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An account of the origins of The Journal of Molecular Graphics, now the Molecular Graphics and Modelling Society, first edited by Andrew Morffew and then the author., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Crown Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

The author hypothesizes that the British psychological climate following World War II, from 1945 to approximately 1960, created the conditions for an unusually frank, honest, and collaborative debate on matters related to religion and spirituality generally as well as broader social and political issues. The author first sketches the nature of this climate, before looking more specifically at the interrelationships among religion, psychotherapy and, very briefly, politics during this period. Suggestions regarding the dissipation of this phase after 1960 are examined. The final section considers some qualifications to the case previously outlined and identifies issues and questions that the author feels need addressing further.

During the latter half of the 20th century it tended to be taken for granted within Psychology that "nativist" or "hereditarian" theoretical positions were intrinsically right-wing in their ideological connotations, while those of "environmentalist" positions were left-wing. In this paper, written from the perspective of a critical historian of Psychology, it is suggested that this is too simplistic. As popularly understood, the term "instinct" has at least three meanings, which differ considerably in their ethical register. It is argued that in none of these senses can unambiguous ideological implications can be drawn.

The preliminary findings are reported of a review of the contents of the British Journal of Psychology 1904-2003 undertaken to mark the journal's centenary. This identifies (a) the top 11 categories of paper published and their patterns of distribution, (b) an apparent change in the nature of papers published after 1983, (c) the overall pattern of category-introduction, showing a dramatic change in 1965 and (d) a provisional typology of the principal patterns of distribution over time. Major conceptual and practical problems arising in the categorization of papers, and their implications, are discussed. Some reflections are offered on the possible value of research of this kind and on the nature of the journal itself.