Department of Psychological Sciences
The Department of Psychological Sciences at Birkbeck: The past and the present1
Hipp chronoscope. This early mechanical timer can measure reaction times to an accuracy of 1 millisecond.
The Department of Psychological Sciences at Birkbeck was established in the difficult period of the Second World War but its origin can be traced to King’s College London in the early days of psychological science towards the end of the Nineteenth Century. In the middle part of the 19th Century in Germany empirical investigations of the senses and sensation began. Among the investigations were those of Helmholtz on hearing and vision, and Weber who began to quantify the relation between the characteristics of physical stimuli and the sensations they produced. Fechner developed his psychophysical methods which facilitated such investigations. Ebbinghaus conducted his systematic study of remembering and forgetting in the early 1880’s. In 1875 Wundt opened the very first psychological laboratory in Leipzig thereby confirming the early belief of the British Associationists, such as J.S.Mill, that the mind is a system governed by laws and so is subject to scientific scrutiny.
Developments in empirical investigations in psychology were relatively slow in Britain for a number of reasons but mainly the conservative attitudes of university authorities and society generally. However, William Rivers established the first experimental laboratory at Cambridge in 1897, and James Sully played an important role in establishing a laboratory at University College London in the following year.
An indication that experimental psychology was being taught at King’s College early on is given by Hearnshaw2 who notes that occasional students were attending courses on experimental psychology as early as 1898. The College Calendar 1902-1903 contains notice of such a course:
A course of Lectures and Demonstrations will be given by Dr W.G.Smith M.A. during the Summer Session; particulars will be summarized later.
Fee £1.1s. for the Course.
Dr Smith was appointed in 1900 as the first lecturer in Experimental Psychology at King’s, although E. Sheppard had been appointed professor of Psychological Medicine in 1871. Hearnshaw observes that when Smith was appointed he began the task of building up a psychological laboratory ‘in most inadequate accommodation, and with extremely scanty apparatus’. It seems conditions did not improve quickly because R.B.Cattell3, writing about the appointment of Francis Aveling as Reader in 1922, states‘The laboratory was at first a couple of cellars, two flights below the level of the Strand and smelling faintly of Thames River Water. These cells had been dungeons for the least popular lodgers when Somerset House accommodated Elizabethan political prisoners.’
Dr C.S. Myers was appointed lecturer in Experimental Psychology in 1903 but it was not until 1906, when he was awarded the Chair in Experimental Psychology, that a Department of Psychology was established. Up till then he was a member of the Department of Physiology. Myers made a substantial contribution to the development of psychological science, particularly in the area of fatigue, and industrial psychology generally. In 1909, the year he moved to Cambridge, he published The Text-Book of Experimental Psychology which can be seen as the first real text book on experimental psychology with a manual for laboratory experiments. While at Cambridge he co-founded the National Institute of Industrial Psychology and the British Journal of Psychology.
It would be wrong to believe that the emphasis at King’s was entirely on experimental psychology at that time. For example, Rev. Caldecott, Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy taught the undergraduate General and Comparative Psychology course. At the same time W. D. Halliburton, FRS, Professor of Physiology, taught a course entitled Histological Psychology which dealt with the nervous system and senses.
Dr William Brown, whose interests were mainly in psychotherapy, succeeded Myers as Head of Department until Dr Francis Aveling was appointed Reader in 1922. Aveling occupied the Chair in Psychology from1932 until 1941, and his interests were both philosophical and empirical. They included conceptualization of consciousness, theories of knowledge, thinking, perception of briefly exposed materials, emotion and fear in warfare, and the status of psychology as an empirical science. During his tenure the Department acquired more adequate equipment and more favourable accommodation, and the emphasis on applied psychology was developed.
