ABSTRACT
Before entering the university in 1915, Jean Piaget certainly had a good idea of the kind of personalities he would meet there. His father, Arthur Piaget, who had been the first rector, was particularly well placed to judge the advantages and disadvantages a student would have in studying life sciences at a modest institution. Lacking documents that record the reasons for this choice, one must make assumptions on the matter. The war raging in neighbouring countries did not encourage the undertaking of studies outside Switzerland; furthermore, local accommodation would have been easily arranged by his father. Such were the factors that must have contributed to the decision. However, it deprived the young man of a scientific setting better adapted to the discipline in which he had already distinguished himself.
