, are considered to be the “founding fathers” of French psychology. In this paper we shall examine the case of Pierre Janet, who, at the turn of the century, was recognized worldwide as the most important French psychologist. It is generally said that he was the follower of Ribot and of Charcot. However, he was also Paul Janet's nephew. Paul Janet was a very well known and influential philosopher of the so-called French “spiritualistic” school, for which psychology was central to philosophy. In 1889, Pierre Janet published his doctoral dissertation, L'Automatisme psychologique, which was immediately considered to be a classic in psychology. We shall argue that this book is as much indebted to the old spiritualistic psychology, which claimed the substantial unity of the self, as to the new psychology at the time, which questioned it. With Pierre Janet, the split between psychology and philosophy in France was reconsidered. It would be more accurate to speak in terms of a compromise between philosophy and the “new” physiological and pathological psychology. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Provides information on several books about the history of behavioral science. "Patient-Based Approaches to Cognitive Neuroscience," edited by Martha J. Farah and Todd E. Feinberg; "Brief History of Czech and Middle European Psychology," by Jiri Hoskovec and Simona Hoskovcová "Scientific Culture and the Making of the Industrial West," by Margaret C. Jacob.

The US psychologist Rona M. Field's book A Society on the Run (1973) offered a psychological account of the nature and effects of the Northern Irish Troubles at their peak in the early 1970s. The book was withdrawn shortly after publication by its publisher, Penguin Books Limited, and never reissued. Fields alleged publicly that the book had been suppressed by the British state, a claim that has often been treated uncritically. Local Northern Irish psychologists suggested that the book was taken off the market because of its scientific deficiencies. Rigorous book‐historical investigation using Penguin editorial fields reveals, however, that what might appear to be a case of state suppression, or an instance of disciplinary boundary work, can be explained instead by the commercial interests and professional standards of a publisher keen to preserve its reputation for quality and reliability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper it is argued that the “cognitive revolution” in psychology is not best represented either as a Kuhnian “paradigm shift,” or as a movement from an instrumentalist to a realist conception of psychological theory, or as a continuous evolution out of more “liberalized” forms of behaviorism, or as a return to the form of “structuralist” psychology practiced by Wundt and Titchener. It is suggested that the move from behaviorism to cognitivism is best represented in terms of the replacement of (operationally defined) “intervening variables” by genuine “hypothetical constructs” possessing cognitive “surplus meaning,” and that the “cognitive revolution” of the 1950s continued a cognitive tradition that can be traced back to the 1920s. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cyril Burt's article on general intelligence published in the British Journal of Psychology in 1909, and to a lesser extent the correspondence of that year between Bun and Charles Spearman about the paper, have recently become one of the many areas of contention in the continuing historical evaluation of Bun and his role in the development of early factor analysis. From a detailed examination of this correspondence, we argue that Spearman's contribution to Burt's paper was both central and crucial, and confirms Spearman's priority as the originator of factor analytic methods, as they were understood at the time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social control doctrines of mental disorders have influenced a generation of psychologists and have shaped attitudes and discussions about how to treat mentally ill. In light of the failure of deinstitutionalization as a public policy and the contemporary concern with the medical or biological bases of psychiatric disorders, this paper re-examines social control doctrines. Reviewing mid-nineteen century statistical accounts, the author challeges claims of social control theorists and shows that in recent years some former social control advocates and revisionists have “ recanted ” and critized their earlier use of the concept of social control, particulary the characterization of the asylum as a “ total institution ”. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]