Pioneers in Psychology

The series, Portraits of Pioneers In Psychology, is published under the sponsorship of the Society for General Psychology, Division 1 of the American Psychological Association. The history of the series goes back to the mid-1970s when Patricia Keith-Spiegel, Norman Weckler, Michael Wertheimer, and Wilson Wilsoncroft had the idea of inviting well-known psychologists to present informal biographies of giants in the history of psychology at the conventions of the Western and Rocky Mountain Psychological Associations. Then, in 1983, Elizabeth Scarborough developed a similar series for presentation at the APA Convention, under the joint sponsorship of Division 1 (General Psychology) and Division 26 (History of Psychology). Sometime in 1988 or 1989, the Executive Committee of Division 1 decided to publish a collection of essays based on these talks, appointing Gregory A. Kimble, Charlotte White, and Michael Wertheimer as Editors of that first volume, which appeared in 1991. Many of the chapters for Volume II, edited by Gregory Kimble, C. Alan Boneau, and Michael Wertheimer, which appeared in 1996, and almost all of those for the remaining volumes, were prepared specifically for the Pioneers series. Volumes III and IV, and V, all edited by Gregory Kimble and Michael Wertheimer, appeared 1998, 2000, and 2003, respectively. Volume VI, edited by Donald Dewsbury, Ludy Benjamin, and Michael Wertheimer, is due out in 2006. The books in this series are published jointly by the American Psychological Association and Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. The two publishers take turns in doing the actual technical editing and publishing.

With authors in parentheses, Volume I contains chapters on Francis Galton (Gerald McClearn), William James (Barbara Ross), I. P. Pavlov (Gregory Kimble), Sigmund Freud (Ernst Beier), May Calkins (Laurel Furumoto), Joseph Jastrow (Arthur Blumenthal), E. B. Titchener (Rand Evans), Ethel Puffer (Elizabeth Scarborough), Harvey Carr (Ernest Hilgard), E. L. Thorndike (Robert Thorndike), C. G. Jung (Irving Alexander), John B. Watson (Charles Brewer), Max Wertheimer (Michael Wertheimer), Clark Hull (Gregory Kimble), E. C. Tolman (Henry Gleitman) Leta Hollingworth (Stephanie Shields), Wolfgang Kohler (Robert Sherrill), Walter Hunter (Charles Cofer), Edna Heidbreder (Mary Henle), Karl Lashley (Darryl Bruce), Harry Stack Sullivan (Kenneth Chatelaine), and Robert Tryon (Kurt Schlesinger). The order of the chapters reflects the pioneers' dates of birth, from oldest to youngest.

The Table of Contents of Volume II includes chapters on Gustav Fechner (Helmut Adler), Dorothea Dix (Wayne Viney), Ivan Sechenov (Gregory Kimble) John Dewey (David Barone), Lightner Witmer (Paul McReynolds), William Stern (James Lamiell), Robert Yerkes (Donald Dewsberry), Lillian Gilbreth (Robert Perloff and John Naman), Harry Hollingworth (Ludy Benjamin), Edwin Guthrie (Peter Prenzel-Guthrie), Carl Murchison (Dennis Thompson), Edgar Doll (Eugene Doll), J. B. Rhine (Sally Feather), W. E. Blatz (Mary Wright), Barbara Burks (Brett King, Lizzie Montanez-Ramirez, and Michael Wertheimer), Donald Hebb (Stephen Glickman), James Gibson (Edward Reed), Clarence Graham (John Lott Brown), Paul Schiller (Donald Dewsbury), Silvan Tomkins (Irving Alexander), and Stanley Milgram). This volume and Volumes III and IV note that fact when a chapter refers to pioneers who were covered in previous volumes.

Volume III includes chapters on Laurens Perseus Hickock (John Bare), Charles Darwin (Bruce Masterton), Wilhelm Wundt (Arthur Blumenthal), Hermann Ebbinghaus (Alan Boneau), Alfred Binet (Raymond Fancher), L. L. Thurstone (Lyle Jones), Kurt Lewin (Miriam Lewin), Floyd Allport (Blair Johnson and Diana Nichols), Jean Piaget (Edward Zigler and Elizabeth Gilman), Karl Duncker (Brett King, Michaela Cox, and Michael Wertheimer), Milton Erickson (Harold Schiffman), Zing-Yang Kuo (Gilbert Gottlieb), Myrtle McGraw (Thomas Dalton and Victor Bergenn), Carl Rogers (Martin Lakin), B. F. Skinner (Daniel Bjork), Kenneth Spence (Gregory Kimble), David Krech (Nancy Innes), Benton Underwood (Joel Freund), and Leon Festinger (Jack Brehm).