With the declaration of hostilities in 1939 London Colleges, including King’s, moved as many students and resources as possible out of London. Birkbeck College, with its unique mission of educating only part-time undergraduates remained in London under the most difficult circumstances. As Professor E.H. Warmington4 notes, ‘During the years 1939-1945 Birkbeck College could have gone from its place in London to some other near abode in Britain: It could have closed its doors altogether. It remained in London, and was closed down for a very short time only; so that its record over those years is part of London in action. Again, at any time the College’s cramped, crowded and shabby buildings might have been wholly destroyed, its inmates mutilated or killed, its busy life brought to a stop; but none of these things happened. Studious work was indeed hindered and the drab structures with their contents were partly wrecked and ruined; but the theme of all that follows in this history is the manner in which a college of London’s University, having chosen for well considered reason to face in its own home a period of stress and strain, passed through all its dangers, and survived.’
Birkbeck College was incorporated into the University of London in 1926. Incorporation meant not only that students were awarded University of London degrees but also benefited from collaboration in teaching and research with other members of the University. In addition, the University exercised control over examination regulations, entrance requirements, teaching and administration. In the pre-war years King’s College, already a member of the University (its students, along with those of University College, were the first to be admitted to University of London examinations in 1836), offered both day-time and evening courses in Psychology with most students opting for evening lectures. When King’s College moved to Bristol in 1939 on the outbreak of war some Psychology students remained in London and obviously could not attend classes in Bristol. The University’s Academic Council decided that intercollegiate evening courses in General Psychology and Experimental Psychology should be provided at Birkbeck, by King’s College Staff, for students registered there and remaining in London.
Professor Mace
With the death of Professor Aveling in 1941 the University decided to transfer the teaching of Psychology from King’s and establish a Chair in Psychology at Birkbeck. Dr. C. A. Mace, reader in Psychology at Bedford College (then housed at Cambridge), was appointed to the Chair in 1944, and Professor R. J. Bartlett joined him from King’s together with Dr. J. Hadfield, Dr. May Smith, and Adele Frankenstein who were part-time lecturers. Dr. A. Caws, L. Cooper, G. Adcock, and Dr. Grace Claver were appointed demonstrators. Sidney Thurlow was appointed Departmental Steward in 1944 having been transferred from Bedford College ‘as soon as he …has the Ministry of Labour’s permission’, together with equipment loaned until purchase of Birkbeck’s own equipment was approved (such was the need for permission in wartime!). Affectionately known to generations of students ‘Sid’ retired in 1968.
Sid Thurlow (centre), the Queen Mother and Professor Mace in 1953
Francis Aveling’s extensive work at King’s provided a good antecedent to Mace’s own research which embraced, for example, psychology of skill, thinking and creativity, psychology of aesthetics, the structure of organizations, and philosophy of mind5.Crucially for the development of Psychology at Birkbeck, much of the research was applied. For example, Professor R. J. Bartlett had early interests in the psychology of advertising, and measurement in psychology. Dr Hadfield’s work included psychological welfare of young children, psychopathology, war neurosis, and the clinical use of hypnosis. May Smith’s interests were principally in industrial psychology, especially fatigue at work under wartime pressures. Other wartime applications included skills involved in operating range-finding equipment.
'During the Autumn of 1945 the Ministry of Works initiated investigations at Birkbeck into ‘problems of selection and training of building operatives and the psychological conditions affecting their efficiency, welfare and general morale.’ Initially supervision of the programme was shared by the Medical Research Council’s Applied Psychology Unit at Cambridge under Sir Frederic Bartlett and the Department of Psychology at Birkbeck under Professor Mace. In 1946, the arrangement was consolidated by the formation of the MRC Building Research Unit attached to Birkbeck. (A report on some of the Unit’s work was published by Norah Davis6 ).
In what was to emerge as important for later developments, Alec Rodger was appointed as lecturer in 1947 thus providing continuity to existing interests in occupational psychology.
Undergraduate courses leading to the University’s BA and BSc General and Honours degrees were offered together with a Postgraduate Academic Diploma in Psychology which provided instruction in certain branches of applied psychology including social, educational, and industrial psychology. The first Birkbeck PhD was awarded in 1945 to Rev. G. Stephen Spinks for his thesis entitled ‘Archetypes and Apocalyptic Literature’ along with the MA awarded to Phyllis Freeston for her work on ‘Children’s conceptions of adult life’. A steady stream of PhD’s and Master’s awards followed.
