Dr Katherine Hubbard

This companion offers crucial support for anyone embarking on a feminist journey through Psychology’s past and present. It offers a uniquely critical, inclusive and affirmative approach to understanding gender in Conceptual and Historical Issues in Psychology (CHIP). By accessibly presenting knotty and entangled topics, this book promises to ignite your curiosity and get you asking questions.

This chapter provides an excavation of the relations between power, history, and psychology that exposes the complex enmeshed relationships between them. Each section of the chapter, which considers power, history, and psychology in turn, reveals the larger entangled structure at hand while maintaining the close connectedness of all three. In the section on power, they outline understandings of “power” within feminism and in (feminist) psychology, arguing for skepticism about the use of individualist “power-to” perspectives which appear to uncritically remove power from its situated context. The second section, on history, identifies how the very writing of history is contextually bound by gendered power and positioning. The section on psychology unearths the inner workings of power in the discipline demonstrating how feminist histories have been especially useful in revealing power dynamics within psychology but arguing for the further recognition of psychology’s inherent subjectivity and power. In doing so, the chapter concludes that it remains vital for feminist psychology to continue to reflect on its positioning within the structures of power that it seeks to dismantle. For feminist psychology to effectively undertake its liberatory work, feminist psychologists must keep complicated power/history/psychology dynamics within their sights.

From the 1950s, aversion therapy gained an international foothold as a behaviourist means to alter what was then considered ‘deviant’ behaviour. Using primary research by psychologists, psychiatrists and other clinical figures published in professional journals, recently published personal testimonies by those who underwent such ‘treatment’, and drawing on the latest historical research, this article maps aversion therapy practices used to ‘treat’ LGBTQ+ people in the UK, mainly in the 1960s and 1970s. We outline our approach to this history and contextualise it by drawing attention to ongoing comparative issues of banning LGBT conversion therapy in the present. Next, we outline the emergence of aversion therapy internationally and identify historical ‘hotspot’ hospitals and universities in the UK, with the nation itself an international ‘hotspot’ for aversion. We then employ the case study of the 2022 report from the University of Birmingham, to demonstrate how such investigations of difficult pasts might be most effectively realised and highlight the potential for a ‘truth and reconciliation’ approach to this history. Finally, we call upon psy-organisations, university and research institutions, and other stakeholders to take this history seriously in effort to address past and ongoing harms enacted upon LGBTQ+ people.

IntroductionRecent research showed that 29% of respondents in a survey of veterinary professionals reported experiencing self-described discrimination in their workplaces. Senior colleagues and clients were responsible for discriminatory behaviors. As part of their training, veterinary students are expected to undertake extra-mural study (EMS) within these same workplaces and are likely to be vulnerable to discrimination from senior colleagues and clients. This study's objectives were to identify and characterize the pattern of perceived discriminatory behaviors (i.e., belief of being treated unfairly) that veterinary students encounter while seeing practice and explore students' attitudes toward discrimination. MethodsStudents at British and Irish veterinary schools who undertook some clinical EMS completed a survey of closed and open questions as part of a cross-sectional study. Demographic data and experiences of discrimination with details of incidents and reporting were collected, alongside respondent attitudes. Quantitative data were analyzed using Pearson's chi-squared analysis to analyse respondents' characteristics and their experiences of discriminatory behaviors and subsequent reporting. Qualitative content analysis was used for open-question data. ResultsOf the 403 respondents, 36.0% had perceived behavior they believed was discriminatory. The most frequent form of discrimination was based on gender (38.0%), followed by ethnicity (15.7%). There were significant associations between respondents' experience of discriminatory behaviors and the following characteristics: age (p = 0.0096), disability (p < 0.00001), race/ethnicity (p < 0.0001), gender/sex (p = 0.018), and LGBTQ+ status (p = 0.001). Supervising veterinarians were the most commonly reported perpetrators of discriminatory behaviors (39.3%) compared with clients (36.4%). Only 13.9% of respondents who experienced discrimination reported the event(s). Respondents with a disability were the least likely to agree with the statement that professional bodies are doing enough to tackle discrimination (p < 0.0001). Most respondents agreed that sexism is still an issue (74.4%), but men were more likely to disagree (p = 0.004). Most respondents felt that ethnic diversity needed to be increased (96.3%). DiscussionDiscriminatory behavior is a problem for students seeing practice, especially those with one or more protected characteristics (as defined by the UK Equality Act 2010). Improved education would need to include perspectives from minority groups to help remove discriminatory behavior from veterinary practice.

