Harriet Babcock (1877–1952) was an American psychologist who specialized in

abnormal psychology Abnormal psychology is the branch of psychology that studies unusual patterns of behavior, emotion, and thought, which could possibly be understood as a mental disorder. Although many behaviors could be considered as abnormal, this branch of psyc ...

research in addition to developing

measures Measure may refer to: * Measurement, the assignment of a number to a characteristic of an object or event Law * Ballot measure, proposed legislation in the United States * Church of England Measure, legislation of the Church of England * Measu ...

and theories of

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. More generally, it can be des ...

. After her doctoral work at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, she worked primarily in the Department of Psychology at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then- Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, th ...

, and acted as a consultant to the New York City Guidance Bureau. Babcock developed multiple intelligence tests evaluating mental deterioration and efficiency.

Education and career

Babcock was educated at

and received her doctoral degree in 1930. During her education from 1923 to 1925, she also worked at the Manhattan State Hospital as a psychologist, and later as chief psychologist at

Bellevue Hospital Bellevue Hospital (officially NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue and formerly known as Bellevue Hospital Center) is a hospital in New York City and the oldest public hospital in the United States. One of the largest hospitals in the United States ...

from 1926 to 1928. Babcock began working at New York University's Department of Psychology in 1931 and continued to work there for her entire career. In addition, she was employed as a consultant with the Guidance Bureau under the New York Board of Education.

Research

Some of Babcock's early work focused on

schizophrenia Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis. Major symptoms include hallucinations (typically hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. Other symptoms include social wit ...

in relation to problem solving behavior. Babcock argued that schizophrenia was most accurately characterized as a slowness in intellectual speed. This characterizations was in contrast to other theories of schizophrenia in terms of split attention, or a failure to generate abstract ideas. Another arm of Babcock's work focused on concerns surrounding the Stanford-Binet test. Specifically, scores between children discretely grouped based on intelligence failed to reveal any substantial differences. Furthermore, when the test was administered to patients with mental illness, scores on the vocabulary portion of the test were less affected compared to other subtests. This finding prompted Babcock to further investigate this finding in order to better understand intelligence deficiencies as a result of mental illness. The result of this investigation led to the design of the Babcock Deterioration Test, developed on the hypothesis that compared to newer associations in memory, older ones 1) are more accessible after they are retrieved, and 2) and becomes inaccessible more slowly over time.

Babcock Test of Mental Deterioration

The Babcock Test of Mental Deterioration was developed to provide an estimate of a patient's

premorbid Premorbidity refers to the state of functionality prior to the onset of a disease or illness. It is most often used in relation to psychological function (e.g. premorbid personality or premorbid intelligence), but can also be used in relation to ot ...

intelligence by way of evaluating vocabulary. The basis for the test rested on the hypothesis that because the "oldest learned habits are the last to be forgotten" in cases of dementia, vocabulary should be relatively less affected by mental illness compared to more recently learned associations. However, some researchers commented that the premorbid measure may not be a valid measure of intelligence. For instance, vocabulary might suffer as a result of the patient's disorder; it may also be the case that patients may have difficulty with vocabulary in their premorbid condition. Other researchers noted its usefulness as an indicator in the context of other intelligence measures.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Babcock, Harriet American women psychologists People from Westerly, Rhode Island Teachers College, Columbia University alumni New York University faculty 1877 births 1952 deaths American women academics