David Wechsler, Ph.D.


Tests Developed:
Wechsler-Bellevue Intelligence Scale
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children

Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence

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Born in Romania in 1896, David Wechsler came to New York City six years later with his parents and six older siblings. He completed his bachelor’s degree in 1916 at City College (New York) and obtained a master’s degree at Columbia University the following year. While awaiting induction into the Army at a base in Long Island, Wechsler came in contact with the renowned historian of psychology, E. G. Boring. Wechsler assisted Boring by evaluating the data from one of the first large-scale administrations of a group intelligence test (the Army Alpha test) as the nation geared up for World War I. Wechsler was subsequently assigned to an Army base in Fort Logan, Texas, where his primary duty was administering individual intelligence tests such as the newly published Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale. Discharged from the Army in 1919, Wechsler spent two years studying in Europe, where he had the opportunity to study with Charles Spearman and Karl Pearson, two brilliant English statisticians known primarily for their work in the area of correlation. Upon his return to New York City, he took a position as a staff psychologist with the Bureau of Child Guidance. In 1935, Wechsler earned a Ph.D. from

Columbia University. His dissertation was entitled "The Measurement of Emotional Reactions." By 1932, Wechsler was appointed Chief Psychologist at Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital. Seven years later, the individually administered test Wechsler had designed to measure an adult’s intelligence in adult terms, the Wechsler-Bellevue Intelligence Scale, was a reality. Three years later, in 1942, came a revision of that test referred to variously as the Wechsler-Bellevue II and as the Army Wechsler. In 1949, Wechsler published the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC). This was followed in 1955 by a revision of the Wechsler-Bellevue II that was named the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS). The Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence (WPPSI) was published in 1967, and in 1974 a revision of the WISC, the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R), was published. Wechsler’s revision of the WAIS, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R), was published in 1981, the same year that this prolific and internationally respected psychologist died.



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