In this article, I provide a micro(oral)history of Cynthia Reid, one of only five women who founded the Minorities Research group-the first known lesbian organization in Britain, in 1963. Such activism paved the way for further lesbian liberatory action and the group did a great deal to combat the isolation experienced by many queer women across the country. They provided social opportunities as well as advice, and made more public calls for greater social acceptance. The group has been central to the interests of 20th-century queer historians, especially as the Minorities Research Group also produced the first lesbian magazine in Britain Arena Three. As a microhistory Cynthia's story informs many threads within queer history, including conceptualizations of masculinities, community, and change; while also challenging dominant notions that families and medical professionals were consistently unsupportive of queer people in the 1940s-1970s. In doing so, this article amplifies Cynthia's story in a way that means not only does it contribute nuance as a micro(oral)history to the broader field of queer scholarship but it also acts as a resource to stimulate further research.

‘An old Victorian oil lamp. The shape of the lamp. Two girls - at each side going to kiss each other. Big breasts, very slim, high heads, only one leg. Red lipstick.’ These are the responses to the above Rorschach ink blot (Card 3) by a woman ‘who was deeply involved in a homosexual relationship’ while at her stay in a psychiatric hospital in London (Barker, 1970). The use of the Rorschach in pathologising and affirmative research towards lesbians and gay men has had an interesting history. In this short paper I outline the work of two individual women – Evelyn Hooker and June Hopkins- and compare their approaches to lesbian and gay affirmative research using the Rorschach. By paying close attention to the historical contexts of such research, I allow for new interpretations of the meaning of difference to emerge and suggest the projective test moment to be particularly rich for feminist scholars.

Despite the easily recognizable nature of the Rorschach ink blot test very little is known about the history of the test in Britain. We attend to the oft-ignored history of the Rorschach test in Britain and compare it to its history in the US. Prior to the Second World War, Rorschach testing in Britain had attracted advocates and critiques. Afterward, the British Rorschach Forum, a network with a high proportion of women, developed around the Tavistock Institute in London and The Rorschach Newsletter. In 1968, the International Rorschach Congress was held in London but soon after the group became less exclusive, and fell into decline. A comparative account of the Rorschach in Britain demonstrates how different national institutions invested in the ‘projective hypothesis’ according to the influence of psychoanalysis, the adoption of a nationalized health system, and the social positioning of ‘others’ throughout the twentieth century. In comparing and contrasting the history of the Rorschach in Britain and the US, we decentralize and particularize the history of North American Psychology.

Heterosexual people with more positive attitudes to lesbians and gay men generally believe that homosexuality is immutable, is not a discrete social category, and that homosexuality exists in all cultures and time periods. Equivalent beliefs about heterosexuality and beliefs about components of sexuality have been less-often researched. 136 people with diverse sexualities described heterosexuality as more universal across history and culture than homosexuality (Study 1). 69 heterosexual-identified participants similarly believed that love, identity, behaviour and desire were more historically invariant aspects of heterosexuality than of homosexuality (Study 2). Less prejudiced participants thought all components of homosexuality – except for identity – were more historically invariant. Teasing apart beliefs about the history of components of heterosexuality and homosexuality suggests that there is no “essential” relationship between sexual prejudice and the tension between ‘essentialist’ and ‘constructivist’ views about the history of sexual identity.

