The Roots and Evolution of Child Psychology: An Interview with Lewis P. Lipsitt

Abstract

Ted Bosack is professor of psychology and chair of the department at Providence College. His teaching is in the areas of child development and experimental child psychology, and his areas of particular interest are children's memory and suggestibility and learned helplessness. He participated in founding the Council of Undergraduate Psychology Programs in 1988, was president of the New England Psychological Association (NEPA), and continues to work toward the goals of the National Forum on Psychology Partnerships Project in which he took part. Many years ago, as a graduate student, he worked with Lew Lipsitt gathering data from some of the newborns who are participants in Lipsitt's long-term longitudinal study.

Lewis P. Lipsitt is professor emeritus of psychology, medical science, and human development at Brown University where he continues as research professor, directing a long-term longitudinal study begun at Brown in 1959. He was the founding director of Brown's Child Study Center from 1966 to 1991. He is the founder of the journal, Infant Behavior and Development, and of the Advances in Child Behavior and Development series. He currently coedits Advances in Infancy Research. Professor Lipsitt was chair of the steering committee, for 5 years, of the well-known National Child Care Project sponsored by the National Institutes of Health. He is codirector of the Lee Salk Center of KidsPeace, a national communications helpline for wayward and needy youth. A few of his many organizational honors include the presidencies of Eastern Psychological Association and of two American Psychological Association (APA) divisions, Developmental Psychology and General Psychology; Fellow status in APA and American Psychological Society; three terms on the APA Council of Representatives; chair of the APA Board of Scientific Affairs; and executive director of the Science Directorate. He has won the Nicholas Hobbs Award for “science in the service of children,” the American Association for the Advancement of Science Lifetime achievement Award, and the Distinguished Contribution Award of NEPA.

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