Martha Tamara Shuch Mednick (March 31, 1929 – August 16, 2020) was a feminist psychologist known for her work on women, gender, race and social class. She was a professor of psychology at

Howard University Howard University is a private, historically black, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C., United States. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity" and accredited by the Mid ...

from 1968 until her retirement in 1995. Mednick played a key role in the founding of the Society for the Psychology of Women (

American Psychological Association The American Psychological Association (APA) is the main professional organization of psychologists in the United States, and the largest psychological association in the world. It has over 170,000 members, including scientists, educators, clin ...

(APA), Division 35) by organizing the APA Ad Hoc Task Force on the Status of Women, which established the Society in 1973. Mednick served as President of the Society for the Psychology of Women from 1976 to 1977. Mednick served as President of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI) from 1980 to 1982. In 2009 Mednick received the NCMS Distinguished Elders Award from the Society of Counseling Psychology (APA, Division 17). The NCMS award honors individuals who advocate for justice and human rights.

Biography

Mednick was born into a working class Jewish family in New York City. Her parents were immigrants from Russia and Poland. Mednick graduated from Evander Childs High School in the

Bronx The Bronx ( ) is the northernmost of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It shares a land border with Westchester County, New York, West ...

and was the first in her family to attend college. She believed education had the power to change one's life and began studying psychology at

City College of New York The City College of the City University of New York (also known as the City College of New York, or simply City College or CCNY) is a Public university, public research university within the City University of New York (CUNY) system in New York ...

. At the time, City College was mostly a male engineering school that allowed some women to attend. Mednick graduated with a Bachelor of Science in education, and continued her education at

Northwestern University Northwestern University (NU) is a Private university, private research university in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Established in 1851 to serve the historic Northwest Territory, it is the oldest University charter, chartered university in ...

where she earned a PhD in Clinical Psychology in 1955. Around this time, she married

Sarnoff A. Mednick Sarnoff Andrei Mednick, (January 27, 1928 – April 10, 2015) was a psychologist who pioneered the prospective high-risk, longitudinal study to investigate the etiology (causes) of psychopathology, or mental disorders. His emphasis was on schi ...

and started a family. Mednick collaborated with her husband on studies of

associative priming In mathematics, the associative property is a property of some binary operations that rearranging the parentheses in an expression will not change the result. In propositional logic, associativity is a valid rule of replacement for expressio ...

, and developed the

Remote Associates Test The Remote Associates Test (RAT) is a creativity test used to determine a human's creative potential. The test typically lasts forty minutes and consists of thirty to forty questions each of which consists of three common stimulus words that appea ...

as a test of creative potential. The family moved several times, with Mednick taking on varied positions, which included work with autistic children at the

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 ...

Research Laboratory, and research and teaching positions at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

and at the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

. Mednick divorced her husband in 1964. She moved to

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

in 1968 where she joined the psychology department at Howard University. At Howard, Mednick met Sandra Tangri and together published an issue called "New Perspectives on Women" which later appeared as the book "Woman and achievement: Social and motivational analysis." Mednick was also important in initiating contact between American and Israeli feminist psychologists. Her “Social Change and Sex Role Inertia: The Case of the Kibbutz” exposed the myth of sexual equality on

kibbutz A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...

im. Mednick also organized the first international, interdisciplinary conference on women at the

University of Haifa The University of Haifa (, ) is a public research university located on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel. Founded in 1963 as a branch of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the University of Haifa received full academic accreditation as an inde ...

in December 1981 with Marilyn Safir, which culminated in the 1985 volume "Women’s worlds: From the new scholarship". Mednick died on August 16, 2020, after a lengthy battle with cancer.

Books

* Mednick, M. T., Tangri, S. S., & Hoffman, L. W. (1975). ''Women and achievement: Social and motivational analysis.'' Hemisphere Publishing Corporation. * Safir, M. P., Mednick, M. T. , Israeli, D., & Bernard, J. (1985).''Women’s worlds: From the new scholarship.'' Praeger.

References

External links

Jewish Women's Association biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mednick, Martha American women psychologists Feminist psychologists 1929 births 2020 deaths Northwestern University alumni City College of New York alumni Howard University faculty American women academics 21st-century American women 20th-century American psychologists