History of psych

  • Edwin Smith Surgical Papyrus
    1600 BCE

    Edwin Smith Surgical Papyrus

    It was written by Egyptian doctor Imhotep. It was the first written reference to the brain. It was the first document that showed the importance of the brain.
  • Plato
    387 BCE

    Plato

    Plato first suggested that the brain is the mechanism of mental processes. It is important because he realized that the brain was an important part of our body and has a purpose
  • Hippocrates
    370 BCE

    Hippocrates

    He was the first "doctor". He is important because he was one of the first to figure out there was a mind-body connection.
  • Avicenna
    1025

    Avicenna

    He published The Canon of Medicine. Which was the used as the standard medical textbook throughout the Islamic world and Europe until the 18th Century. He also used evidence based medicine, which is important because he used medicine based on actually evidence.
  • Jan Swammerdam

    Jan Swammerdam

    Swammerdam received his medical PhD in 1667. He was important in the history of psychology because he was one of the first to demonstrate a relationship between nerves and movement through his experiments on frogs.
  • Robert Whytt

    Robert Whytt

    He was the first to describe diseases like anorexia, bulimia, multiple sclerosis. He also discovered specific spinal damage can cause specific functional issues.
  • Franz Mesmer

    Franz Mesmer

    Mesmer claimed to use magnets to heal. With his work with groups to "heal" their problems later came the ideas of social contagion and social facilitation, even when he wasn't trying to discover those. He thought he was healing with magnets. He was the 1st person to demonstrate the placebo effect and what later became hypnosis. He was popular in France during the french revolution.
  • Philippe Pinel

    Philippe Pinel

    He worked at the Salpetriere hosptial in Paris. He was the first to actually treat mentally ill people. He used logically consequences which mean that you can reason with mentally ill people. He emphaisised the importance of environment, grouped similar patients, and "moral theapy". He improved the way mentally ill people were treated. In 1794 Pinel made public his essay 'Memoir on Madness', recently called a fundamental text of modern psychiatry.
  • Jacques Quetelet

    Jacques Quetelet

    Quetelet applied statistics to human behavior to identify patterns and regularity. Quletelet changed in thinking from studying individuals to studying groups and averages. Quetelet was an influential figure in criminology.
  • James Braid

    James Braid

    He coined the term Hypnotism. He documented the physiology of the memeserism trance. He discovered that it lowered heart rate, lowered blood pressure, and lowered sensory response. In 1841 he first use hypnotism in surgery.
  • Charles Darwin

    Charles Darwin

    Darwin documented evidence of evolution and the explanation for how adaptation takes place. Darwin influenced comparative psychology and developmental psychology.
  • Gustav Fritsch

    Gustav Fritsch

    Fritsch did the first electrical studies of cortex. He discovered the primary motor cortex.
  • Wilhelm Wundt

    Wilhelm Wundt

    In 1879 he opened the first psychology research lab at the University of Leipzig. He is known as the formal founder of psychology.
  • Emil Kraeplin

    Emil Kraeplin

    He classified mental illness like the DMS now. He described mental diseases like manic depressive psychosis (now Bipolar Disorder), dementia praecox (now schizophrenia) and Alzheimer's disease.
  • Sigmund Freud

    Sigmund Freud

    He developed Psychoanalysis and started treating people in 1886. He used dreams to look into peoples unconscious mind. He also thought that childhood experiences had an impact on development.
  • Edward Titchener

    Edward Titchener

    He brought the experimental psychology to the United States. He opened the first psychology lab in the United States.
  • Ivan Pavlov

    Ivan Pavlov

    He discovered classical conditioning with his research with dogs. Even though he never wanted to be considered a pyschologist he ended up being important in the history of psychology.
  • John E. Waston

    John E. Waston

    Founded Behaviorism based off of Pavlov's research.
  • Abraham Maslow

    Abraham Maslow

    He formally founded Humanistic psychology
  • david shakow and the boulder conference

    david shakow and the boulder conference

    Developed the rules and what is needed to practice clinical psychology.
  • Gordon Allport

    Gordon Allport

    Formally founded social psychology.
  • DSM first published

    DSM first published

    Outlined a uniform way to diagnose mental illnesses. A new one is published about every 10 years
  • B.F Skinner

    B.F Skinner

    He discovered operant conditioning. He had more of a cognitive shift in the study of learning. He was important in cognitive psychology.
  • APA Ethical Standards

    APA Ethical Standards

    The American Psychological Association publishes the first edition of Ethical Standards of Psychologists. The document undergoes continuous review and is now known as APA's Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct.
  • Albert Bandura

    Albert Bandura

    Bobo doll experiment in which child behavior is described as a construct of observation, imitation, and modeling.
  • Stanley Milgram

    Stanley Milgram

    He published "Obedience to Authority" which describes the findings of his famous obedience experiments. Which is important in social psychology.
  • Richard Dawkins

    Richard Dawkins

    Richard Dawkins publishes The Selfish Gene, which begins to popularize the idea of evolutionary psychology
  • DSM V

    DSM V

    The lastest addition of the DSM was published. In it, the APA removes "gender identity disorder" from the list of mental illnesses and replaces it "gender dysphoria" to describe a person's discomfort with his or her gender.