29 November in the History of Psychology

On November 29:

1825 — Jean-Martin Charcot was born. Charcot was a pioneer of modern neurology best known to psychologists for his investigations of hypnosis and hysteria and his influence on Sigmund Freud. Charcot believed hysteria to be the cause of hypnotic behavior. Charcot was honorary president of the First International Congress of Psychology in 1889.

1879 — Grace Maxwell Fernald was born. Fernald developed the visual-auditory-kinesthetic-tactile system of teaching reading to readers with disabilities. With William Healy, she administered the pioneering Juvenile Psychopathic Institute in Chicago and developed the Healy-Fernald performance tests of intelligence.

1910 — Edith Weisskopf-Joelson was born. Weisskopf-Joelson was a clinical psychologist with special interests in projective techniques and transcendental experiences. She developed widely used norms of responses to the Thematic Apperception Test.

1938 — Ralph Buchsbaum's book Animals Without Backbones was first published. This enduring guide to invertebrate behavior has gone through several editions over a lifetime of more than 50 years.

1956 — An informal meeting was held at the University of New Mexico to organize the New Mexico Psychological Association. James J. Calvert, Robert F. Utter, Roger J. Weldon, and John Salazar called this first meeting. The first formal business meeting was held on March 15, 1957, at the Veterans Hospital in Albuquerque.

1971 — An early form of the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment was published by Jane Mercer and June Lewis. The instrument, at that time, was titled the Adaptive Behavior Inventory for Children.

1975 — Public Law 94-142, the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, was signed by President Ford. The law mandated assessment and programs for children with mental and physical disabilities, including those with learning disabilities. Entire college special education courses are taught on the implications of this act.

1979 — Stephen C. Woods, Elizabeth C. Lotter, L. David McKay, and Daniel Porte, Jr. published "Chronic Intracerebroventricular Infusion of Insulin Reduces Food Intake and Body Weight of Baboons" in Nature. This study conclusively demonstrated the key role of the pancreatic hormone insulin in controlling body weight, making insulin the first hormonal regulator of body weight to be discovered. Woods gained prominence for his studies of insulin signaling in the central nervous system. Insulin is now considered important to many CNS functions, including learning and memory, and plays a role in Alzheimer's disease.

1993 — A portrait of Sigmund Freud appeared on the cover of Time magazine along with the caption, "Is Freud Dead?" The cover article discussed the current status of Freudian thought.