A seminar following bomb damage
The Department’s achievements in those early years up to 1951 are all the more remarkable given the prevailing conditions brought about by the Second World War. The main College accommodation was Breams Buildings in Holborn with Psychology occupying space in nearby Greystoke Place. Following earlier damage Greystoke Place was severely damaged by a V1 ‘flying bomb’ in 1944 and the Department moved to temporary accommodation in nearby Field House. In 1946 it was moved to a large hut built on a site adjoining Greystoke Place. The College entered its present building in Malet Street in 1951 with Psychology situated on the 4th Floor which had been added to the original pre-war plan. Completion of the building, which had started before war was declared, was permitted because it was designated ‘utility’ under the then current regulations which severely restricted building, but it was clearly strong enough to support the recent addition of two further floors!
Malet Street 1939 Birkbeck todayThe opportunities offered by the new accommodation were exploited and the years 1951-55 saw new appointments including Brian Foss, Thelma Veness, Harry Hurwitz, John Brown, Peter Cavanagh, and Peter Dodwell. Research included occupational psychology, psychophysics, memory, animal learning and discrimination (by octopus, rat and mynah bird), educational psychology, and childhood cognition, some of it with the aid of substantial external funding.
During years 1951-1960 there was a steady flow of PhDs, and increasing numbers of MA’s in occupational psychology.
The early years of the Department up to Mace’s retirement in 1961, then, are marked by extensive research, particularly applied, and successful teaching at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Professor Mace died in 1971 the Times obituary describing him ‘as perhaps the last in line of eminent philosophers such as William James, James Ward and G. F. Stout who helped established psychology as an empirical science.’
The Birkbeck Vocational Guidance Centre opened at Dartford in the 1958/9 session and 1959 saw the introduction of a Masters course in Occupational Psychology. In 1961, and building on the long-standing interests stretching back to the King’s College period, the Department of Occupational Psychology was established as the first of its kind in the United Kingdom, with Alec Rodger moving from the Department of Psychology to his appointment as Professor and Head. In that year, too, Arthur Summerfield was appointed to the Chair in Psychology and Head of the Department of Psychology.
Professor Arthur Summerfield
The two departments shared the 4th floor of the Malet Street building until 1968, collaborating on teaching and both participating in the University’s MSc Ergonomics course which ran from 1970 until 2000. Despite the limited space there was expansion in both research and teaching. Funding from the MRC and US sources to Arthur Summerfield, Daphne Joyce and Harry Hurwitz facilitated the introduction of psychopharmacological research using animals, and the appointment of Peter Venables as Reader in 1964 (and, shortly after, Professor) introduced research into psychophysiology and schizophrenia. Another notable appointment, in 1975, was that of Max Coltheart who quickly established his work in cognitive neuropsychology.
The Department of Occupational Psychology vacated the 4th floor in 1967/68 thus enabling new research laboratories to be built, all connected to the new LINC-8 computer and marking the introduction of the new technology that was to have such profound consequences generally. Pressure for research space brought about by increasing research activity was significantly alleviated when the Department took possession of the basement in the North Block of Senate House in 1978. That space, originally occupied by the Institute of Education, had lain idle long enough for questions to be asked in Parliament about the University’s use of prime space in central London. As a result a small committee assisted by Brian Aviss, the Departmental Superintendent, set about designing a suite of laboratories under considerable time pressure. Their task was not helped by discrepancies between the architectural plans and the building, which made their result all the more impressive!
The number of undergraduates increased after Arthur Summerfield was appointed Head of Department in 1961 and the emphasis on teaching excellence was maintained. There was a further expansion, albeit temporary, with the introduction of full-time undergraduates for the session 1967/68 in response to various national policies for Higher Education. But difficulties coping with the new demands in parallel with the part-time students led to termination of the arrangement in1970. The Department was then able to devote itself fully, again, to Birkbeck’s mission of providing ‘for persons who are engaged in earning their livelihood during the daytime and other persons, education, instruction, and the means for research’ (Charter and Statutes, Article 3).
