1. Father of Sport Psychology
Scott R. Furtwengler
EPSY 8351 History & Philosophy of Psychological Systems
Tuesday, June 26, 2012

2.  History of sport psychology
 Coleman Griffith
 Relation to my research interests

3.  The Early Years (1895-1920)
 The Griffith Era (1920-1938)
 Preparation for the Future (1938-1965)
 The Establishment of Academic Sport
Psychology (1966-1977)
 Multidisciplinary Science & Practice in Sport
and Exercise Psychology (1978-2000)
 Contemporary Sport and Exercise Psychology
(2000-present)

4.  Born May 22, 1893 in Iowa
 1915 A. B., Greenville College
 1920 Ph.D., University of Illinois
 1925-1932 Research in Athletics lab
 1932-1944 Bureau of Institutional Research
 1944-1953 Provost
 1956 NEA’s Office of Statistical Information
 1962 Oregon State System of Higher Ed
 1966 Dies at age 72

5. William Wundt
University of
Leipzig
Harry Wolfe Edward Titchener
PhD Leipzig (1886) PhD Leipzig (1892)
Madison Bentley
PhD Cornell (1898)
Coleman Griffith
PhD Illinois (1920)

6.  “Psychology and Its Relation to Athletic
Competition” (1925)
 To teach young and inexperienced coaches
 Adapt information already gained in the field of
psychology to sport
 Use the scientific method & experimental lab to
discover new facts and principles that would aid
the practitioner in the field

7.  Four Types of systematic observation & research
 The gathering, compiling, and interpreting of records
from different practice fields
 The observations of shifting moods and
temperaments of athletes when apparatus failed to
do so
 The surveying of athletic aptitude and athletic talent
 The solving of special psychological and physiological
problems

8.  Examples of experimental research
 Effect of physical exercise on rate of learning
 Effects of emotions and anxiety on learning
 Psychological hunches and jinxes
 Effect of will power on performance
 The psychology of pep sessions
 Relation between exercise, learning, and
resistance to disease

9.  Griffith’s Legacy
 Delineation of functions of the field
 Receptivity to multiple ways of studying sport
psychology
 Contributions to psychology and to sport
 Positive, realistic, expectations for the field
 Focus on performance enhancement and personal
growth
 Recognition that knowledge knows no international
borders
 Advancing both research and practice

10.  Background
 Robert Furtwengler’s martial arts school: Zen and
Maxwell Maltz
 Maurice Merleau-Ponty: Mind-Body problem
 Played and coached basketball and volleyball
 Sport Psychology at University of Tennessee-
Knoxville
 Honors program administrator
 Beliefs and their effect on learning & performance

11.  Motivation in Education
 Achievement Motivation Theory: Atkinson,
McClelland
 Attribution Theory: Heider, Weiner,
 Achievement Goal Theory: Duda, Dweck, Maehr,
Nicholls Roberts
 Self-efficacy Theory: Bandura
 Self-perceptions of competence: Harter
 Expectancy-Values Theories: Eccles & Wigfield, Lewin
 Stereotype Threat: Steele

12.  Personal epistemology: beliefs about
knowledge and knowing
 Mindset (Dweck)
 Placebo effect
 Belief formation
 Self-theories/Implicit Theories
 Belief bias
 Naïve theories

13.  Can we modify long-held beliefs to improve
learning and performance? Is attribution
retraining possible?
 Can successful instruction ever effectively
eliminate early, erroneous intuitions or will
they persist of the comprehensiveness or
systematicity of the newly acquired theory?
 Are beliefs habituated thoughts?
 What are the neural correlates of belief?

14.  Mangels, J. A., Butterfield, B., Lamb, J., Good, C.,
& Dweck, C. S. (2006). Why do beliefs about
intelligence influence learning success? A social
cognitive neuroscience model. Social Cognitive &
Affective Neuroscience, 1, 75-86.
doi:10.1093/scan/nsl013
 Shtulman, A. and Valcarcel, J. (2012). Scientific
knowledge suppresses but does not supplant
earlier intuitions. Cognition, 124, 209-215.

15.  What are your questions?

16.  Boring, E.G. (1950). A history of experimental psychology.
New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
 Griffith, C. R. (1925). Psychology and its relations to
athletic competition. American Physical Education
Review, 30, 193-199.
 Kroll, W. & Lewis, G. (1970). America's First Sport
Psychologist. Quest (00336297), 131-4.
 Weinberg, R. S. & Gould, D. (2007). Foundations of sport
and exercise psychology. Champaign, IL: Human
Kinetics.