Théodule Ribot (1839–1916), founder of French psychology: A biographical introduction.

Abstract

Pratique des Hautes EtudesTheodule Ribot taught philosophy before obtaining 2 doctoral degrees from the Sorbonne in 1873: 1 about David Hartley and 1 about hereditary factors in psychology. Ribot wrote books on the topics of 19th-century British psychology (1870), 19th-century German psychology (1879), diseases of memory (1881), diseases of will (1883b), and diseases of personality (1885), among others. He founded the Revue Philosophique (Ribot, 1876b), had a chair created for him at the College de France (in 1888), helped organize the first French laboratory of experimental psychology (in 1889), and presided over the First International Congress of Psychology in Paris in 1889 (Ribot, 1889b).It is astonishing that nobody has yet written a detailed biography of Theodule Ribot. In this connection, the remark made by Boring (1950) is still relevant: "The accounts of him are short and inadequate as they are for many who died during the first World War" (p. 438). Even the most extensive works written in French are notably incomplete and are more concerned with listing his works than with providing a trustworthy account of his life (Dugas, 1924; Lamarque, 1928). Given that historians of psychology are in general agreement that Ribot was the founder of French "scientific" psychology, it seemed to us not only interesting, but obligatory, to provide, for the benefit of historians and psychologists alike, an extensive biography of this French pioneer. He had an influence both on the substantive content of psychology, by way of laws that bear his name, and on the institutional development of the discipline, by founding a journal and a chair in psychology; he also helped to found a laboratory. Some aspects of his research on the organic basis of memory have recently been explored in detail by historians of science (Gasser, 1988;Nicolas, 1997). This article is intended to serve as an introduction to a full-length biography, currently being written.However, this is a preliminary sketch because there are various lacunae in our knowledge concerning Ribot's life. Although it is true that we can be fairly precise about the most important events in his career, documents concerning the beginning and end of his life are irritatingly few in number (the fact that Ribot left no

Hearing the inaudible experimental subject: Echoes of Inaudi, Binet’s calculating prodigy.

“…It was then Theodule Ribot (1839Ribot ( -1916 who estab lished the method for engaging such experi ences in a scientific way (Danziger, 2008, pp. 109-110; see also Gasser, 1988;Nicolas & Murray, 1999).…”

Premature Thoughts on Writing Disorders

“…In his article Pitres acknowledged both the contributions of Marcé (1856) and Ogle (1867) as the first to emphasize the dissociations between speech and writing. Pitres (1884) was also strongly influenced by a modular approach to memory proposed by the founder of experimental psychology in France, Ribot (1839Ribot ( -1916) (Nicolas and Murray, 1999). The three components of his reading and writing models reflect this influence:…”

Premature Thoughts on Writing Disorders

“…In his article Pitres acknowledged both the contributions of Marcé (1856) and Ogle (1867) as the first to emphasize the dissociations between speech and writing. Pitres (1884) was also strongly influenced by a modular approach to memory proposed by the Founder of experimental psychology in France, Ribot (1839Ribot ( -1916 (Nicolas & Murray, 1999). The three components of his reading and writing models reflect this influence: a) a visual component that stores the memory for letters and how they combine to form syllables and word; b) an auditory component that stores the memory for the sound of these letters; c) a motor component that stores the motor-graphic memory of the letters.…”