Kurt Lewin
Kurt Lewin was a great innovater at his time in the field of Psychology. The theories he developed, the methods of reserch he used and the people he influenced all have had a profound impact on Psychology and even more specifically on Social Psychology.
Lewin was born in 1890 in what is now Poland but at the time was the Prussian province of Posen, in the village of Moglino and was the second of four children (Greathouse). His parents owned a general store, and a farm on the outskirts of the village. When Lewin was fifteen his family moved away from the small village, the farm and their store and went to Berlin.
It was in Germany was where Lewin began his formal education, but like most people he was unsure of what he really wanted to study at first. In 1909 Lewin began attending the University of Frieberg where he started to study medicine. This did not interest him so he transferred to the University of Munich where he tried to study Biology. Again Lewin decided that this was not for him so he transferred for the last time, this time to the University of Berlin where his study of Philosophy and Psychology began (Frostburg). Lewin was said to have "found many of (the school's) department's courses in the grand tradition of Wundtian psychology irreverant and dull (Greathouse)." He would eventually receive his Ph.D. in the "experimental study of associative learning" at the University of Berlin in 1916 (Jones).
Lewin was married twice in his life, the first time in 1917 to a schoolteacher named Maria Landsberg with whom he had the first two of his four children, but in 1927 they divorced. In 1929 he remarried to Gertrud Weiss who he had his third and fourth child with (Frostburg). But before Lewin actually received his degree, he served in the German Army during World War I. While in the service Lewin rose from the rank of private to Lieutenant and was wounded in battle (Jones). These experiences may have had a significant effect on his later research on group psychology.
After the war in 1921 Lewin began work at the Psychological Institute at the University of Berlin, where he had the opportunity to work with Wolfgan...
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... to speak where ever he went. Students and colleagues working under at different times and at different institutions have said that they felt like the were "doing important work (Patnoe pg. 15)." and there is very little that can provide for a better working environment then honest pride in one's work.
Kurt Lewin's work in Child Psychology, Group Psychology, Social Psychology, the psychology of prejudice and his new methods of testing and retesting theories through Action Research were all groundbreaking at the time and continue to have their impact on the field today. But, Lewin was not only a genius in terms of his work in Psychology, he also had a great ability to make the people that he was working with better at their own work. Many of his students and colleagues went on to be some of the most influential minds in psychology. The group he worked with at MIT at the end of his life was especially influential. A study in 1984 showed that "eight of the ten most cited social psychologists are direct descendants of this line of researchers (Patnoe pg.11)." It is fair to say that Kurt Lewin was the father of modern Social Psychology.
fact, “it wasn’t until the 1970s,” she acknowledges, “that more kids became likely to experience a
Sigmund Freud is considered to be one of the most studied and respected historical figures in psychology. Freud has had a huge impact on the way we think today. He also is responsible for creation psychoanalysis. Sigmund Freud is even known as the “father of psychoanalysis”. Through endless contentious theories such as, the Case of Anna O, the Unconscious Mind, the Psyche, and the most infamous of his theories, the Psychosexual stage, Freud has generated many fans and supporters. His works has earned him a place in the list of psychology legends today.
...riod of human development. It is not just a human that happens to be a smaller version of an adult. Seeing that his theories are still being used and tested today is pretty outstanding considering the field study. But it is not just in psychology; his theories are also being studied in education, sociology and genetics as many researchers continue to elaborate on his claims (Piaget, 1976).
...ed with early childhood because he was interested in the age group; he was interested in the theories and seeing how children function. Sigmund Freud is one of the childhood leaders who were considered an exceptional theorist because his ideas about growth and development are thoroughly explained. His ideas were vague but articulate in a way. Sigmund Freud and his theories awaken the mind and they are taught in parenting and early childhood education courses today along with a couple other early childhood leaders. Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory has definitely had an influence on the way some of us see children today.
“Men’s greater involvement at home is good for their relationships with their partner and also good for their children. Hands-on fathers make better parents than men who let their wives do all the nurturing and child care” (Coontz 99). Coontz believed that if men come home after work and share the chores with their wife, then they will have stronger bonds and the marriage will stay longer. Children’s are very observant, therefore they will learn valuable lessons from both of their parents. Carver showed how his father not being involved in the family has affected his relationship with his
Rieber, R. W. (2001). Wilhelm Wundt in history: the making of a scientific psychology. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum.
