Henry Herbert Goddard (1866-1957) was a teacher and football coach who returned to school for a PhD in Psychology at age 30. Following this, he first taught at the State Normal School in Westchester, PA. Goddard then became the director of research at the Training School for Feeble-Minded Boys and Girls in Vineland, NJ. In the spring of 1908, Goddard traveled to Europe. While there, another educator gave him a copy of a recent French article by Alfred Binet and Theodore Simon, who had developed and tested an instrument to measure students' cognitive abilities.
Goddard brought the test back to the U.S., translated and implemented it. By the end of 1908, he had published an article on his results. He continued presenting information on the new test at a variety of conferences over the next two years. Gradually, intelligence testing began to be widely employed in student assessments, and eventually spread to those of normal or high intelligence. However, the first use of the tests in this country were in institutions for the mentally retarded.
Goddard went on to study and publish about the role of genetics in mental retardation, including authoring "The Kallikak Family" (1912). Goddard was a eugenicist who pushed for immigration bans on those with mental deficiencies. This became a major reason for immigration quotas featured in the Johnson-Lodge Immigration Act of 1924. It was not until 1965 that Congress changed the legislation that had restricted the immigration of the feeble-minded.
Sources: James Trent, "Inventing the Feeble Mind: A History of Mental Retardation in the United States". 1994, Univ of California Press.
Profile of Henry Herbert Goddard. Located at http://www.indiana.edu/
Noll, Steven. Feeble-Minded in Our Midst: Institutions for the Mentally Retarded in the South, 1900-1940. 1995, the University of North Carolina Press.
No comments:
Post a Comment