James McKeen Cattell

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James McKeen Cattell

James McKeen Cattell (* 25. May 1860 in Easton , Pennsylvania , USA ; † 20th January 1944 in Lancaster , Pennsylvania, USA) was an American personality - psychologist . He was also an important major publisher of scientific literature.

Life

Cattell grew up as the oldest child in a wealthy and prominent family. His father, William Cassady Cattell , a Presbyterian clergyman, became President of Lafayette College , Pennsylvania , shortly after James was born . His mother Elizabeth "Lizzie" McKeen brought a considerable inheritance into the marriage in 1859. His uncle Alexander Gilmore Cattell represented New Jersey in the US Senate . James Cattell entered Lafayette College in 1876 and graduated with an excellent four years later. He went to Germany and studied with the philosopher Rudolf Hermann Lotze at the University of Göttingen and with the psychologist Wilhelm Wundt at the University of Leipzig . Back in the USA he spent 1882/83 studying philosophy at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore . During a further stay in Leipzig he became Wilhelm Wundt's first assistant and received his doctorate there in 1886. From there he went to London to Francis Galton's laboratory . In 1887 he became a lecturer at Bryn Mawr College , in 1888 he became the first professor of psychology in the USA at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. There he set up a psychological laboratory and developed a series of tests. 1891-1917 he was professor of psychology, anthropology and philosophy at Columbia University , where he worked for many years with his student Edward Lee Thorndike . He was a founding member and in 1895 president of the American Psychological Association (APA). His opposition to American involvement in World War I led to his dismissal from Columbia. In 1921, together with a few prominent colleagues, he founded the ' Psychological Corporation ', which researches and provides services in various areas such as aptitude diagnostics or advertising for the economy. In 1888 he was elected to the American Philosophical Society , in 1901 to the National Academy of Sciences and in 1933 to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences .

His students include Thorndike FL Wells, Robert S. Woodworth , SI Franz, EK Strong and Margaret Washburn.

research

During his time as assistant to Wilhelm Wundt in Leipzig, his focus was on the individual differences in the experimental answers (such as the reaction time), while Wundt was more interested in general conclusions. Therefore, he continued his studies with Francis Galton , who worked very hard on the methodical recording of individual differences in ability. This made Cattell one of the founders of differential and personality psychology . With his publication 'Mental tests and measurement' (1890) he introduced the psychological test and presented his experimental results from previous years. It was also the beginning of psychometrics in the form of intelligence test research and aptitude tests for college students. Among many other skills, Cattell was the first to empirically study reading . Cattell also experimented with the effects of the (then legal) hashish . He became a stimulator of behaviorism through his student Edward Lee Thorndike . His theoretical approaches were close to functionalism .

Cattel was together with Granville Stanley Hall , also a Wundt student, the promoter of experimental psychology in the USA.

James McKeen Cattell should not be confused with the British-American personality psychologist Raymond Bernard Cattell , who among other things designed a personality structure with 16 primary factors and the concept of fluid and crystalline intelligences.

Entrepreneur

Cattell was not only committed to establishing psychology as a science, but also to science as a whole. In November 1894 he acquired the weekly ' Science ' and the publishing rights for 50 years. Science became the official bulletin of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1900 .

In 1900 he bought the printing company "The Science Press" in New York, and in January 1908 it took over the publishing house of the weekly newspaper Science . Cattell was editor of several important magazines - u. a. Psychological Review, School and Society, Popular Science Monthly , and Scientific Monthly .

literature

  • MM Sokal: The unpublished autobiography of James McKeen Cattell . American Psychologist 26, 1971, 626-635.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Member History: J. McKean Cattell. American Philosophical Society, accessed June 1, 2018 .
  2. ↑ A History of AAAS Origins: 1848-1899 - A History of AAAS and Science: 1900-1940
personal data
SURNAME Cattell, James McKeen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American psychologist, professor of psychology
DATE OF BIRTH May 25, 1860
PLACE OF BIRTH Easton , Pennsylvania , USA
DATE OF DEATH January 20, 1944
Place of death Lancaster , Pennsylvania