Karl Edward Zener (April 22, 1903 – September 27, 1964) was a perceptual

psychologist A psychologist is a professional who practices psychology and studies mental states, perceptual, cognitive, emotional, and social processes and behavior. Their work often involves the experimentation, observation, and explanation, interpretatio ...

best known for his affiliation with Dr.

Joseph Banks Rhine Joseph Banks Rhine (September 29, 1895 – February 20, 1980), usually known as J. B. Rhine, was an American Botany, botanist who founded parapsychology as a branch of psychology, founding the parapsychology lab at Duke University, the ...

and their work in the field of

extra-sensory perception Extrasensory perception (ESP), also known as a sixth sense, or cryptaesthesia, is a claimed paranormal ability pertaining to reception of information not gained through the recognized physical senses, but sensed with the mind. The term was ado ...

(ESP).

Biography

Zener was born in

Indianapolis Indianapolis ( ), colloquially known as Indy, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Indiana, most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana, Marion ...

Indiana Indiana ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Michigan to the northwest, Michigan to the north and northeast, Ohio to the east, the Ohio River and Kentucky to the s ...

the son of German-descent Clarence and Ida Zener, and brother of Katherine (later Mrs. Katherine Humiston) and Clarence (later Dr. Clarence Zener). He received a Ph.B. from the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

in 1923, followed by M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in psychology from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

in 1924 and 1926. His doctoral thesis was on the psychology of music. He then went on to spend a year as a

United States National Research Council The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), also known as the National Academies, is a congressionally chartered organization that serves as the collective scientific national academy of the United States. The name i ...

Fellow at the

University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...

before returning to the U.S. After a year of teaching psychology at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

, Zener took up what was to be a lifelong post with

Duke University Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...

, in

Durham, North Carolina Durham ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the county seat of Durham County, North Carolina, Durham County. Small portions of the city limits extend into Orange County, North Carolina, Orange County and Wake County, North Carol ...

. The main thrust of Zener's work over the next ten years concerned conditioned responses, and during the 1930s he maintained one of the few Pavlovian conditioning laboratories in the U.S. It was also during this time that, along with colleague J. B. Rhine, he devised the card symbols that were used by Rhine in early ESP tests. Rhine called cards bearing these symbols " Zener cards" in honor of his colleague. Zener's later work focused on theories of

perception Perception () is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous syste ...

and the analysis of perceptual experience. With research partner Dr. Mercedes Gaffron, he identified previously unknown aspects of visual processing and comprehension. The resultant Zener-Gaffron theory combined a psychological analysis of perception with then-contemporary findings from the field of biological

neuroscience Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions, and its disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, ...

.Henryk Misiak, Virginia Staudt Sexton ''Phenomenological, existential, and humanistic psychologies: a historical survey'' Grune & Stratton, 1973, p. 58 Zener was the recipient of the only grant ever given for psychological research by the

Ford Foundation The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a $25,000 (about $550,000 in 2023) gift from Edsel Ford. ...

Program in Humanities and the Arts. Zener was appointed Chairman of the Department of Psychology at Duke University in 1961, after having served there as the director of graduate studies in psychology for nearly twenty years. The Zener Auditorium (Room 130, Sociology-Psychology Building) of Duke University is named after him.

Personal life

Zener married Ann Adams and the couple had three sons: Dr. Karl A. Zener, Dr. Julian C. Zener, and Wilfred Zener. Wilfred, however, died in a tragic drowning accident in 1956.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zener, Karl 1903 births 1964 deaths University of Chicago alumni Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni American parapsychologists Princeton University faculty 20th-century American psychologists Duke University faculty People from Indianapolis