Single parent homes are becoming more common as time goes on. With this growing number, the traditional nuclear family seems to be less relevant. Welna reports that “[t]he portion of children living with a single parent has jumped over a generation from 1 out of 20 to about 1 out of 5 children” (1999, p. xii). Within a few decades, single parenting became very common among the modern society. This is a large shift and changes civilization. However, this difference it isn’t expressed very much. Television doesn’t show a lot of representation for
Westen, D. (1998). The scientific legacy of Sigmund Freud: toward a psychodynamically informed psychological science. Psychological Bulletin, 124(3), 333.
At Wesleyan University, Edward Thorndike’s junior year psychology course was merely a requirement for completing his degree and claimed it offered no spark of inspiration. The desire to pursue psychology came later through required readings from chapters in William James’ book Principles of Psychology. After graduation from Wesleyan University, an opportunity presented itself to Thorndike to work under James at Harvard for his graduate degree. He continued his education under the supervision of James McKeen Catell at Columbia University and in 1898 completed his Ph.D..
Fifty years ago, the typical American family included a mother, father and their children. However today, “One in every four children in the United States are being raised by a single parent. Experts point to a variety of factors to explain the high US figure including a cultural shift toward greater acceptance of single parent rearing.”(Armario). As these numbers continue to rise due to modern day ideas and the increasing divorce rate, the children of single parents struggle. “Today 41% of all births were to unmarried women.”(Hymowitz). Single parent families have a detrimental effect on the psychological development of children because single parent families lack financial stability and quality parenting, in addition to lacking a stress free environment.
PSYC321-Social Psychology taught me about the ways in which people are influenced by others, how people make decisions, inferences we make about others’ attitudes and personalities, and influence of situational and variables on behavior. I learned that people behave the way that they do for so many reasons. Behaviors are caused more by the social situation than they are by the characteristics of the individuals. One of the concepts that I recall is Lewin’s equation which indicates that the behavior of a person at any given time depends on both the characteristics of the person and the influence of the social situation. Some of the things we do can also be attributed to cultural influences and differences that exist between societies. I found
Through his psychiatrist work with brain-damaged soldiers, Fritz Perls (Husband to Laura Pearls), established that an approach which would treat patient as functional ‘whole’ would be more effective. He therefore diverted from his traditional psychoanalytic practices, to develop gestalt which he believed would be less discrete. Apart from Sigmund Freud, Reich works on self-understanding and the process of personality change heavily influenced his theories and concepts. Differential thinking as presented by philosopher Friedlander, also played notable and influential role. Fritz nonetheless did...
The theories of Jean Piaget and Lawrence Kohlberg contributed greatly to the field of psychology. They are similar in some ways and distinct in others, but both theories served to lay the foundation for a major facet of modern developmental psychology.
In the past, because life expectancy was lower, large proportions of children lived part of their youth in a OPF as they lost one parent and then another to death. What has changed over time is the composition of such families (Ambert, 2006).” One parent families have been around for thousands of years. There is no avoiding widowing or divorce. Historically single parent family homes have been looked down upon and still catch the blame for a lot of society’s problems today. Children need the support of not only their parents but the other people around them too, when a parent has left, it is society who has the power to help this child and support it. Instead of blaming single parents, there are a number of things that can be done to slowly help lower the negative effects of single parenthood on a child. Community programs and after school programs show children that there are people that care about them. Subsidizing daycare so that it does not cost people half their paychecks can allow single mothers to advance their careers and create a safety net for their families. “Youth who overcome disadvantage are able to rely on a greater number of sources of social support than youth with serious coping problems, including teachers, ministers, older friends, family day-care providers, nursery school teachers, neighbors, or contacts at social agencies (Kaplan,
Sigmund Freud was one of the original pioneers in the field of Psychology. The work that he accomplished throughout his lifetime laid a foundation for many theorists after him. The theorists that worked in Psychology, after Freud, were able to form their own thoughts, ideas, and hypotheses about the human mind after learning from his work. Sigmund Freud’s major contribution in the field of Psychology was his theory about the human psyche; which he called the Id, the Ego, and the Super-Ego. This theory was based on the human personality and its formation. Many of Freud’s analysis strategies became common practice in the field of Psychology and are still used today. Sigmund Freud will always be one of the most influential figures in the