Department History

The Department of Psychology at McGill University is among the oldest in the world. The first psychology course was taught at McGill in 1850 by W. T. Leach (Ph.D. Edinburgh). The first psychological laboratory was established in 1910 by William Dunlop Tait, and the Department was founded in 1922. Donald Hebb became Chair in 1948 and ushered in an era of intellectual and curricular expansion.

Today, the department occupies several floors in the Stewart Biology Building,
1/2 km north of downtown Montreal at the foot of Mount Royal. Our faculty and students maintain a broad, integrated approach to the scientific study of human behaviour, creating a collegial and collaborative research environment that emphasizes diverse approaches and interdisciplinarity. Research spans all of contemporary psychology and includes neuroscience, mathematical/quantitative psychology, social psychology, clinical psychology, cognition, perception, personality, psycholinguistics, development, and health psychology. Affiliated research centers include more than half a dozen area hospitals, the Montreal Neurological Institute, the McGill Vision Center, the School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, the McGill Pain Center, McGill Cognitive Science, Center for Research in Language, Mind and Brain, and the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Music, Media, Mind and Technology. Research facilities include behavioural and psychophysical testing laboratories, EEG, motion capture, histology, and animal behaviour laboratories.

Distinguished faculty members of our department have included Dalbir Bindra, Al Bregman, Virginia Douglas, George Ferguson, Donald O. Hebb, Wally Lambert, John MacNamara, Tony Marley, Ronald Melzack, Brenda Milner, Peter Milner and James Olds.