At the end of the 1960’s there were important changes in the degree regulations, the most fundamental being the transfer of responsibility for setting and marking of examinations from the University to individual Colleges, and the introduction of course units in1970. Up to that point students sat all their University examinations in their final year under the regulation that if candidates failed, or were absent from any paper, they had to take all the papers again! Some of the advantages of the course unit system in terms of greater flexibility and pedagogic principles of, for example, practice and feedback, will be obvious, but students are placed under more continuous demands than under the previous regulations. It is possible that those changes contributed to the reduction in extra-curricular activities such as the Psychology Society, participation in the Birkbeck Players, and membership of College sports teams.
Over the period of Arthur Summerfield’s headship the introduction of several prizes for examination performance added to the overall motivation of undergraduate students. Although not of great monetary value such prizes have a high intrinsic value. The Elaine Gladston prize for the best performance by an undergraduate student in the final year examinations was first awarded in 1963, and the Arthur Summerfield Prize for the most promising performance in First Year examinations was established in 1991. Professor Charles Dicken of the State University of California, San Diego introduced the Visitors in Psychology Prize for the best final year project in 1992. The Henrietta Mary Whitehead Exhibition first awarded in1966 to give financial assistance for women psychology students was established in memory of Henrietta Mary Whitehead who had been a student at King’s College.
Dr Paul Barber Prof William Marslen-Wilson Dr Simon Green Prof Mike OaksfordArthur Summerfield retired in 1988 handing on a department that had increased substantially in size and was successful in both teaching and research. Expansion and success continued under the Headships of Paul Barber (1987- 1991), William Marslen-Wilson (1991-1995), and Simon Green (1995-2005), and continues presently under Mike Oaksford. The chair occupied by Arthur Summerfield went to William Marslen-Wilson with a new chair being established for Loraine Tyler, both coming from Cambridge with a strong team researching the psychology of language. Their need for research space was met by the house at 32 Torrington Place but at the cost of surrendering an equivalent amount of space in Senate House. The house in Torrington Place is at present occupied by the Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development and the BabyLab .
In 1999, and in accordance with a general policy, the Department was reclassified as a School of the College. In 2008, recognising the dynamic development of the School in both teaching and research activities, the Centre for Psychosocial Studies transferred to the new School of Psychosocial Studies. The Centre had established a range of clinically and socially oriented taught Masters courses in collaboration with external bodies, for example, the Institute of Family Therapy, the Institute for Group Analysis, and the British Association for Psychotherapy. These courses, together with the extensive research activities, continue to flourish in this new arrangement which is reminiscent of the expansion of Psychology at Birkbeck with the creation of the Department of Occupational Psychology in 1961.
Research activity has responded dynamically to internal and external pressures and opportunities, and is currently organised under four research groupings: Brain and Cognitive Development; Child, Family and Health Psychology ; Cognitive Modelling; and Perception, Attention and Emotion. As these names suggest, research includes postnatal brain development and changes in perceptual, cognitive, and linguistic abilities; child, family and community development; health; computational modelling of cognition, and emotions.
The Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development added to its successes by being awarded The Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education 2005. It attracts funds.for PhD students by its status as a Marie Curie Centre for Excellence doctoral training site which has placed it in the top 5% of life science research groups in Europe. In 2006 the group moved into the new Woburn Link Building, adjacent to the Clore Building, equipped with an fMRI scanner. Other successes include the conduct of the large and important National Evaluation for Sure Start programme by members of the Institute for the Study of Children, Families and Social Issues, collaborations on a large-scale US study of infant, child and adolescent development with colleagues at more than 15 American universities, and a longitudinal study is being carried out in association with colleagues at Otago University, the Institute of Psychiatry (King’s College London), and the University of Pennsylvania.
