Psychology
Margaret Floy Washburn
Margaret Floy Washburn was an influential American psychologist known for her work in animal behavior and motor theory. She was the first woman to receive a PhD in psychology and the second female president of the American Psychological Association. Washburn's research on animal behavior and her book, "The Animal Mind," significantly contributed to the field of comparative psychology.
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eBook - PDFOur Voices
Psychology of Women
- Elizabeth A. Rider(Author)
- 2015(Publication Date)
- Wiley(Publisher)
In this section, we review noteworthy contributions by women in psychology’s formative years (see Russo & Denmark, 1987; and Scarborough & Furumoto, 1987, for more complete reviews). In doing so, we are restoring women and their accomplishments in the history of psychology for a complete picture of psychology’s past. Women pioneers serve as role models for young women in psychology today who otherwise study almost exclusively men’s accomplishments in this field (Bernstein & Russo, 1974). In addition, women’s scholarship, past and present, provides important per- spectives on issues that might otherwise be ignored. Margaret Washburn was the first woman to officially receive her doctor- ate degree in psychology, from Cornell University in 1894. She had trans- ferred from Columbia University, which did not grant degrees to women at the time. With her family’s finances and support, Washburn immersed her- self in the new field of psychology and became the first woman in psychol- ogy’s “inner circle,” which included eminent figures of the time such as E. B. Titchener, Lewis Terman, James McKeen Cattell, and William James. Her work on animal psychology, published in The Animal Mind, is considered her most important contribution. Margaret Washburn became a member of the APA in 1894, joining two other women in the organization: Mary Calkins and Christine Ladd- Franklin. These women had completed the requirements for doctoral de- grees, Calkins at Harvard and Ladd-Franklin at Johns Hopkins, but both were denied the actual conferring of the degree because their universities prohibited women from receiving higher degrees. William James noted of Calkins’ final examination for the Ph.D., “it was much the most brilliant ex- amination for the Ph.D. that we have had at Harvard. It is a pity, in spite of this, that she still lacks the degree” (quoted in Scarborough and Furumoto, 1987, p. 46).
eBook - PDF- Michele A. Paludi(Author)
- 2004(Publication Date)
- Praeger(Publisher)
Prior to that, psy- chological questions were addressed by philosophers and researchers with training in medicine and other sciences. During the 1890s psychology became recognized as a science in the United States, and colleges and universities began to add formal psychology programs, departments, and laboratories. In 1894 Margaret Floy Washburn became the first woman to receive a doctorate in psychology from a major American university; a few other women were already active in the field (e.g., Christine Ladd-Franklin, Ethel Puffer) after having done their graduate study in Germany or completed the degree re- quirements without being awarded an official degree (Scarborough & Furu- moto, 1987). Some of the early women psychologists (e.g., Mary Whiton Caulkins, Margaret Floy Washburn) obtained faculty positions at women's col- leges, where they were able to set up laboratories and conduct research; oth- ers made their careers in applied psychology, especially in child development, child welfare, counseling, and educational psychology. Then, as now, women made major contributions to applied psychology. Until recently, women's op- portunities to contribute to the development of research and training in psy- chology were limited. In the early years of psychology, few Americans attended college, and a small percentage of them were women. Most colleges and universities did not admit women students, or allowed them to study only as nondegree can- didates. In 1910 only 3.8 percent of American women aged eighteen to twenty-one attended college; by 1930 the number had increased to only 10.5 percent (Levine, 1995). It was not until after World War II, when the G.I. Bill made it possible, that large numbers of Americans began to attend college, and new academic institutions (including state universities and community colleges) were founded to meet the demand.
eBook - ePubWomen's Lives
A Psychological Exploration
- Claire A. Etaugh, Judith S. Bridges(Authors)
- 2023(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
Margaret Floy Washburn was elected the second woman president in 1921. It would be 51 years before the APA had another female leader (Chrisler, 2013). Since the early 1980s, the number of women in APA leadership roles has increased notably (Etaugh & Geraghty, 2014). The percentage of women presidents of APA and the Association of Psychological Science (APS; the other national US psychological association) was 70 percent for the 2010–2019 decade compared to 30 percent in 2000–2009. Also as of 2019, nearly half of the editors of prominent APA and APS interdisciplinary journals were women (Gruber et al., 2020). Jennifer Eberhardt is the 2021–2022 president of the Association for Psychological Science (formerly the American Psychological Society). Since its founding in 1988, 15 other women have served as president. Women’s Contributions In some ways, however, women’s contributions to the field have often been overlooked or ignored (Etaugh, 2018). For example, women comprise only one in three APA Fellows, the most prestigious membership category (Etaugh & Geraghty, 2014) and they receive significantly fewer prestigious APA awards than men (Etaugh & Snidman, 2017). One reason for this apparent invisibility of many women psychologists is the long-standing practice in psychology books and journal articles is to refer to authors by their last name and first initials only. Second, in the absence of gender-identifying information, people tend to assume that the important contributions included in psychology books and articles have been carried out by men (Etaugh, 2016). When Claire learned about the Ladd-Franklin theory of color vision in introductory psychology, she assumed that two men named Ladd and Franklin had developed the theory. Only later did she discover that it was the work of Christine Ladd-Franklin. Similarly, most people assume that it was Harry Harlow who established the importance of touch in the development of attachment
- Jon Grahe, Michelle Ceynar, Rihana S. Mason, Jon Grahe, Michelle Ceynar, Rihana S. Mason(Authors)
- 2023(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
Goodenough & Harris, 1950 ). Table 2 in the OSF includes a comprehensive set of optional classroom activities, projects, and discussion-based exercises designed to facilitate student learning. Each assignment is organized around specific learning objectives and subfields within the discipline of psychology.Conclusion
As the first African American woman to earn a PhD in psychology, Dr. Ruth Howard should be a name recognized by all psychology students. Her early childhood experiences set her on a path to working for the welfare of others, and her dissertation research, a systematic study of the development of triplets, is both widely viewed as the first attempt to establish norms across physical, psychological, and socioemotional domains for this population, as well as provides a foreshadowing to more contemporary theorical and empirical positions within Black and feminist psychology against the then-commonly held assertion of the power of “nature” over “nurture.” Though technology and instrumentation have advanced significantly since Howard's dissertation was completed, her work remains valuable to contemporary students as it is a prime example of exhaustive and critical efforts to obtain large, representative samples for psychological research, substantial effort to precisely measure key variables and rigorously analyze data, and broad-based application to both theoretical and applied psychology. Dr. Ruth Howard is a trailblazer in the domains of Black and feminist psychology, and her legacy of service to the lives of children and families continues to be celebrated well after her death.We have no known conflict of interest to disclose.Note
- Dr. Inez Prosser who earned an Educational Psychology Doctoral degree in 1933 from the University of Cincinnati is often recognized as the first African American to receive a doctorate in Psychology because her dissertation topic focused on psychology, however Ruth Howard is the first to earn a PhD in Psychology.
References
- Angoff, W. H. (1988). The nature-nurture debate, aptitudes, and group differences. American Psychologist , 43(9), 713–720.
- APA . (2013). Ruth Howard, PhD: Featured Psychologist. Retrieved from https://www.apa.org/pi/oema/resources/ethnicity-health/psychologists/ruth-howard
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