Clinical Psychology

AbstractThe study of psychopathology, later a part of clinical psychology, was a part of modern psychology from its inception in Wundt's Leipzig laboratory in 1879. In France, the study of psychopathology was even more central to the concept of psychology of such pioneers as Theodule Ribot, who wrote on disorders of memory and disorders of the personality. The actual founding of clinical psychology, as a field involving helping individuals (as opposed to merely studying them), was due to Lightner Witmer, who in 1896 founded the first psychology clinic at the University of Pennsylvania. Witmer's interest was focused on work with children and on academically related problems more than is the case in present day clinical psychology. Despite Witmer's active involvement in remediation as well as diagnostic study, clinical psychology, as it developed early in the twentieth century was largely concerned with the psychometric evaluation of individuals, particularly with the administration and interpretation of the Binet test. The American Association of Clinical Psychologists, founded by J.E.W. Wallin and Leta Hollingworth in 1917, was the first instance of organized clinical psychology. It was later incorporated as the Clinical Section of the American Psychological Association. After World War II, clinical psychology expanded greatly in America under the stimulus of funds from the Veterans Administration and the National Institute of Mental Health. It also emerged as a field internationally in Great Britain, the Scandinavian countries, and elsewhere as a part of emerging nationalized health systems. Post‐World War II clinical psychology acquired a strong interest in psychological intervention, including psychotherapy and behavior therapy. As the twentieth century drew to a close and psychiatry became preoccupied with psychotropic medications and less interested in psychoanalysis, clinical psychology emerged as a field with the primary expertise in psychotherapy and in the development of evidence‐based approaches to psychological intervention.