An emerging science of the mind in 1898

Abstract

This article is an extended review ofHeadhunters: The search for a science of the mind, by Ben Shephard. Shephard realised while preparing his 2002 bookA war of nervesthat, although the role of W.H.R. Rivers was ever present in his reading around the First World War, he was not the only psychologist to have treated war-shocked soldiers. This second book is both an account of an anthropological-psychological expedition and adventure, and the consequences of that expedition for the growth of psychology over the following years, including the impact of the First World War. The narrative is driven by the interplay between the key players in that project, here focusing on the roles of William McDougall, Charles Myers and William Rivers, and the intellectual questions and disputes of their day which underpin our present-day disciplines of anthropology, neurology, psychiatry and psychology.