Beth Lucy Wellman

1895-1952

In the 1930s Beth Wellman demonstrated that a person's intelligence quotient (IQ) is alterable depending on stimulation from the environment. Her findings altered previous notions that intelligence was inherited. Her results led to early childhood school programs such as Head Start, Home Start and early education for the mentally retarded.

Beth Lucy Wellman was born in Clarion in 1895. She graduated from Ames High School in 1912 and received her B.A. from the Iowa State Teachers College at Cedar Falls in 1920. In that same year she became secretary to Bird T. Baldwin, the first director of the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station, and enrolled in the psychology program at the University of Iowa. From 1921 to 1924 Wellman worked as a research assistant at the Iowa Research Station. During this period she was responsible for taking all the physical measurements of the children in the preschool laboratories.

Following her research in Iowa Wellman went to New York City and worked for a year as a research associate at Columbia University. She was offered the position of chief psychologist there and a similar position at Yale, but she returned to the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station. She earned Ph.D. in child psychology in 1925 at Iowa University. In 1937 she was appointed Professor of Child Psychology at Iowa University.

Writings of Beth Wellman, Chronologically Arranged

Wellman, Beth (1926, 1969-Kraus Reprint). The development of motor co-ordination I young children: An experimental study in the control of hand and arm movements. Iowa City, IA: The University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth, Case, Ida Mae, Mengert, Ida Gaarder, & Bradbury, Dorothy E. (1931, 1969-Kraus reprint). Speech sounds of younger children. Iowa City: The University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth (1932). Education of the preschool child. Iowa City, IA: The University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth (1932). Learning to talk. Iowa City, IA: The University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth (1932, 1939). Learning to use hands and feet. Iowa City, IA: the University of Iowa.

Stoddard, George Dinsmore, & Wellman, Beth (1934). Child psychology. NY: the Macmillan Company.

Wellman, Beth (1934). A manual of nursery school practice. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth, O’Shea, Harriet Estabrooks (1935). Essentials of nursery education with special reference to nursery schools. Boston, MA: National Association for Nursery Education.

Stoddard, George Dinsmore, & Wellman, Beth (1936). A manual of child psychology. NY: the Macmillan Company.

Wellman, Beth (1938). The intelligence of preschool children as measured by the Merrill Palmer Scale of Performance Tests. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Studies in Child Welfare, 15, #3. (Reprinted in 1977 by Kraus Reprint Co, NY)

Skells, Harold Manville, Updegraff, Rugh, Wellman, Beth Lucy (1938). A study of environmental stimulation: An orphanage preschool project. Iowa City IA: University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth (1939). How the child’s mind grows. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa.

Wellman, Beth (1940). Iowa studies on the effect of schooling. Bloomington, IL: Public School Publishing Co.

Wellman, Beth (1945). IQ Chanes of preschool and non-preschool groups during the preschool years: A summary of the literature. Journal of Psychology, 20, 247-268.

Wellman, Beth, McCandless, Boyd R. (1946). Factors associated with Binet IQ changes of preschool children. Washington: American Psychological Association.