Kurt Lewin Biography
Early Life and Education
Kurt Lewin was born on September 9, 1890, in Mogilno, Poland (then part of the German Empire), to a Jewish household. He was one of 4 children born to Leopold Lewin, an effective merchant, and Recha (Fischlewitz) Lewin. When Lewin was 15, his family transferred to Berlin, Germany, where he was exposed to various intellectual and cultural impacts.
Lewin showed an early interest in the sciences, particularly in biology and viewpoint, and this led him to study medication at first. In 1910, he entered the University of Freiburg and after that moved to the University of Munich, where he continued his research studies in the field of medication. Nevertheless, his interests shifted to psychology, and he chose to pursue a doctorate because field.
In 1914, Lewin finished his Ph.D. under the guidance of Carl Stumpf at the University of Berlin, focusing on speculative psychology. His dissertation focused on the relationship between the understanding of movement and time.
World War I and Early Career
During World War I, Lewin served in the German army as an artilleryman on the Eastern Front. He was hurt in fight and invested a long time as a prisoner of war in Russia. After the war, he went back to Berlin and worked as a research associate at the Psychological Institute of the University of Berlin.
During this duration, Lewin performed groundbreaking research study in addition to Wolfgang Köhler and Max Wertheimer, the creators of Gestalt psychology. Nevertheless, Lewin established his own distinctive method to psychology, heavily affected by his background in causality, characteristics, and topology. His innovative technique, known as field theory, emphasized the significance of social, psychological, and ecological consider forming human behavior.
Migration to the United States
Due to the installing anti-Semitism in Germany during the 1930s, Lewin and his household chose to emigrate to the United States in 1933. There, he ended up being a checking out professor at Stanford University, teaching psychology and carrying out further research study on field theory.
In 1935, Lewin signed up with the professors at Cornell University, where he continued to establish his field theory method to psychology and gained prominence for his deal with group characteristics and social psychology. During this period, Lewin also carried out crucial research study on the impact of propaganda and bias on children.
The Research Center for Group Dynamics
In 1944, Lewin established the Research Center for Group Dynamics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The center intended to study the behavior of individuals within social groups and understand the elements affecting group processes and decision-making.
Lewin likewise coined the term "action research", which ended up being a considerable method in the field of social psychology, highlighting the integration of research and social action. Through his work at the Research Center for Group Dynamics, Lewin exerted a significant influence on the development of organizational psychology and the application of psychology in social problems.
Personal Life and Legacy
Lewin married Maria Landsberg in 1917, and they had 2 children, Agnes and Fritz. After Maria died in 1921, Lewin married Gertrud Weiss in 1929, with whom he had two more children, Miriam and Daniel.
Unfortunately, Kurt Lewin passed away unexpectedly from a cardiac arrest on February 12, 1947. His work, nevertheless, continued to shape the field of psychology. The Research Center for Group Dynamics later on moved to the University of Michigan, ending up being the Institute for Social Research. Throughout his career, Lewin contributed in advancing social psychology, group characteristics, and speculative psychology. His field theory and system theories still form psychology and organizational research studies to this day.
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