This text focuses on some of the central figures in the development of the discipline of psychology. Chapters focus on psychophysics, and on Geshalt, cognitive, and evolutionary psychology. Extensively updated, it covers topics such as the Americanization of psychology and psychoanalysis.

This is the second edition of a 1980 publication, in which contributors explored theory and history by focusing on some of the central figures in the development of the discipline. Chapters focus on psychophysics (the oldest incarnation of experimental psychology) and on Gestalt, cognitive and evolutionary psychology. This text is considerably updated and expanded, covering such seminal influences as Fechner, G.E. Muller, Wundt, Galton, James, Darwin, Baldwin and Vygotsky; such topics as the Americanization of psychology and psychoanalysis, the relationship between politics and psychology in the United States and the contrasting development of the concept of the self in Western and Eastern psychology; and reprinting chapters originally contributed by B.F. Skinner and Jean Piaget. This book documents the development of a continually evolving field - one that had a profound influence on the thought and culture of the 20th century.

Vicissitudes of Fechnerian Psychophysics in America
Neglect of G.E. Muller in the History of American Psychology
Why Study Wundtian Psychology?
Solomon Diamond, Francis Galton and American Psychology
William James on the Demise of Positivism and the Denial and Affirmation of the Self
The Americanization of Psychology Before William James
Politics and American Psychology
Diverse Relations Between Psychology and Evolutionary Thought
Gestalt Psychology and Evolutionary Psychology
The Experimental Analysis of Operant Behaviour - a History
The Historical Antecedents of Contemporary Behaviourism
The Assimilation of Psychoanlaysis in America - From Popularization to Vulgarization
In Tribute to Piaget - a Look at His Scientific Impact in the United States - Genetic Epistemology and Developmental Psychology
Some Recent Research and its Link With a New Theory of Groupings and Conservations Based on Commutability
Thought and Things - James Mark Baldwin and the Biosocial Origins of Mind
the Historical and Contemporary Significance of Vygotsky's Sociohistorical Psychology
Sitzfleisch, the Zeitgeist and the Hindsightgeist.