Karl Mierke

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Karl Friedrich Mierke (born March 4, 1896 in Zellerfeld , † January 9, 1971 in Kiel ) was a German psychologist , educator and university professor . He was mainly active in the field of talent research and will psychology .

Life

Until 1909 Mierke went to elementary school and until 1912 he went to the preparatory institute in Melle . At the age of 18, he passed his first teacher examination at the teachers' seminar in Alfeld. Then he became a volunteer soldier. Mierke returned from the First World War seriously wounded and became a teacher in Imbshausen. He took the second teacher examination in 1919 and then graduated from high school in Hanover. In 1923, Mierke began studying psychology, ethnology, pedagogy and geophysics at the University of Göttingen , but had to drop out after three semesters for financial reasons due to inflation . After he had worked again as a teacher at his school, he was transferred to Göttingen in 1928 to continue his studies there. Mierke became a student of Narcissus Ach . He received his doctorate in 1932 in Göttingen with a dissertation “On the ability to object and its significance for type theory ”. Mierke finally resigned from the school service in 1934 and became head of the personnel inspection department of the Wehrmacht in Braunschweig. During the war, Mierke carried out aptitude tests as a senior marine psychologist . He was promoted to government councilor, senior government councilor and government director. Mierke developed the psychotechnical "Kiel Determination Device " for diagnostics , which is still used today in aviation and traffic psychology .

Mierke completed his habilitation in 1943 at the University of Erlangen with the thesis “Psychological Diagnostics”. Between the years 1946 and 1949, Mierke headed the career counseling of the Schleswig-Holstein employment office.

After the war, Mierke became a member of the professional association of German psychologists and later a board member of the German Society for Psychology .

From 1948 he taught at the University of Education in Kiel and from 1952 Mierke headed the Psychological Institute at the University of Kiel . In 1964 he retired .

plant

Mierke worked especially on the psychology of talent and achievement. His typology of talent grew more from practical requirements than theoretical ones. His dissertation was a practical experiment, his habilitation serves the purpose of making psychological diagnostics useful for the völkisch Nazi ideology. Mierke published a number of books on educational psychology .

estate

Mierke's scientific estate is in the Psychology History Research Archive (PGFA) of the Distance University in Hagen.

Selected publications

  • Psychological diagnostics. Buchner, Bamberg 1943.
  • Will and performance. Hogrefe, Göttingen 1955.
  • Talent, education and flexibility. Reflections on the educational fate of the moderately gifted school child. Hans Huber, Stuttgart, Bern 1963.
  • Ability to concentrate and poor concentration. Huber, Klett, Bern, Stuttgart 1966.
  • Self-presentation. In: LJ Pongratz, W. Traxel, EG Wehner (ed.): Psychology in self-portrayals. Huber, Bern 1972, pp. 231-255.

literature

  • HE Lück : Mierke, Karl. In: U. Wolfradt, E. Billmann-Mahecha, A. Stock (eds.): German-speaking psychologists 1933–1945. A dictionary of persons. supplemented by a text by Erich Stern. Springer, Wiesbaden 2015, pp. 316-318.
  • H. Lück: Mierke, Karl. In: MA Wirtz (ed.): Dorsch - Lexicon of Psychology. 2016. Retrieved on August 2, 2016, https://portal.hogrefe.com/dorsch/mierke-karl/
  • H. Schmidtke, K. Mierke (Hrsg.): Festschrift for the 65th birthday of Professor Dr. Karl Mierke. Anton Hain, Meisenheim 1961.