National Psychological Associations 543Hardcastle, 2000). The name was a jab at the SEP, many of
whom were no longer actively engaged in experimental re-
search. The name was later changed to the Psychological
Round Table (PRT) in order to avert professional retaliation
from the senior members of the SEP. Like “The Experimen-
talists” before them, the members of PRT found the APA
meetings too bureaucratic and too inclusive of nonexperi-
mental psychology. They were also excluded from member-
ship in the SEP. The PRT organizers created a small group
based at universities in the eastern United States who met an-
nually to talk about research and socialize. Women were ini-
tially excluded. Once a member reached the age of 40, he
could no longer participate in the meetings. As a result, mem-
bership was never large and the group was never formally in-
corporated. Nevertheless, the PRT served as an important
communication network in American experimental psychol-
ogy for many years.
Dissatisfaction with the annual meetings of the APA
provided the impetus for the formation of the Psychonomic
Society in December 1959. In that sense, the Psychonomic
Society is heir to the tradition inaugurated by Titchener and
continued by the Psychological Round Table. Apparently, the
experimentalists’ dissatisfactions had been growing for years
so that by the late 1950s there was a perception that the APA
was catering to the interests of psychologists in professional
practice (Dewsbury & Bolles, 1995). The proximal stimulus
for the formation of the group was the decision by the APA
Board of Convention Affairs in 1959, later reversed, that no
one could use slides as part of his or her presentation. This,
for many experimentalists, was the last piece of evidence
needed that the APA convention was not about scientific
communication.
A small group of psychologists went to work over the
summer of 1959 to drum up support for a new, more science-
oriented society. Led by William Verplanck (b. 1916) and
Clifford Morgan (1915–1976), an organizing committee
began meeting to form the new society. When letters of invi-
tation sent out to members of the APA science divisions indi-
cated that there was more than adequate interest for such
a society, the organizing committee met in late 1959 and de-
veloped by-laws to govern the as-yet unnamed society
(Dewsbury & Bolles, 1995). The name Psychonomic Society
was agreed on in early 1960, and the society was incorpo-
rated in April of that year.
The purposes of the society were two: to conduct an an-
nual meeting to exchange research results and to develop a
journal to publish the results. In terms of structure, the Psy-
chonomic Society was the anti-APA. The group refused to
develop the bureaucratic machinery they disliked in the
larger association. Instead, they chose to govern their affairs
through a governing board, which was empowered to do busi-
ness on behalf of the society. From its inception to the time of
this writing, the society has succeeded remarkably well in
keeping its governance simple and maintaining its focus as a
hard-nosed scientific psychological organization.
The Psychonomic Society experienced rapid growth. Its
membership standards were the PhD and a record of success-
ful publication beyond the degree. Ironically, these were the
standards for APA membership prior to 1926 (Fernberger,
1932). Although membership requirements have varied
slightly over the years, including the development of an asso-
ciate membership, the basic requirements have changed little.
The membership total at the end of the first year was 772.
That number rose steadily over the years and had stabilized at
approximately 2,000 members by the 1990s. Associate mem-
bership also grew from its inception in 1975 to between 400
and 500 during the 1990s.
At the end of the twentieth century, the Psychonomic
Society published six major experimental psychology jour-
nals. Journal publication had been one of the two primary
purposes of the society at its founding, but it took several
years before the society was able to begin its publishing pro-
gram. It was able to do so through the generosity of one of its
founders, Clifford T. Morgan. Morgan began a journal, Psy-
chonomic Science,in 1964. This was followed in relatively
quick succession by Psychonomic Monograph Supplements
(1965) and Perception & Psychophysics(1966). In 1967,
Morgan gave the journals to the Psychonomic Society. The
society initially struggled with its management of the jour-
nals but by the mid-1970s had overcome most of its publica-
tion problems. The society split Psychonomic Scienceinto
four volumes and added others, so that by 2000 it published
Animal Learning & Behavior, Behavior Research Methods, In-
struments, & Computers, Memory & Cognition, Perception &
Psychophysics, Psychobiology,andPsychonomic Bulletin &
Review(Dewsbury, 1996).
Other experimental societies have formed over the years
in reaction to the size or policies of the APA. To note one
other example, the Society of Experimental Social Psychol-
ogy formed in 1965 to promote scientific communication
among those social psychologists that viewed themselves as
experimentalists. A small group of social psychologists de-
cried the large meetings of the APA and the rapid growth of
its Division 8 (Personality and Social Psychology). They, like
the founders of the Psychonomic Society, wanted a society
whose members were experimentalists. The initial intent of
the group was to keep the society small in number. That pol-
icy has been maintained, as indicated by its membership of
only 600 by the year 2000 (Blascovich, 2000; Hollander,
1968).