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James McKeen Cattell

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James McKeen Cattell
Born(1860-05-25)May 25, 1860
Easton, Pennsylvania,U.S.
DiedJanuary 20, 1944(1944-01-20)(aged 83)
Lancaster, Pennsylvania,U.S.
Alma materLafayette College(BA,MA)
University of Leipzig(PhD)
Scientific career
FieldsPsychology,psychometrics
InstitutionsUniversity of Cambridge
University of Pennsylvania
Columbia University
Doctoral advisorWilhelm Wundt
Doctoral studentsWalter Dearborn
Harry L. Hollingworth
Shepherd Ivory Franz
Edward Thorndike
Edward Kellog Strong Jr.
John Dashiell
Spouse
Josephine Owen
​
(m.1888)​
Children7, includingPsyche
Parent

James McKeen Cattell(May 25, 1860 – January 20, 1944) was the first professor ofpsychologyin the United States, teaching at theUniversity of PennsylvaniainPhiladelphia.He was a long-time editor and publisher of scientific journals and publications, includingScience,and served on the board of trustees for Science Service, now known asSociety for Sciencefrom 1921 to 1944.

At the beginning of Cattell's career, many scientists regarded psychology simply as a minor field of study, or as apseudosciencewhich is a collection of beliefs or practices regarded as a scientific method when it is not such asphrenology.Cattell helped establish psychology as a legitimate science, worthy of study at the highest levels of the academy. At the time of his death,The New York Timescredited him as "the dean of American science."

Cattell was uncompromisingly opposed to American involvement inWorld War I.[1]His public opposition to the draft led to his dismissal from his position atColumbia University,which later led many American universities to establishacademic tenureas a means of protecting unpopular beliefs.[1]

Early life and education

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Cattell was born inEaston, Pennsylvania,on May 25, 1860, the eldest child of a wealthy and prominent family. His father,William Cassady Cattell,aPresbyterianminister, became president ofLafayette Collegein Easton shortly after James' birth. In 1859, William Cattell married Elizabeth "Lizzie" McKeen; together, they shared Lizzie's substantial inheritance. James' uncleAlexander G. CattellrepresentedNew Jerseyin theUnited States Senate.[2]

Cattell entered Lafayette College in 1876 at the age of sixteen and graduated in four years with the highest honors. In 1883, the faculty at Lafayette awarded him anM.A.,again with highest honors. At Lafayette, Cattell spent most of his time devouringEnglish literatureand also showed a gift formathematics.Cattell saidFrancis March,aphilogist,was a great influence during his time at Lafayette.[3]

Cattell found his calling after arriving inGermanyfor doctoral studies, where he was supervised byWilhelm WundtatUniversity of Leipzig.He also studied underHermann Lotzeat theUniversity of Göttingen.An essay on Lotze won Cattell a fellowship atJohns Hopkins UniversityinBaltimore.

In October 1882, Cattell left Germany for his fellowship in October 1882.[3]The fellowship was not renewed,[3]and Cattell returned toLeipzigthe next year as Wundt's assistant.

The partnership between Wundt and Cattell proved highly productive; the two helped to establish the formal study ofintelligence.Under Wundt, Cattell became the first American to publish a dissertation in the field ofpsychology.The title of his German dissertation wasPsychometrische Untersuchungen(Psychometric Investigation); it was accepted by the University of Leipzig in 1886. Cattell tried to explore the interiors of his own mind through the consumption of the then-legal drughashish.Under the influence of this drug, Cattell once compared the whistling of a schoolboy to asymphony orchestra.

Career

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Academia

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After completing hisPh.D.with Wundt in Germany in 1886, Cattell took up a lecturing post at theUniversity of Cambridgein England, and became a Fellow ofSt. John's Collegeat the University of Cambridge.[4]He made occasional visits to the U.S., where he gave lectures atBryn Mawr CollegeinBryn Mawr, Pennsylvania,and theUniversity of PennsylvaniainPhiladelphia.

In 1889, he returned to the U.S. to become a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1891, he moved toColumbia University,where he became department head of psychology, anthropology, and philosophy. In 1895, he was appointed president of theAmerican Psychological Association.In 1888, he was elected as a member to theAmerican Philosophical Society.[5]

From the beginning of his career, Cattell worked to establish psychology as a field as worthy of study as any of the hard physical sciences, such as chemistry or physics. He believed that further investigation would reveal that intellect itself could be parsed into standard units of measurements. He also established the methods of Wilhelm Wundt andFrancis Galton,including mental testing, in the U.S.