This article charts the historical period from the 1950s to the 1990s, focusing on the role of Psychology in the lives of LGBTIQ people in Britain. Psychology has been, and is, central to the social, legal and medical understandings of biological sex and how best to understand diversity in gender and sexuality. Likewise, gay liberation and liberationist politics also had an effect on Psychology. For the 1950s-1960s, we outline how Psychologists influenced the Law in relation to the Wolfenden Report (1957) and how expertise was centrally located within the Psy disciplines. Following this, in the 1960s-1970s, activists began to challenge this expertise and became increasingly critical of pathologisation and of ‘treatments’ for homosexuality. They did not reject Psychology wholesale, however, and some groups engaged with queer affirmative psychologists who had similar liberatory aims. Finally, for the 1980s-1998 we highlight the establishment of the Lesbian and Gay Section of the British Psychological Society which signalled institutional recognition of lesbian and gay psychologists. This is explored against a backdrop of a specific British history of HIV/AIDS and Section 28. The past fifty years have been a battleground of categories in which LGBTIQ people were conflated, compared, and confused. We demonstrate that psychologists (not all of whom adopted a pathologising perspective) alongside politicians, lawyers, doctors, journalists and activists all played a role in the boundary-making practices of this period. Across this entangled history we demonstrate varied and significant shifts in the legitimacy of professional and personal expertise. Public Significance Statement: This article presents a British history of LGBTIQ Psychology from 1954-1998. Within a complex landscape of law, social change, medicine and activism, it recognises the influence Psychology has had on the lives of LGBTIQ people and vice versa. This history is important for contemporary Psychology as LGBTIQ issues continue to be contested in Britain and further afield.

This historical interdisciplinary book contextualises the Rorschach ink blot test and embeds it within feminist action and queer liberation. What do you see when you look at an ink blot? The Rorschach ink blot test is one of the most famous psychological tests and it has a surprisingly queer history. In mapping this history, this book explores how this test, once used to detect and diagnose ‘homosexuality’, was later used by some psychologists and activists to fight for gay liberation. In this book the author uses the test in yet another way, as a lens through which we can reveal a queer feminist history of Psychology. By looking closely at the lives and work of some women psychologists and activists it becomes clear that their work was influenced by their own, often queer, lives. By tracing the lives and actions of women who used, were tested with, or influenced by, the Rorschach, a new kind of understanding of gay and lesbian history in Britain is revealed. Pushing at the borders between Psychology, Sociology, and activism, the book utilises the Rorschach to show how influential the social world is on scientific practice. This is fascinating reading for anyone interested in the history of sexuality and Psychology.

Hooker, Evelyn (2 September 1907 – 18 Nov. 1996) psychologist and key figure in the movement to depathologise homosexuality in the US, was born Evelyn Gentry in her grandmother’s one-room farm house in North Platte, Nebraska, the sixth of nine children of Edward and Jessie Bethel Gentry.

In the literature about bisexuality few studies consider bisexual people’s beliefs about bisexuality and none examine essentialist beliefs about bisexuality. In the present study 244 participants (bisexual n = 58, lesbian/gay n = 54 and heterosexual n =132) from the UK were asked via online questionnaire about their attitudes towards bisexuality, homosexuality and heterosexuality, and how stable they perceived bisexuality, homosexuality and heterosexuality to be. They were also asked about their essentialist beliefs towards bisexuality. Bisexual respondents viewed bisexuality as significantly more stable than lesbian, gay and heterosexual respondents. Analysis also showed that less belief in the discreetness of bisexuality predicted more positive attitudes towards bisexuality, as did positive beliefs towards homosexuality and heterosexuality. Belief in the immutability of bisexuality did not, however, predict attitudes towards bisexuality. Therefore, discreteness appears to be an especially problematic essentialist belief about all sexual minorities, as it is consistently associated with negative attitudes. However, beliefs about the immutability of sexuality are not consistently associated with negative attitudes for all sexual minorities.