Volume IV has chapters on Thomas Upham (Alfred Fuchs), Hermann von Helmholtz (Helmut Adler) George Croom Robertson (Brett King), Carl Stumpf (Helga and Lothar Sprung), G.E. Mueller (Lothar and Helga Sprung), Charles Spearman (Arthur Jensen), Hugo Muensterberg (Ludy Benjamin), Lewis Terman, (Jennifer Randall and Albert Hastorf), Frederick Bartlett (Henry Roediger), Karen Horney (Bernard Paris), Francis Sumner (Robert Guthrie), Fritz Heider (Bertram Malle and William Ickes), T.C. Schneirla (Ethel Tobach), Starke Hathaway (James Butcher), Evelyn Hooker (Douglas Kimmel and Linda Garnets), Frank Beach (Donald Dewsbury), Carl Hovland (Roger Shepard), Stuart Cook (Jack Brigham), Roger Sperry (Antonio Puente), Hans Eysenck (Arthur Jensen), and Sigmund Koch (David Finkelman and Frank Kessel).

This volume consists of chapters on Gottfried Leibniz (Raymond Fancher and Heather Schmidt), G. Stanley Hall (John Hogan), Harry Kirke Wolfe (Ludy Benjamin), James R. Angell (Donald Dewsbury), Margaret Washburn (Wayne Viney and Laura Burlinghame-Lee), William McDougall (Nancy Innis), June Downey (John Hogan and Dennis Thompson), Kurt Goldstein (Wade Pickren), Walter Bingham (Ludy Benjamin and David Baker), Albert Michotte (Eileen Gavin), Wolfgang Metzger (Herbert Goetzl), Nancy Bayley (Judy Rosenblith), Egon Brunswik (Elke Kurz-Milcke and Nancy Innis), Leona Tyler (Ruth Fassinger), Solomon Asch (Clark McCauley and Paul Rozin), Anne Anastasi (John Hogan), Harry Harlow (Helen LeRoy and Gregory Kimble), Frederick Lord (Bert Green), Mary Ainsworth (Inge Bretherton), and Floyd Ratliff (John Werner and Lothar Spillmann).

The names of several of the pioneers will be unfamiliar to you. Some of them were not, in the traditional sense, even psychologists. Their relevance and their contributions have both been lost for generations. The chapters in these books resurrect them, helping to provide a sense of continuity in the history of psychology.

Many of the authors (frequently distinguished in their own rights) are offspring, former colleagues, or students of their pioneers. A special section on "Portraits of the Editors and Authors" early in each volume presents a sketch of the contributors' biographies and credentials.

The pioneers presented in these books worked on a huge range of subject matters. The Preface to each volume suggests ways in which the individual might supplement the readings assigned for topics that are commonly covered in courses in psychology. After Volume I, these connections are suggested for all volumes to that date. There is ample supplementary material in the set, as indicated in the preface for Volume V, for courses in methodology and statistics, schools and systems, biopsychology, sensation and perception, comparative psychology and animal psychology, learning and conditioning, cognitive psychology, motivation and emotion, developmental psychology, individual differences, personality, applied psychology, psychopathology and clinical psychology, social psychology, and psychology and social issues.

The main purpose of these books, however, is to provide supplementary human-interest readings for the students and instructors in courses on "History and Systems of Psychology," "Advanced General Psychology," and, conceivably, the introductory course. Almost without exception, the chapters are easy reading and some of them introduce a note of humor now and then. A secondary purpose is to flesh out the biographical materials available to scholars of the history of psychology. According to a review of Pioneers III in Contemporary Psychology (1999, 44, 27–29), "This volume, like the others, succeeds for those purposes. Much of it reads well, and much of the information in its pages is not readily available in other sources. [T]his volume, and the others in the series, are important source books that would enhance the reference shelves of any psychologist."

Portraits of Pioneers in Psychology