Science in the Service of Children, 1893-1935
Alice Smuts
Abstract
This book presents a history of the development of child study during the early part of the twentieth century. Most nineteenth-century scientists deemed children unsuitable subjects for study, and parents were hostile to the idea. By 1935, however, the study of the child was a thriving scientific and professional field. This book shows how interrelated movements—both social and scientific—combined to transform the study of the child. Drawing on nationwide archives and extensive interviews with child study pioneers, the book recounts the role of social reformers, philanthropists, and progressiv ... More
This book presents a history of the development of child study during the early part of the twentieth century. Most nineteenth-century scientists deemed children unsuitable subjects for study, and parents were hostile to the idea. By 1935, however, the study of the child was a thriving scientific and professional field. This book shows how interrelated movements—both social and scientific—combined to transform the study of the child. Drawing on nationwide archives and extensive interviews with child study pioneers, the book recounts the role of social reformers, philanthropists, and progressive scientists, who established new institutions with new ways of studying children. Part history of science and part social history, this book describes a fascinating era when the normal child was studied for the first time, from which a child guidance movement emerged, and the newly created federal Children's Bureau conducted pathbreaking sociological studies of children.
Keywords:
child study,
children,
parents,
social movements,
scientific movements,
social reformers,
philanthropists,
progressive scientists,
child guidance movement,
Children's Bureau
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2006 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780300108972 |
| Published to Yale Scholarship Online: October 2013 |
DOI:10.12987/yale/9780300108972.001.0001 |
