Biography of nicholas hobbs

American psychologist

Nicholas Hobbs (March 13, – January 23, ) was an American psychologist and a past president of the American Psychological Association (APA).

Biography

Hobbs graduated from The Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina in He then moved to Ohio State University where he studied under Carl Rogers and Sidney Pressey.^[1] He received his master's in educational psychology in During World War II, he served in the Air Force and directed the Aviation Psychology Program, helping to establish the selection process for that branch of the military.

He would then return to Ohio State University and obtain his PhD in educational psychology in He served as the director of the clinical psychology program at Teachers College, Columbia University, from to At Columbia University, he met Mary Thompson among his graduate students there and they married in Nicholas became chair of the psychology department at Louisiana State University from to , then moved to chair the Division of Human Development at George Peabody College for Teachers (then a separate school, now part of Vanderbilt University) where he served until He resigned from this post in order to seize on the role of director of the John F.

Kennedy Center for Research on Teaching and Human Development, now acknowledged as the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, which he and Susan Gray established. In the academic year of –, he taught as a visiting professor in the psychology department at Harvard University.

From to he worked as a visiting lecturer at the Institute of Humanistic Studies of the University of Pennsylvania.

Doctor of Science, Louisville, Paul Valery-Montpellier, High School, Associate professor, director training clinical psychology Columbia Teachers College,

He served as provost of Vanderbilt University from to , after which he helped to found the Vanderbilt Institute for Public Policy Studies, establishing and serving as the first director of that Institute's Center for the Study of Families and Children until retiring in ^[1]

Throughout his life, Hobbs also served on a number of regional and national boards.

In the early s, he directed the Southern Regional Education Board.^[1] His involvement there led to the establishment of the Commission on Mental Health. He chaired the APA committee that created the organization's first code of ethics, introduced in ^[2] In the late s, he was the vice-chair of the board of trustees of the Combined Commission on Mental Health and Illness.

This enterprise would assist to embolden the deinstitutionalization movement and put emphasis on group care for the mentally ill.

Speech therapy was added in and a training program for teachers of the blind in But it was the groundbreaking work of Peabody-based special training and psychology researchers such as Susan Gray, Lloyd M. Hobbs, a pioneer in developing modern concepts for treating children with emotional problems and children with intellectual disabilities, served as the first director of selection and research for the Peace Corps, headed by Sargent Shriver. Hobbs became a close friend of Shriver and his wife, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, whose sister Rosemary was born with intellectual disabilities.

Based in part on his experience during World War II of helping to establish the selection process for the Combined States Air Force, he was appointed the first director of selection for the Peace Corps by President John F. Kennedy in ^[3]

Also in Hobbs initiated an 8-year pilot project to address the need for successful and affordable mental health programs for children.

Project Re-ED, for the re-education of emotionally disturbed children, was funded by a National Institutes of Health grant involving residential programs at the Cumberland House in Nashville, Tennessee, and the Wright School in Durham, North Carolina.

The groundbreaking program emphasized teaching rather than therapy and addressing the child's full environment (family, school, neighborhood) rather than treating the kid separately, with the goal of teaching children and their caregivers more effective and constructive ways of addressing and overcoming obstacle situations.^[4] His report of the results was published in his book The Troubled and Troubling Child in , by which time the project included or influenced many more schools across the United States.^[5]

Hobbs was the American Psychological Association president.^[6] He would also become the vice president of the Joint Commission on Mental Health of Children that same year.

The describe the commission presented would direct to the conception of kid advocacy and early bills such as an amendment to the Elementary and Secondary Education Operate made to include the handicapped, disadvantaged, and mentally ill youth.

In , Edward Zigler, director of the Office of Toddler Development, and Elliot Richardson, the U.S. Secretary of Health, Learning, and Welfare, organized a major effort to standardize and disseminate appropriate diagnostic procedures for classifying and categorizing children with exceptional needs.

This resulted in the Project on Classification of Exceptional Children, which Hobbs directed. The task force sought to equilibrate the concerns of accurately classifying special needs of children in order to better facilitate providing help, with the concerns of such a label stigmatizing a child and limiting subsequent expectations and opportunities.

The results of this task force were presented in two publications: Issues in the Classification of Children, a two-volume collection of papers by members of the task drive which Hobbs edited, and The Futures of Children authored by Hobbs.^[7] Hobbs also served on the National Advisory Mental Health Council, a policy board that advises the Secretary of Health and Human Services, the director of the National Institutes of Health, and the director of the National Institute of Mental Health.

He received the two APA Awards in ; one for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Institutional Practice, another for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Psychology in Public Interest.^[8]

The Nicholas Hobbs Culture at the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center raises money for research into developmental disabilities.^[9] APA Division 37 awards the Nicholas Hobbs Award for child policy and advocacy.^[10]

Publications

Selected list of books and articles by Nicholas Hobbs:

• Hobbs, N ().

  "The Development of a Code of Ethical Standards for Psychology". American Psychologist. 3 (3): 80– doi/h

• Hobbs, N. (). Group-Centered Psychotherapy. In C. R. Rogers (Ed.), Client-Centered Therapy: Its Current Practice, Implications, and Theory.

  Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co.

• Hobbs, N. (). Client-Centered Psychotherapy. In J. L. McCary (Ed.), Six Approaches to Psychotherapy. New York, NY: Dryden Press.
• Hobbs, N (). "Science and Ethical Behavior".

  American Psychologist. 14 (5): – doi/h

• Hobbs, N. (). Motivation to High Achievement. In B. Schertzer (Ed.), Active with Superior Students: Theories and Practices (pp.&#;–). Chicago, IL: Science Research Associates.
• Hobbs, N ().

  "A Psychologist in the Peace Corps". American Psychologist. 18 (1): 47– doi/h

• Hobbs, N ().

  Nicholas Hobbs () was a pioneer in the field of child psychology, developing new concepts for treating children with emotional problems and children with intellectual disabilities.

  "Mental Health's Third Revolution". American Journal of Orthopsychiatry. 34 (5): – doi/jtbx. PMID&#;

• Hobbs, N. (). How the Re-ED Plan Developed. In N. Long, J., W. C. Morse & R. G. Newman (Eds.), Conflict in the Classroom: The Education of Emotionally Disturbed Children (pp.&#;–).

  Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co.

• Hobbs, N (). "Helping Disturbed Children: Psychological and Ecological Strategies". American Psychologist. 21 (12): – doi/h PMID&#;
• Hobbs, N ().

  "The Project on Classification of Exceptional Children". Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology. 1 (1): – doi/BF PMID&#; S2CID&#;

• Hobbs, N. (). The Futures of Children. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
• Hobbs, N.

  ().

  Policies and Procedures. Networks and Affiliates. Contact Us. Nicholas Hobbs, "A National Resource for Children" Nicholas Hobbs was a pioneer in the field of child psychology, developing new concepts for treating children with heartfelt problems and children with intellectual disabilities.

  The Troubled and Troubling Child. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

• Hobbs, N.; Robinson, S. (). "Adolescent Development and Public Policy". American Psychologist. 37 (2): – doi/X PMID&#;
• Hobbs, N. (). Strengthening Families.

  San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

• Hobbs, N., & Perrin, J. M. (). Issues in the Care of Children with Chronic Illness. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

References