Editing Stanley Smith Stevens

{{Short description|American psychologist (1906–1973)}}
{{About|a psychologist|a ship|SS Stevens}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=November 2011}}

[[File:Headshot_of_Stanley_Smith_Stevens.png|thumb|SS "Smitty" Stevens]]

'''Stanley Smith Stevens''' (November 4, 1906 – January 18, 1973)<ref>{{cite book
  | last = Miller
  | first = George A.
  | author-link = George Armitage Miller
  | title = Biographical Memoirs
  | place = Washington, D.C.
  | publisher = The National Academies Press
  | year = 1975
  | volume = 47
  | url = http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=570&page=424
  | isbn = 978-0-309-02245-3
  | page = 524}}
</ref> was an American [[psychologist]] who founded [[Harvard]]'s Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory, studying [[psychoacoustics]],<ref>{{cite journal|title=Obituary: S. Smith Stevens|journal=Physics Today|date=May 1973|volume=26|issue=5|pages=81|doi=10.1063/1.3128068|doi-access=free}}</ref> and he is credited with the introduction of [[Stevens's power law]]. Stevens authored a milestone textbook, the 1400+ page ''Handbook of Experimental Psychology'' (1951). He was also one of the founding organizers of the [[Psychonomic Society]].  In 1946 he introduced a theory of [[level of measurement|levels of measurement]] widely used by scientists but whose use in some areas of [[statistics]] has been criticized.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Velleman |first1=Paul F. |first2=Leland |last2=Wilkinson |author-link2=Leland Wilkinson |title=Nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio typologies are misleading |journal=The American Statistician |year=1993 |volume=47 |issue=1 |pages=65–72 |doi=10.1080/00031305.1993.10475938 |jstor=2684788 }}</ref> In addition, Stevens played a key role in the development of the use of [[operational definitions]] in psychology.<ref name = Nicholson/>

A ''[[Review of General Psychology]]'' survey, published in 2002, ranked Stevens as the 52nd most cited psychologist of the 20th century.<ref>{{cite journal |title=The 100 most eminent psychologists of the 20th century |journal=Review of General Psychology |volume=6 |issue=2 |year=2002 |pages=139–152 |doi=10.1037/1089-2680.6.2.139 |url=http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug02/eminent.aspx |last1=Haggbloom |first1=Steven J. |last2=Warnick |first2=Renee |last3=Warnick |first3=Jason E. |last4=Jones |first4=Vinessa K. |last5=Yarbrough |first5=Gary L. |last6=Russell |first6=Tenea M. |last7=Borecky |first7=Chris M. |last8=McGahhey |first8=Reagan |last9=Powell III |first9=John L. |last10=Beavers |first10=Jamie |last11=Monte |first11=Emmanuelle |citeseerx=10.1.1.586.1913 |s2cid=145668721 }}</ref> He was a member of the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]],<ref>{{Cite web |title=Stanley Smith Stevens |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/stanley-smith-stevens |access-date=2022-12-16 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |language=en}}</ref> the United States [[National Academy of Sciences]],<ref>{{Cite web |title=Stanley S. Stevens |url=http://www.nasonline.org/member-directory/deceased-members/20001524.html |access-date=2022-12-16 |website=www.nasonline.org}}</ref> and the [[American Philosophical Society]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Stanley+Smith+Stevens&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2022-12-16 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref>

==Life==
Stevens was born in [[Ogden, Utah]], to Stanley and Adeline (Smith) Stevens and educated in [[The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints|Latter-day Saint]]-affiliated schools in [[Salt Lake City, Utah]]. He spent much of his childhood in the [[polygamous]] household of his maternal grandfather Orson Smith. At the death of his parents in 1924, he spent the next 3 years on an LDS mission in [[Switzerland]] and [[Belgium]].  He attended the [[University of Utah]] from 1927 to 1929 and [[Stanford University]] for the next two years, graduating with an [[Bachelor of Arts|A.B.]] in psychology in 1931.

Shortly after arriving in Massachusetts to begin a Ph.D., he left the LDS church, but continued to struggle with conflicting ideas of faith and science.<ref name = Nicholson>{{cite book|last1=Nicholson|title=From the Book of Mormon to the Operational Definition: The Existential Project of S.S. Stevens|date=2005|publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780198037606|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mc6KzuyEtDoC&q=%22orson+smith%22+mormon&pg=PA287|access-date=24 March 2018}}</ref> After two years of graduate study, he received his Ph.D. in psychology from [[Harvard University]], where he served under [[Edwin Boring]] as assistant in psychology, from 1932 to 1934.

The following year he spent studying physiology under [[Hallowell Davis]] at [[Harvard Medical School]], and in 1935 served as a research fellow in physics at Harvard for a year. In 1936, Stevens accepted a position as an instructor in experimental psychology at Harvard University.<ref name=AJS>{{cite journal |jstor=1422022 |title=Stanley Smith Stevens: 1906–1973 |journal=American Journal of Psychology |date=1974 |volume=87 |issue=1/2 |pages=279–288|last1=Miller |first1=George A. }}</ref>

He married Maxine Leonard in 1930 and had a son, Peter Smith Stevens, in 1936.<ref name=AJS/> He married Geraldine Stone, who had worked in the Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory from its inception, in 1963.