Professor Martin Eimer and the Master being presented with the The Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education 2005
The year 2008 was notable for the School’s success in the Research Assessment Exercise, being ranked fifth amongst UK Psychology departments and second only to Cambridge amongst medium sized departments.
The Department’s BSc in Psychology has flourished with a high demand for places. Not surprisingly, the undergraduate population has changed noticeably over the years. In the early decades of the Department’s existence University regulations normally required three A level passes for registration for the BA or BSc. Furthermore, a large proportion of undergraduates had previously attended a teacher training college or university, and so were familiar with academic practices and requirements. Over recent years relaxation of formal entry requirements and the increased numbers of students created challenges for teaching which, according to the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education have been very successfully met.
MSc courses in Psychological Research Methods, Cognitive and Decision Sciences, and Cognitive Neuroscience, the latter two courses jointly with UCL, have been successfully established.
The Department has training exchange agreements with the Sackler Institute, Cornell Medical School, and the University of Tokyo. Through the EC Research and Training Network grants the Department has had doctoral and post-doctoral training exchange agreements in place with institutions across the EC. These include University of Brussels, University of Liege, University of Grenoble, University of Dijon, University of Amsterdam, University of Padova, University of Warwick, University of Exeter, Cardiff University, and Budapest Technical Institute.
This history of Birkbeck’s Department of Psychological Sciences is intended to reveal the bonds that link the present Department of Psychological Sciences with the smaller but influential Department established in 1944, and further back to the early days of modern psychology in the 19th Century. There is, of course a dramatic contrast in the conditions of research, teaching and learning now compared to the initial years of Psychology at Birkbeck. In 1944 and 1945 students and staff faced danger and disruption from V1 and V2 bombs, the library had been destroyed, and accommodation was temporary and taken where it could be found. Much was achieved under those conditions and much has been achieved under the present more favourable conditions. There is every reason to be optimistic for the future, proud of the inheritance from George Birkbeck and the link with King’s College, and grateful for the foundations laid by Professor Mace and his colleagues in the difficult years of the 1940’s.
Notes
1. This history touches on the origins of the Department of Occupational Psychology (now the School of Management and Organizational Psychology) but not included Psychology in Birkbeck’s Faculty of Continuing Education which, as the University’s Extra Mural Department, was incorporated into Birkbeck in 1988.
2. Hearnshaw, F.J.C. (1929). The Centenary history of King’s College London 1828-1928.
3. Cattell, R.B. (1941). Francis Aveling, 1875-1941. American Journal of Psychology, 54, 608-
4. Warmington, E.H. (1954). A history of Birkbeck College University of London during the Second World War 1939-1945. London: Birkbeck College.
5. Mace, M. (Ed). (1973). C. A. Mace: Selected papers. London: Methuen.
6. Davis, N. (1948). Attitudes to work; a field study of building operatives. British Journal of Psychology, 38, 107-134.
If you wish to comment on this History, or have personal experiences or other information that might be included in it, please contact Vernon Gregg at v.gregg@bbk.ac.uk
Heads of Department/Heads of School
Prof. C. A. Mace 1944 - 1961Prof. A. Summerfield 1961 - 1987
Dr. P. Barber 1987 - 1991
Prof. W. Marslen-Wilson 1991 - 1995
Dr. S. Green 1995 - 2005
Prof. M. Oaksford 2005 -
Professors
C. A. Mace 1944 - 1961A. Summerfield 1961 - 1987
P. Venables 1968 - 1974
M. Coltheart 1975 - 1987
G. Humphreys 1988 - 1991
W. Marslen-Wilson 1991 - 1997
L.K. Tyler 1994 - 1998
S. Frosh 1998 -
H.J. Muller 1999 -
J. Driver 1997 -1998
M. Johnson 1997 -
J. Belsky 1999 -
L. Segal 1999 -
E. Melhuish 2001 -
M. Eimer 2002 -
J. Barnes 2002 -
M. Oaksford 2005 -
M. Usher 2005 -
D. Mareschal 2006 -
M. Sereno 2007 -
J.A. Smith 2008 -
A. Richards 2009 -
