ABSTRACT
Child psychology generally is designated as having had an official existence from the time of the publication of a few diaries or baby biographies. These diaries represented early attempts at the compilation of human ecological data. That is, the authors relied upon their own powers of observation to assimilate naturally occurring behavioral events, and they made an attempt to relate behavior to the existing environmental conditions. It was the custom for many years to condemn such biographies as biased and unscientific; yet anyone who has read even excerpts from the reports of Darwin (1877) or Preyer (1888) might question that generalization. In retrospect, they appear to represent careful exercise of scientific caution and restraint and the utmost respect for accuracy and detail. Such biographies are analogous to the careful descriptions of clinical material which have played a major role in the advancement of medical science and to the description of naturally occurring phenomena in botany and astronomy.