In 1917, Cattell and English professor Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Dana, grandson ofHenry Wadsworth LongfellowandRichard Henry Dana Jr.,were fired from Columbia University for opposing the United States’ conscription policy duringWorld War I.[6]He later sued the university and won an annuity. In 1921, he used the money that he gained from the settlement to startThe Psychological Corporationto foster his interest in applied psychology. Because he was never able to really explain how psychologists apply their work, the organization failed until it was taken over by other psychologists who had experience in applied psychology. Towards the end of his life, Cattell edited and published journals. To help himself in the process, he created the Science Press Printing Company in order to produce his journals. He continued his work on journals until his death in 1944.

Eugenicist beliefs

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Like many eminent scientists and scholars of the time, Cattell's thought was influenced by belief ineugenics,defined as the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population, usually referring to human populations."[7]Cattell's belief in eugenics was heavily influenced by the research ofCharles Darwin,whosetheory of evolutionmotivated Cattell's emphasis on studying “the psychology ofindividual differences”.[8]

In connection with his eugenicist beliefs, Cattell's own research found that men of science were likely to have fathers who were clergymen or professors. Incidentally, Cattell's father was both.[9]

Cattell believed that he had “inherited ability", but he also credited the influence of his environment, saying "it was my fortune to find a birthplace in the sun. Agermplasmfairly well compounded [good genes] met circumstances to which it was unusually fit to react”.[9]Cattell's belief in eugenics even motivated him to offer his own children monetary gifts of $1,000 if they married the offspring of a university professor or academic professional.[10]

Mental tests

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Cattell's research on individual differences played a significant role in introducing and emphasizing the experimental technique and importance of methodology in experimentation in America.[11]Cattell's design of mental tests were influenced by Wundt's definition of psychology in regards to the achievements of psychophysics and by Galton's view on the importance of the senses for judgement and intelligence.[12]Regarding the beginnings of his mental tests, in Leipzig, Cattell independently began to measure “simplemental processes”[10]

Between 1883 and 1886, influenced byFrancis Galton,[12]Cattell published nine articles on humanreaction timerates andindividual differences.[10]As a professor at theUniversity of Pennsylvania,Cattell administered a battery of ten tests to student volunteers, and for the first time introduced the term "mental tests" as a general term for his set of tests which included measures of sensation, using weights to determine just-noticeable differences, reaction time,human memoryspan, and rate of movement. There are two types of perspectives on measuring intelligence which are: 1.) Derived from Aristotle that asserts it is only through the identification of intelligence that its measurement becomes possible, through identification does not necessarily imply a definition 2.) all measurement is based on comparison and that different bases of comparison are possible.[12][10]When Cattell moved to Columbia University, the battery of tests became compulsory for all freshmen. Cattell believed that his mental tests were measuring intelligence; however, in 1901Clark Wissler,a student of Cattell, demonstrated that there was nostatistical relationshipbetween scores on Cattell's tests and academic performance. The tests were finally rendered irrelevant with the development ofAlfred Binet’sintelligence measurements.[10][13]

Journals

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Cattell was well known for his involvement in creating and editing scientific journals. He was so involved in owning and publishing journals, that his research productivity declined. Along withJames Mark Baldwin,he co-founded the journalPsychological Review.He also acquired the journalScienceand, within five years of acquiring it, made it the official publication of theAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science.

In 1900, Cattell purchasedPopular Science MonthlyfromD. Appleton & Company.In 1915, the title was purchased from him and becamePopular Science.He, in turn, founded and editedThe Scientific Monthly,which went to the subscribers of the oldPopular Science Monthlyas a substitute.[11][14]

Cattell was the editor ofSciencefor nearly 50 years. During that time, he did much to promote psychology as a science by seeing to it that empirical studies in psychology were prominently featured in the journal.[10]On Cattell's editorship ofScience,Ludy T. Benjaminwrote "there is no denying that it significantly enhanced psychology’s visibility and status among the older sciences."[8]: 56 

American Men of Science

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Further information:American Men and Women of Science

In 1906, Cattell became the first compiler ofAmerican Men of Science.[15]Despite the name, two women,Grace AndrewsandCharlotte Angas Scott,were listed in this first edition ofAmerican Men of Science.[16]