==Science of Science discussion group==
Stevens played a key role in organising the [[Science of Science discussion group]] in [[Cambridge, Massachusetts]], which met on eight occasions from October 1940 to mid-1941. Stevens, who was noted for the clarity of his scientific writing, attracted to the group a number of participants whose aim was the "debabelisation of science". The group was also influenced by the 5th Congress of the Unity of Science, which had been held at [[Harvard University]] in September 1939 and featured a number of well-known scientists from different disciplines.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Hardcastle|author-link1=Gary Hardcastle|editor1-last=Richardson|editor1-first=Alan W.|editor2-last=Hardcastle|editor2-first=Gary L.|article=Debabelizing Science: The Harvard Science of Science Discussion Group, 1940–41|title=Logical Empiricism in North America|date=2003|publisher=University of Minnesota Press|pages=170–196}}</ref>

==Work==
Stevens' experimental and theoretical work lay primarily in the fields of [[psychophysics]] and [[psychoacoustics]]. One of his most influential contributions was his definition of a measurement scale  defined by four types: Nominal, Ordinal, Interval, and Ratio. (see [[Level of measurement]]) <ref>[http://web.mit.edu/epl/StevensBiography.pdf], 2001, pp. 15105–15108</ref> He is the author of the operational theory of measurement, which “...in the broadest sense, is defined as the assignment of numerals to objects or events according to rules.”<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Stevens |first1=S. S. |title=On the Theory of Scales of Measurement |journal=Science |date=7 June 1946 |volume=103 |issue=2684 |pages=677–680 |doi=10.1126/science.103.2684.677}}</ref> In fact, the definition paraphrased [[Norman Robert Campbell|Campbell]]'s note from the Final Report of the so-called Ferguson's committee (joint committee of sections A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences, and J, Psychology, of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, held 1932&ndash;1940).<ref>{{cite journal |author1=Ferguson, A., Myers, C. S., Bartlett, R. J., Banister, H., Bartlett, F. C., Brown, W., ..., & Tucker, W. S. |title=Final report of the committee appointed to consider and report upon the possibility of quantitative estimates of sensory events |journal=Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science |volume=2 |page=331–349}}</ref> Stevens just omitted or extended some of Campbell's assumptions. While Campbell considered additivity to be a necessary condition, Stevens considered any rule to fit the definition. His goal was to overcome the committee's conclusion concerning the possibility of measurement in psychology.

==See also==
* ''[[The Logic of Modern Physics]]''

==References==
{{Reflist}}
*{{cite book
 | first = Neil J.
 | last = Smelser
 |author2=Paul B. Baltes
  | year = 2001
 | title = International encyclopedia of the social & behavioral sciences
 | pages = 15105–15108
 | publisher = Elsevier
 | location = Amsterdam, New York
 | isbn = 0-08-043076-7
 | url = http://web.mit.edu/epl/StevensBiography.pdf
}}
* Nicholson, I. (2000).  "S.S. Stevens".  In Alan E. Kazdin (Ed.), ''Encyclopedia of Psychology.'' Washington, DC: American Psychological Association Press. {{ISBN|978-1-55798-187-5}}
* Nicholson, I.  (2005). "From the Book of Mormon to the Operational Definition: The Existential Project of S.S. Stevens". In William Todd. Schultz (Ed.), ''Handbook of Psychobiography'' (pp.&nbsp;285–298). New York: Oxford University Press. {{ISBN|978-0-19-516827-3}}

==Further reading==
* {{Cite journal |date=June 7, 1946 |last=Stevens |first=Stanley Smith |title=On the Theory of Scales of Measurement |journal=[[Science (journal)|Science]] |volume=103 |issue=2684 |pages=677–680 |doi=10.1126/science.103.2684.677 |pmid=17750512 |bibcode=1946Sci...103..677S |url=https://marces.org/EDMS623/Stevens%20SS%20(1946)%20On%20the%20Theory%20of%20Scales%20of%20Measurement.pdf }}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stevens, Stanley Smith}}
[[Category:1906 births]]
[[Category:1973 deaths]]
[[Category:Former Latter Day Saints]]
[[Category:Latter Day Saints from Massachusetts]]
[[Category:Latter Day Saints from Utah]]
[[Category:American Mormon missionaries in Switzerland]]
[[Category:American Mormon missionaries in Belgium]]
[[Category:20th-century Mormon missionaries]]
[[Category:Scientists from Ogden, Utah]]
[[Category:University of Utah alumni]]
[[Category:Stanford University alumni]]
[[Category:Harvard University Department of Psychology faculty]]
[[Category:Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni]]
[[Category:20th-century American psychologists]]
[[Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society]]
[[Category:APA Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution to Psychology recipients]]