Psychology | A Hidden History Of Racism

A Transmutation Of Philosophy

Psychology. It has become an inescapable buzzword these days that seems to cover everything from emotional self-help to finance. But how exactly did psychology garner the behemoth status it has in popular culture today?

Well, it began with René Descartes, a French philosopher in the 17th century who, among other things, introduced the concept of dualism. The idea is that the body and mind are separate entities. His study of the idea coined the saying ‘cogito, ergo sum,’ which translated means ‘I think, therefore I am.’

It is worth making clear that Descartes only laid the foundations of the debate. Indeed, Descartes and his contemporaries viewed the concept of dualism as being part of the ideas within philosophical discourse. The actual field of psychological study began in 1854 through the work of Gustav Fechner.

Psychology: A History Of Racism

Between the late 19th century and early 20th century, many prominent psychologists espoused the view that non-white races, particularly those of African descent, possessed an innate intelligence deficit. This ludicrous notion was further exacerbated by the fact that many of these individuals were also eugenicists. 

Paul Popenoe (1888-1979) was one of the founding practitioners of marriage counseling in the USA. He also held the view that intelligence was determined by the amount of ‘white blood’ an individual had. He even went so far as to advocate for, and succeed in, the involuntary sterilization of those he termed 'human waste'.

Popenoe was a member of the ironically named Human Betterment Foundation, which, alongside Ezra Seymour Gosney, spearheaded the introduction of California’s first compulsory sterilization law in 1909. The law would finally be repealed in 1979, having irreparably damaged over 20,000 people. The consequences of the law and the actions taken by its proponents were on par with the crimes committed by the Nazis.

A prominent example of this is Leo Stanley, who, as the chief surgeon at San Quentin prison, conducted a number of horrific procedures and medical experiments, ranging from the injection of ground-up testicles into men’s abdomens to testicular transplantations; Stanley’s practices also led to the abhorrent ideology of ‘white manhood.’

Lewis Madison Terman (1877-1956), another member of the Human Betterment Foundation, is often cited as a pioneer in educational psychology. You have likely heard of the work, if not the man. Terman is best known for his amendment of the Stanford-Binet IQ test. The test is currently the most ubiquitously used today to quantify an individual’s intelligence. Now, the test itself may not seem malign, but how the results were used, particularly considering the validity of the data, was, and perhaps still is, questionable.

Terman, at the time and in the context of his work, said, “Their dullness seems to be racial” and that he believed, “Children of this group should be segregated in special classes and be given instruction which is concrete and practical…they cannot master abstractions.”

Now, any of you moderately familiar with the history of the world at that time will know about the insidious Jim Crow laws that resulted in segregation in America, as well as parallel events like the apartheid in South Africa. It is more than arguable that these figures within psychology provided, at least in part, the pseudo-scientific rationale required for these heinous acts to take place.

Has Psychology Put Its Past Behind It?

In a word, no. You would be misinformed if you believed that this grade of psychology is reserved for the distant past. A relatively recent New York Times Bestseller and controversial book titled The Bell Curve (1994) is just as problematic, more so because of who co-wrote it. Richard Herrnstein was the Edgar Pierce professor of psychology at Harvard until his death, as well as being the former chairman of that department for over five years. So, by all definitions, a fairly well-respected, mainstream, and contemporary academic in the field of psychology.

However, the arguments set forth in the book linked back to the ideas of Terman. Specifically, the authors, amongst other things, believed that IQ disparities between the ‘cognitively elite’ and the below average had their roots in genetics. According to Herrnstein, this was by no small measure. He stated that the heritable nature of cognitive ability accounted for ‘no less than 40 percent and no more than 80 percent’. There is, of course, not one shred of evidence of this being true. Curiously, the authors of this book had no academic background in genetics or biology, yet felt the compulsion nonetheless to present their ‘revolutionary’ ideas on the field.

Indeed, the authors of the book put forth not just what they perceived to be the problem but the solution, which was the blanket elimination of all welfare policies that they stated encouraged poor women to have babies. A policy that is tragically creeping its way back into modern politics.

Now, you are, I am sure, assuming that despite this Harvard professor's New York Times bestselling book being part of a large causal chain made up of psychologists using their chosen soft science to do harm, it would stop there. And yet, you would be wrong.

Just a year after the book was published in 1995, the other co-author of the book, political scientist Charles Murray, was chosen to provide expert testimony to a Senate committee on welfare reform.

Now, of course, you may say it was 1995, we’ve changed. Well, no. United States congressman Paul Ryan cited Charles Murray's work during a speech in 2014, claiming Murray to be an expert on poverty. For context, Congressman Paul Ryan at the time was helping to push through legislation to provide tax cuts for the wealthy. 

The last refuge of denial you may have as a citizen of the UK could be thinking this is an exclusively American problem. And again, no. In 2018, it was discovered that an event named ‘The London Conference of Intelligence’ was secretly being held at the University College London by a then-honorary senior lecturer. The speakers and their views are egregious beyond words.

One of the themes reportedly discussed at the conference was the idea that race and genes played a determining role in intelligence and IQ – i.e. the ideas of Terman. To its credit, UCL had no knowledge of the event and took swift action against all those involved. But the fact remains, it happened.

Psychology: A Hall Pass That Needs To Be Revoked?

Now, there are many other examples of racism in psychology to be found throughout history and indeed within our modern era. I have simply done the best I can to provide an organised chronological narrative of how this malignant idea was formed and how it continues to develop. More importantly, I have tried to highlight to you how this has been and is being used to shape the world around us, even up to the legislative level.

There needs to be a recalibration in how we view psychology both in the public sphere and in academia. We should not, at any point, hold the view that psychology has the same scientific or factual value as a hard science. Nor should it be used to dictate public policy. Otherwise, you risk giving terrible people a pseudoscientific rationale with which to do appalling things.

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