APS David Myers Distinguished Lecture on the Science and Craft of Teaching Psychology

Just How Intelligent was William James? Baseball Wasn't Even Included in His Varieties of Religious Experience

Ludy T. Benjamin Texas A&M University

In the Boston environs in the 1890s, in the midst of a national call for the reform of American education, there was much discussion about the importance of psychology for education and especially for its relevance to teaching. Clark University’s G. Stanley Hall and Harvard University’s William James and Hugo Münsterberg were some of the luminaries who addressed this topic. Hall argued that psychology was the science that was key to educational reform, whereas Münsterberg told teachers that there was absolutely nothing that scientific psychology could offer them that would be of use in their work. James, always the more reasoned, weighed into this controversy on his own terms. This talk will explore the history of psychology’s relation to American public education, concluding with a brief analysis of contemporary views. Oh yes – there will be some baseball history, but that’s a secret.