Journal o/ rhe Hirrory o/ rhe Behavioral Sciences Volume I9. July, I983

Ludwig J. Pongratz, Werner Traxel, and Ernst G. Wehner, eds. Psychologie in Selbst- darstellungen [Psychology in autobiography], vol. 2. Bern: Hans Huber, 1979. 33 1 pp. (Reviewed by JOSEF B R O ~ E K )

The editors note in the introduction (p. 7) that while the first volume, published in 1972, was concerned primarily with problems, of general psychology, the present volume’s emphasis is on specific fields of psychology: industrial and organizational (Hans Biiisch); personality (Helmut von Bracken); motivation (Wilhelm Keller); educational (Heinrich Roth); social (Theodor Scharmann); and developmental (Jean Piaget). Two chapters were contributed by psychologists with gestalt-theory orientation (Anitra Karsten, advertising, prejudice, and gerontology; Edwin Rausch, visual percep- tion).

Taken as a whole, the autobiographies constitute a nonrandom sample of mini- portraits of European, principally German, psychology of the second and third quarter of the twentieth century. The eight authors were born around the turn of the century, between 1896 (Jean Piaget) and 1907 (Theodor Scharmann). Three were born in Ger- many, three in Switzerland, and one on the border between the two countries, with the mother a Swiss and the father a German. Anitra Karsten was born in Finland but worked also in Germany and elsewhere.

With the exception of Piaget’s all the autobiographies were written specifically for the present volume. Piaget’s had previously appeared elsewhere in three installments (1952, 1966, 1976). Many a reader will welcome the detailed name index.

What light do the Selbstdarstellungen throw on the intellectual contacts between the U.S. and post-World War I1 Europe? While the autobiographies cannot serve as a true mirror of U.S.-European professional interactions, positive contacts are evident in five of the eight autobiographies.

Von Bracken was one of the earliest and most systematic bridge builders, interested in facilitating a two-way traffic of ideas between the United States and Western Ger- many. He translated Gordon W. Allport’s A Psychological Interpretation of Per- sonality, in 1949, when-as he puts it-Germany was still full of strong prejudices against American psychology. At Allport’s invitation, von Bracken spent five months in 1950 at Harvard University. Von Bracken was stimulated by Allport’s work on racial and national prejudices to study prejudices against handicapped children. In 1953 von Bracken presented a report on English and American theories of personality at the Nineteenth Congress of the German Psychological Society. Finally in 1954 he organized a symposium on “European characterology” and, in cooperation with Henry P. David, edited the expanded proceedings of the symposium under the title Perspectives in Per- sonality Theory containing von Bracken’s review of the current German theories of per- sonality. The volume was published in English (in New York, 1957, and in London, 1958), in German (1959) and in Spanish (1963).

A fellowship awarded by the International Association of University Women enabled Anitra Karsten, a native of Finland, to spend the academic year 1949-1950 at the Institute for Social Research, newly founded at the University of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Of special interest is her account (pp. 98-99) of how the confrontations of her own, typically European preconceptions with reality led to a technical study of the phenomena of prejudice, especially of prejudices against older persons.

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FOREIGN BOOK REVIEWS 313

Edwin Rausch notes (p. 228) the presence in the late 1940s of American visiting professors (L. L. Thurstone, T. G. Thurstone, H. L. Koch) at the Frankfurt Institute of Psychology.

Heinrich Roth (p. 269), having spent a year (1950) in travel and study in America, was deeply impressed by the idea that the social sciences must provide the basis for the making of decisions in education and politics. In 1956, in Frankfurt, study of the American literature helped him to come to the realization that “learning” is the central psychological phenomenon (p. 273). Roth (p. 282) views the concept of “aptitude- treatment interaction” as a point of departure of all new thought and research in the PSY- chology of learning and development. (cf. L. J . Cronbach & R. E. Snow, Aptitudes and Instructional Methods: A Handbook of Research on Interactions [New York: Irvington,

Theodor Scharmann interacted intellectually (pp. 3 10-3 I 1) with American psy- chologists concerned with group processes, especially Rensis Likert. During his second journey to America he visited R. F. Bales at the Harvard Center of Social Relations (Bales’s “interaction analysis”). Apparently it was during Scharmann’s earlier journey (p. 31 1) to the US. that he became acquainted with developments in “Human Relations in Industry” and in sociology; his report appeared, in German, in 1956. Seven years later he published, in English, a paper on “Rehabilitation of disabled persons in the Federal Republic of Germany”-a contribution to the westward flow of scientific information.

Errors, typographical and of other kinds, plague the work of us all. In the chapter by Anitra Karsten the frequency of the slips is particularly high. Some are very minor, as when the name of Lili Kohler, the wife of Wolfgang Kohler, is spelled Lilli (p. 97). Matters become more serious when the name of Eugenia Hanfmann is spelled G. Hauf- mann, and, still worse, when Mary Henle’s name comes out as Heine. These errors are found not only in the text (p. 98) but also in the Name Index (p. 327). It is highly probable (though not certain, on the basis of evidence available to this reviewer) that Karsten visited the Kohlers at Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, not in Stanford (p. 97). On the other hand, there is trustworthy evidence at hand that Wolfgang Kohler was on first- name terms with a number of Americans, contrary to Karsten’s explicit statement on this point (p. 97). This does not mean, of course, the casual acquaintances (or students) would address Professor KGhler as “Wolfgang.”

In addition to the two volumes on psychology, prepared collaboratively, Professor Ludwig J. Pongratz edited in the 1970s autobiographies of eminent contributions to education (3 vols.), psychiatry ( 1 vol.), and psychotherapy (1 vol.). In preparation is a volume on sociology. Taken together, these publications constitute the single largest body of recent information of this type available for analysis. We owe thanks to Professor Pongratz for his labors in this sector of historiography.

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