psychology_Sons_(2003)

Scholarship 473

is to develop the habit of critical and objective analysis of psy-

chological problems which arise and of the data or hypotheses

available to help solve them. The third important objective

depends on the attainment of the first two and consists of the im-

provement of the student’s ability to understand his own per-

sonal problems and to achieve personally and socially desirable

solutions of those problems. (pp. 706–707)

This ideal synthesis was accomplished after the first 50 years
of the new discipline’s history. Recalling Veysey’s (1973)
themes, psychology was in the disciplinary mainstream in pro-
viding for the utilitarian needs of society, affirming a respect
for science, and espousing the value of liberal arts education.
For 25 years after World War II, psychologists continually
refined their understanding and pedagogy for these three ob-
jectives. As it had done in the first part of the twentieth cen-
tury, the knowledge base addressed in Wolfle’s (1942) first
objective would continually expand, so much so as to suggest
that the discipline had splintered. However, as we discussed
in the introduction to the chapter, from the broader historical
perspective of American higher education, the period after
World War II would bring many different students to the cam-
pus with many different objectives. The “psychological prob-
lems of modern society” and students’ “personal problems”
of Wolfle’s objectives became more complex, and faculty
confronted them firsthand in their classrooms.
In a paper prepared for the APA Committee on Undergrad-
uate Education, Buxton (1956) asked: “Who is responsible for
determining the objectives, and the means for reaching them,
in liberal education?” (p. 84). He espoused control by each
local institution’s faculty but recommended a balance be-
tween student-centered (intellectual and personal adjustment)
and teacher-centered (content and method) curricular and
course objectives. His answer to the question “To what degree
should curricular offerings, courses, or requirements be
adapted to the student populations served?” (p. 90) focused
solely on differences in major fields and career orientations.
The student-centered versus teacher-centered curriculum
had been debated at length by the Cornell Conference group
(Buxton et al., 1952). It would be echoed by the Michigan
Conference group (McKeachie & Milholland, 1961), but their
response derived from the direct experience of increasingly
heterogeneous student populations. In describing three differ-
ent types of “first course”—elementary, introductory and “ex-
igential, or functionally oriented” (p. 47 ff.)—these authors
asserted:

The term liberal educationhas traditionally implied a quest for

underlying abstract principles rather than a concern with specific

problems.... Teaching not bound by practical concerns might

produce minds not adjusted to life as it is now lived and poorly

suited to meet in a practical way the tasks that every citizen

knows how to define. But it could also produce products who

could break up these problems and approach them from a point

of view off the cultural map commonly believed in.

Kulik’s (1973) national survey of undergraduate departments

and their highly diverse curricula led him to conclude:

It is an empirical question whether curricula like those of liberal

arts colleges best meet the ideals of liberal education. Is it con-

ceivable that for some students, occupationally oriented pro-

grams may provide a better road to personal soundness than the

traditional curricula of liberal arts colleges? (p. 202)

Developing courses that incorporated the expanding

knowledge base and met the needs of changing student

populations led to “academic shopping center” curricula

(Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching,

1977, p. 5). The upside was that our discipline caught the

imagination of so many of the new students, especially

women, who came to higher education during the 1960s and

1970s. Faculty charged with thinking about undergraduate

education from a national (versus local) perspective made

every effort to transform the “shopping center” of courses

into a coherent discipline. Kulik’s (1973) conclusion was an

insightful one and would become an important agenda into

the 1990s: “The diverse goals of students in psychology

courses suggest that pluralism may be a valuable concept in

the design of programs in psychology” (p. 203).

As 1 of 12 learned-society task forces in the Association

of American Colleges project on the arts and sciences major,

McGovern et al. (1991) identified objectives for undergradu-

ate psychology. The authors proposed eight common goals

for the diversity of settings, students, and courses that char-

acterized psychology:

1.Knowledge base.

2.Thinking skills.

3.Language skills.

4.Information gathering and synthesis skills.

5.Research methods and statistical skills.

6.Interpersonal skills.

7.History of psychology.

8.Ethics and values.

Assessing the Outcomes of Undergraduate Psychology

As we noted in the beginning of this section on scholarship,

the desire to identify what students need to learn in their