Milestones in psychology

1247 - Priory of St. Mary of Bethlehem is founded in London and it becomes the world's oldest psychiatric treatment facility. Later named the Bethlem Royal Hospital; locals dub it "Bedlam."

1487 - Malleus Maleficarum, the Inquisition's guide to diagnosing and punishing deviant behavior, is published. Nineteen editions follow in the next two centuries.

1566 - First psychological hospital in the Americas is established in Mexico.
1692 - Over four months, 20 people are accused, tried and executed as witches in Salem, Mass.

1790 - Erasmus Darwin produces his theory of human behavior employing three fundamental categories: stimulation, muscular contraction, a central sensory power.

1843 - Social activist Dorothea Dix begins her years-long crusade to reform state mental hospitals, notorious for filthy, brutalizing conditions.

1848 - An accidental explosion sends an iron rod through railroad worker Phineas Gage's skull. Gage survives, but he exhibits dramatic behavioral changes - evidence that portions of the brain control personality.

1855 - First textbook on psychology is published.

1879 - Francis Galton introduces the method of word association.

1892 - American Psychological Association is founded with 42 members.

1895 - On July 23, after dreaming of a patient named Irma, Sigmund Freud sits down to figure out what it signified. The effort becomes Freud's prototype for psychoanalysis.

1898 - Norman Triplett of Indiana University notes bicyclists pedal faster against other cyclists than against a clock, the first experiment in sports psychology.

1906 - Ivan Pavlov describes his conditioning experiments with dogs.

1908 - Alfred Binet and Theodor Simon develop the first formal intelligence test, and it is intended for children.

1916 - Stanford University psychologist Lewis Terman revises the Binet-Simon test.

1933 - Freud defines three parts of personality: the id, ego and superego.

1938 - B.F. Skinner introduces his theory of operant conditioning, that animals can be taught simple skills through positive and/or negative reinforcement.

1943 - Chemist Albert Hoffman accidentally discovers psychoactive powers of LSD.

1948 - Alfred Kinsey and colleagues publish a report on sexual behaviors of Americans.

1959 - In famous monkey experiments, Harry Harlow and Robert Zimmerman show that affection more than nourishment influences baby-mother relationship.

1965 - Using goslings, Konrad Lorenz shows that hatchlings immediately attach themselves to the first moving object.

1968 - Linguist Noam Chomsky asserts all humans are born with an innate ability to learn language.

1969 - Elisabeth Kubler-Ross describes the five psychological stages of dying: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance.

1974 - Study introduces concepts of A-type and B-type personalities.

1976 - Cognitive therapy, which emphasizes eliminating self-defeating thinking, is introduced.

1993 - Elizabeth Loftus proves that "repressed memories" can be inaccurate or totally false.

1995 - The first prescription written by a practicing psychologist legally trained to prescribe psychoactive drugs.

Copley News Service