Edwin Ray Guthrie - First Years

First Years

Guthrie received a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Nebraska. He got his Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania (1912). He taught high school math until he was offered a position as a philosophy professor at the University of Washington (1914). One of Guthrie’s influences was his professor in college, Harry Kirke Wolfe, who was one of Wilhelm Wundt’s Ph.D. students. In 1919 Guthrie changed from philosophy to the department of psychology. He later became the dean of the graduate school in 1943 and president of the American Psychological Association (1945) (Clark, 2005).

Guthrie’s father was a store manager and his mother was a school teacher. Guthrie was the oldest of five children. At an early age Guthrie showed great interest in learning. When he was in eighth grade he read Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species and The Expression of the Emotions (Clark, 2005). He was married to Helen Macdonald. He traveled with his wife and met Pierre Janet in France. Janet’s writing had a great impact on Guthrie’s thinking. Guthrie and his wife translated Janet’s Principles of Psychology together. Guthrie added to Janet’s writings an objective theory of learning (Encyclopedia of Psychology, 2001).