Reflections on One Hundred Years of Experimental Social Psychology

In the Spring of 1997, a remarkable group of social psychologists came together at Yosemite National Park to reflect upon the field which they have been so instrumental in creating. This edited collection brings together the reflections of the nine scholars who spoke at the Yosemite conference that day and marks the 100th anniversary of Tripplet’s seminal study of bicycle racers—an experiment which has often been cited as the beginning of modern experimental social psychology. The contributors: Elliot Aronson, Leonard Berkowitz, Morton Deutsch, Harold Gerard, Harold Kelley, Albert Pepitone, Bertram Raven, Robert Zajonc, and Philip Zimbardo have not only observed the development of this burgeoning discipline, collectively, they have played an essential role in crafting its young legacy.The book begins with personal histories of the researchers. Being that these personal histories are, in fact, closely connected to the most significant people, laboratories and conceptual trends of the field, these reminiscences are much more than simply histories of the course of particular individuals’ lives; they are at the same time histories of the discipline itself. Subsequent chapters turn to the field’s historical roots: its origins, course of theories, methods, and approaches. But all chapters share a common theme: an examination of the ways that the lives and experiences of social psychology’s most prominent living scholars have helped to shape the history of the field itself.