The Psychology of Women and Equalities Section (POWES) of the British Psychological Society (BPS) accounts for much of the feminist action in British psychology and beyond. In this qualitative study, we use discursively informed thematic analysis to examine a set of eleven in-depth interviews to explore the everyday experiences of feminists within academic spaces in and around the discipline of Psychology in the United Kingdom (UK). Three research questions addressing: the boundary between activism and academia; the provision of support; and differing approaches to knowledge production; were investigated. Our findings highlight the role of POWES as a feminist community as well as the conceptual importance of notions of home, work, and fun. Moreover, the paper examines the ways traditional conceptions of scientific rigor continue to haunt feminist spaces, as does the invisibility of emotional labour. Overall, our findings indicate that the place of feminist academic communities remains vital to sustain critical thought and action: having an intellectual 'home' is pivotal to the survival of feminist psychology as well as feminists in psychology. Abstract The Psychology of Women and Equalities Section (POWES) of the British Psychological

In order to do queer history well a number of difficult challenges have to be overcome. Our understanding of sexuality has changed so much over time that historians must be careful and considerate when carving out ‘queer’ as a narrative. In this paper I will be outlining some of my analysis from my recent paper 'Queer signs: The women of the British projective test movement' in the Journal of the Behavioural Sciences and present some of the notable queer women involved in the early projective test movement. By paying attention to their queerness, in terms of their unusual and unconventional positions in a men-dominated early Psychology and their queer private lives, I add an additional lens through which we can consider early British Psychology. In reflection of this research I will draw upon two key issues central to this analysis. By reflecting upon the research project outlined here I argue it is not only important to recognise the work of these early queer women but also celebrate their work, their resistance and their unconventionality.

One of the clearest signs that Psychology has impacted popular culture is the public’s familiarity with the Rorschach ink blot test. An excellent example of the Rorschach in popular culture can be found in Watchmen, the comic/graphic novel written by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (1987). In the mid-20th century Psychology had an especially contentious relationship with comics; some psychologists were very anxious about the impact on comics on young people, whereas others wrote comics to subvert dominant norms about gender and sexuality. Yet historians of Psychology have had almost nothing to say about this popular and critically acclaimed novel. We read Watchmen here for its narratives that most concern the history of Psychology. We focus on such themes as anti-psychiatry, sexual violence, homophobia, lesbian erasure, and social psychological research on bystander intervention. We argue it is possible to more closely align Psychology and comics despite their sometimes contentious history. In doing so we demonstrate the active role of the public in the history of the Rorschach, public engagement of Psychology via comics, and also reveal what is possible when historians consider comics within their histories.

As queer history is often hidden historians must look for ‘signs’ that hint at queer lives and experiences. When psychologists use projective tests the search for queer signs has historically been more literal, and this was especially true in the homophobic practices of Psychology in the mid-20th century. In this paper I respond to Elizabeth Scarborough’s call for more analytic history about the lesser known women in Psychology’s history. By focusing on British projective research conducted by lesbian Psychologist June Hopkins I shift perspective and consider, not those who were tested (which has been historically more common), but those who did the testing, and position them as potential queer subjects. After briefly outlining why the projective test movement is ripe for such analysis and the kinds of queer signs that were identified using the Rorschach ink blot test in the mid-20th century, I then present June Hopkins’ (1969; 1970) research on the ‘lesbian personality’. This work forms a framework upon which I then consider the lives of Margaret Lowenfeld, Ann Kaldegg and Effie Lillian Hutton, all of whom were involved in the British projective test movement a generation prior to Hopkins. By adopting Hopkins’ research to frame their lives I present the possibility of this ambiguous history being distinctly queer.

Sex has at least two different but related meanings: a biological property that bodies can seemingly ‘have’, and a set of bodily practices that one or more people can ‘have’. In the 1950s, the endocrinologist CN Armstrong stated that biomedical evidence of sex variance and the lack of a clear legal definition of sex highlighted a problem with the criminalisation of homosexual activity. It was not until the 1970s that a clear category of legal sex was enacted in law. In this paper we consider the Wolfenden Committee (1954-57) and the legal cases of Georgina Somerset and April Ashley (1969-70). As we demonstrate, despite the complexity revealed by biomedicine, the law has not struggled to enact binary categories, due to the normative force of binary and heteronormative social understandings of sex (in all its meanings). We conclude by reflecting upon the many queer ways that people have and do sex outside of the purview of legal or medical definitions.