Centripetal and centrifugal trends in psychology.

This chapter describes how psychology, higher education, and American society reflect oppositional centripetal and centrifugal factors, or consolidating and unifying versus diverging and separating qualities, respectively. It discusses how centripetal trends prevailed in psychology, universities, and society at certain times in history and how centrifugal factors dominated at other times. Psychology appears presently to be in a condition where centrifugal forces are very strong, yielding a concern in some quarters that the field is splitting apart. The modern era of psychology in the United States may be said to have begun in the late 1800s, coincident with the founding of Wilhelm Wundt's psychological laboratory in 1879 and the organization of the American Psychological Association in 1892. The dramatic changes in American society described earlier had counterparts in higher education in the form of protest movements, student participation in governance, and new attitudes toward undergraduate and graduate curriculums.