The moral power of suggestion: A history of suggestion in Japan, 1900–1930

In Japan, as in the west, suggestion theory was the predominant theory of hypnosis, and suggestive therapy was one of the most important, if not the most important, form of psychotherapy in the early 20th century. While the use of suggestion was met with objections on both scientific and moral grounds in the west, it was seen in a more positive light and has had a significant influence on the development of psychotherapy in Japan. With regard to the contexts of suggestion, suggestive power, suggestibility, and the effects of suggestion, this study will examine the distinctive conceptions and practices of suggestion developed by analogy with existing ideas about interpersonal influence, particularly with the concept of kanka (assimilative transformation) in Japan. They provide an interesting comparison to the western ideas of suggestion, helping us understand the historical and cultural particularity of western dynamic psychiatry and psychotherapy, particularly their presumptions about interpersonal influence.     

Selected Trends in the Economic Status of American Women (1900–1986): Implications for Employment Counselors

The author compares selected data since the turn of the century to identify trends that affect the economic status of women in a changing world economy and the implications for counselors.     

“The tempest in my mind”: Cultural interfaces between psychiatry and literature, 1844–1900

The professional literature of the first generation of American psychiatrists is replete with poetical passages drawn from the imaginative works of such English authors as Shakespeare, Byron, and Scott as well as the writings of residents of the asylums they tended. A close reading of such passages in the American Journal of Insanity (AJI), the central medium through which members of this nascent profession attempted to “popularize the study of insanity,” suggests they were not simply textual ornaments or signs of the underdeveloped state of American psychiatry in the mid-nineteenth century. Indeed, literary manifestations of the imaginative minds of patients and renowned writers were scrutinized by psychiatrists seeking to advance their understanding of mental disease. Moreover, the English authors were often elevated to the status of medical experts and their poetry and prose were commended to fellow medical practitioners as sources of psychological insight. Toward the turn of the century psychiatrists' engagement with these literary forms was less pronounced in the AJI, due in large part to the impact of rising asylum populations and the coming of a culture of positivist medicine. Yet literary influences on psychiatric writing are still evident in this period, indicating the complexity of the cultural interfaces between psychiatry and literature and the importance of examining the historical processes that have served to define and distinguish the enterprise of the psychiatrist from that of the poet.     

The golden section and American psychology, 1892–1938

The golden section has been said by many to be the most beautiful proportion. Fechner was the first to investigate it experimentally, and several late‐nineteenth‐ and early‐twentieth‐century American psychologists followed up on his work. Among these were four prominent names: Lightner Witmer (1867–1956), Edward L. Thorndike (1874–1949), Robert S. Woodworth (1869–1962), and Robert M. Ogden (1877–1959). Why did such well‐known psychologists bother with the golden section? In attempting to answer this question we discovered that the golden section was surprisingly well known during this period, not only in psychology but also in advertising and design. It would have been entirely congruent with their stature for prominent psychologists to take an interest in it. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

A Tale of Two Congresses: The Psychological Study of Psychical,Occult, and Religious Phenomena, 1900–1909

In so far as researchers viewed psychical, occult, and religious phenomena as both objectively verifiable and resistant to extant scientific explanations, their study posed thorny issues for experimental psychologists. Controversies over the study of psychical and occult phenomena at the Fourth Congress of International Psychology (Paris, 1900) and religious phenomena at the Sixth (Geneva, 1909) raise the question of why the latter was accepted as a legitimate object of study, whereas the former was not. Comparison of the Congresses suggests that those interested in the study of religion were willing to forego the quest for objective evidence and focus on experience, whereas those most invested in psychical research were not. The shift in focus did not overcome many of the methodological difficulties. Sub‐specialization formalized distinctions between psychical, religious, and pathological phenomena; obscured similarities; and undercut the nascent comparative study of unusual experiences that had emerged at the early Congresses.     

Of Maslow,motives, and managers: The hierarchy of needs in American business, 1960–1985

This paper examines the impact of psychologist Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs in American management. I trace how a roster of management experts translated the hierarchy of needs into management through case studies of job redesign programs at Texas Instruments and marketing firm Young & Rubicam's management training. The hierarchy of needs resonated with management, I argue, because it seemed to offer both a concrete guide for management, with practical implications for designing management training and work structures, alongside a broader social theory that purported to explain changing social values and economic circumstances in America. For the management theorists who invoked the hierarchy of needs, the corporation served as both the prime site for people to fulfill their higher psychological needs and the ideal site to study and cultivate motivation. This article contributes to histories of psychology that show how psychology became a prominent resource in American public life.