Jean Macfarlane

Jean Walker Macfarlane (1894–1989) was an American psychologist. She was born in Selma, California.^[1] In 1922 she earned a doctoral degree in psychology at the University of California, Berkeley; she was the second person ever to do so, the first being Olga Bridgman in 1915.^[2][3] In 1927 Macfarlane founded the University of California, Berkeley's Institute of Human Development, originally called the Institute of Child Welfare.^[3]

In 1928 Macfarlane began a lifelong study of 250 individuals born that year and the next year that still continues, known as the Guidance Study, which provides information on normal personalities; previously psychological theories were mostly based on information about abnormal personalities.^[1] She was a professor at the University of California, Berkeley from 1929 until 1961.^[1]

In 1963 Macfarlane received the American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished contributions to the Science and Profession of Clinical Psychology.^[1] In 1972 she won The G. Stanley Hall Award for Distinguished Contribution to Developmental Psychology, along with Margaret Harlow and Harry Harlow.^[4] It is the American Psychological Association's highest honor in developmental psychology.^[3]

Macfarlane was president of the California State Psychological Association and of the Western Psychological Association, as well as a member of the board of directors of the American Psychological Association and president of its Division of Clinical Psychology.^[1]

During her undergraduate career, Macfarlane became a close friend of Theodora Kroeber, and her passion for psychology influenced Kroeber's decision to major in that discipline.^[5]