Margaret Floy Washburn
|
|
Margaret Floy Washburn (1871-1939), psychologist, was best known for her experimental work in animal behavior and motor theory development. She was the first woman to be granted a PhD in psychology (1894).
Born 25 July 1871 in Harlem, Manhattan, an only child, she entered school at age 7 and was graduated from high school in June 1886, at age fifteen. That autumn she entered Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, graduating in 1891. She became determined to study under James Cattell in the newly established psychological laboratory at Columbia University, but was refused by the trustees on the basis of her gender.
Cattell encouraged her to enter Sage School of Philosophy at Cornell University, which she did in 1892, studying under E.B. Titchner. In 1893, Vassar College awarded her a M.A. degree (in absentia) for her work at Cornell. Cornell awarded her a PhD in psychology in 1894, the first in this field of study for a woman.
She then took teaching posts at, in turn, Wells College, Cornell’s Sage College, and University of Cincinnati. At Cincinnati, she was the only woman on the faculty. In 1903 she returned to Vassar College as Associate Professor of Philosophy, where she remained until a stroke in 1937 necessitated her retirement (as Emeritus Professor of Psychology).
After a long illness, she died at her home in Poughkeepsie on 29 October 1939. She never married.