New Light Watson, Goodwin
Journal of consulting psychology,
01/1938, Volume:
2, Issue:
1
Journal Article
If the column, "New Light" had even a fraction of a Nobel Prize to award each two months to the most useful contribution, the glad notification would go this time to the December number of
...Occupations
Several of the articles from this issue are summarized in this column. Also of note, a recent issue of the
Psychological Monograph
gives valuable new light on stuttering. A new book by Cyril Burt, "The Backward Child," provides a competent summary of the remedial work which should be done on health, sensory capacities, speech, and emotional problems, together with the educational adjustments for the ten-to-fifteen percent of the children who will remain retarded in intellect despite the best available remedial service. These and other recent works are discussed in this column.
The present study examines the reported condition and clinical treatment of children at the Psychological Clinic that Lightner Witmer (1867-1956) founded at the University of Pennsylvania for ...delinquent and "backward" children whose problems were considered to have been caused not by "feeble-mindedness", but rather by environmental and physical factors. It was thought possible for children who received continuous treatment there to improve their mental and physical abilities up to the typical level for their age. At the Clinic, individual treatments were designed based on continuing diagnosis conducted through a prolonged period of educational treatment; coordination with the children's homes and specialized agencies was also emphasized. An experimental special class organized by the Psychological Clinic and held during the summer vacations of public schools not only provided continuous individual treatment to children who had earlier visited the Psychological Clinic and were considered to need more detailed examination, but also practiced an experimental group treatment. The experimental special class was, however, never exclusively designed to help "backward" children who were thought to be capable of achieving the grade level and social status of children with typical development, due to the lack of methods for classifying "backwardness" and "feeble-mindedness". Although Witmer never developed systematic methods of diagnosis and treatment for these children as a group, he achieved some progress in diagnosing and treating individual cases. The Psychological Clinic was the world's first psychological clinic.
Studied the existing conditions and progress of the backward and defective children under such favorable surroundings and pedagogical procedure, which the physiological school afforded. The 53 normal ...children between ages 4 to 14 yrs and backward and defective children between ages 9 to 19 yrs were chosen for study. Sensory tests and motor coordination tests were given. Results showed that there was need of frequent psycho-physical examination of children. It has been emphasized that such results would help in the establishment of norms in terms of which children could be scientifically classed for pedagogical purposes. It was found that there was a uniform increase of ability at motor coordination as the intelligence arose and that lower the intelligence the more prominent was the element of fatigue. The abnormal child was found deficient in intensity and not in extent of psychic function.
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