Skepticism

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Cattell was skeptical ofparanormalclaims andspiritualism.He dismissedLeonora Piperas a fraud. He was involved in a debate over Piper with the psychologistWilliam Jamesin theSciencejournal.[17][18][19]He took issue with James's support forpsychical research.[20]In a letter to James, Cattell wrote that the "Society for Psychical Researchis doing much to injure psychology ".[21]

Personal life

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Cattell married Josephine Owen, the daughter of an English merchant, in 1888. Their seven children obtained their pre-college educations at home with their parents as instructors. The whole family shared in Cattell's editorial work.[3]One daughter,Psyche Cattell(1893–1989), followed in her father's footsteps, establishing a small child psychology practice inLancaster, Pennsylvania,and developing tests to assess the intelligence of infants.[22]

Death

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Cattell died atLancaster General HospitalinLancaster, Pennsylvania,on January 20, 1944, at age 83.[23]

Legacy

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The main street in the College Hill neighborhood ofEaston, Pennsylvania,home toLafayette College,Cattell's alma mater, is named after Cattell.

References

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  1. ^abJonathan Baron (2006)."History: Cattell at Penn".Retrieved2014-09-24.Baron cites C. S. Gruber (1972), "Academic freedom at Columbia University: The case of James McKeen Cattell",AAUP Bulletin,Autumn, pp. 297-305, with respect to Cattell's views on the war and place in the debate on academic freedom.
  2. ^Smyth, Edward (March 18, 2015)."Cattell, Alexander Gilmore".
  3. ^abcdDorothy Ross (1973). "Cattell, James McKeen".Dictionary of American Biography.Vol. Supplement Three (1941-1945). New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.
  4. ^"Cattell, James McKeen (CTL886JM)".A Cambridge Alumni Database.University of Cambridge.
  5. ^"APS Member History".search.amphilsoc.org.Retrieved2021-07-07.
  6. ^Current Opinion,November 1917, p.294
  7. ^"Eugenics", Unified Medical Language System (Psychological Index Terms), National Library of Medicine, 26 Sep. 2010.
  8. ^abBenjamin, L.T. Jr.(1993).A history of psychology in letters.Dubuque, IA: Wm. C. Brown.ISBN978-0697129802.OCLC26931839.
  9. ^abSokal, M. M. (1980). "Science and James McKeen Cattell, 1894 to 1945".Science.209(4452): 43–52.Bibcode:1980Sci...209...43S.doi:10.1126/science.7025202.PMID7025202.
  10. ^abcdefThorne, B. M., Henley, T. (2001).Connections in the history and systems of psychology.Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  11. ^abPillsbury, W.B. (1947).Biographical Memoir of James McKeen Cattell 1860-1944. National Academy of the Sciences.http:// nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/cattell-james-m.pdf
  12. ^abc“Boeck, P.D., Gore, L. R., Gonzalez, T., & Martin, E. S. (2019). “An Alternative View on the Measurement of Intelligence and its History”. The Cambridge Handbook of Intelligence, 47-74.https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108770422.005
  13. ^Applied History of Psychology/Models of Testing. Wikibooks.http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Applied_History_of_Psychology/Models_of_Assessment
  14. ^Cattell, James McKeen (September 1915)."The Scientific Monthly and the Popular Science Monthly".Popular Science Monthly.87(3): 307–310.
  15. ^Cattell, J. McKEEN,ed. (1906).American Men of Science.New York: The Science Press.RetrievedNovember 7,2018– via Internet Archive.
  16. ^Bailey, Martha J. (1994).American Women in Science:A Biographical Dictionary.ABC-CLIO, Inc.ISBN0-87436-740-9.
  17. ^Cattell, J. M. (1898).Mrs. Piper, the medium.Science7: 534-535.
  18. ^James, W. (1898).Mrs. Piper, "the medium".Science7: 640-641.
  19. ^Cattell, J. M. (1898).Mrs. Piper, "the medium".Science7: 641-642.
  20. ^Kimble, Gregory A; Wertheimer, Michael; White, Charlotte. (2013).Portraits of Pioneers in Psychology.Psychology Press. p. 23.ISBN0-8058-0620-2
  21. ^Goodwin, C. James. (2015).A History of Modern Psychology.Wiley. p. 154.ISBN978-1-118-83375-9
  22. ^Cattell, Psyche (1940).The Measurement of Intelligence of Infants and Young Children(1st ed.). New York, New York: The Psychological Corporation.
  23. ^"Dr. James M. Cattell".Harrisburg Telegraph.21 January 1944. p. 3.Retrieved2021-05-03– viaNewspapers.

Further reading

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