UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

Interview #232
BERKOWITZ, LEONARD

BERKOWITZ, Leonard (1926- )
Vilas Research Professor Emeritus of Psychology
At UW: 1955-1993

FIRST INTERVIEW

Interview: 	1982 (2 sessions)		
Interviewer: 	Laura Smail
Indexed by:	Laura Smail and edited by Stephen Pierce
Length: 	2 hours, 39 minutes

Abstract: In his two November 1982 interviews with Laura Smail, Leonard Berkowitz talks about his involvement with the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s psychology faculty during the decades from the 1950s to the 1990s.  Dr. Berkowitz grew up in New York City and received his undergraduate degree in sociology from New York University.  He served in the U.S. Air Force and then received his PhD in 1951 from the University of Michigan. In the interviews, he discusses his research into situational influences on aggressive behavior including the influence of watching violent actions on TV or in films—research conducted using laboratory experiments and field interviews with violent offenders. He also offers perspective on internal conflicts within the psychology department, developments in the wider field of psychology, and changes in the University of Wisconsin over his 38 years as a professor. This interview was conducted for inclusion in the University of Wisconsin-Madison Archives Oral History Project.  

Key words:  New York City, NY; Dr. Daniel Katz; the role of chance in success; University of Wisconsin-Madison; empirical versus theoretical psychology; aggression studies; Harry Harlow; psychology department; department reputation; Carl Rogers; Wilfred “Wulf” Brogden; Mavis Hetherington; James Archer; primate laboratory; the 1960s; student unrest; undergraduate advising; Vietnam War; chairmanship; University of Michigan; Vilas Research Professorship. 

First Interview Session (November 11, 1982): Digital File

Time	Keywords
00:00:00	Start of Interview/Interviewer’s Introduction [tape 1, side 1]

00:00:03	Question: Talk about your background. Answer: Berkowitz grew up in NYC to Russian immigrant parents who wanted him to be a physician. From HS on, he said he was intrigued by being a psychologist because of the regularities and principles of the subject. He attended Stuyvesant HS, but was disappointed by its science program. After returning in 1946, he completed his education at NYU on the GI Bill and then went to University of Michigan (UM) in 1948. 

00:03:09	Question: Why UM? Answer: Primarily because they accepted him and he wanted to get out of NY. But he noted how fortunate an event this was—UM was the leading place for social psychology when it was still groundbreaking and his advisor Dr. Katz landed him his job at UW. He speculated that success was about being in the right place at the right time. Follow up: The interlude with the Air Force? Answer: He said this was because the job market was slim and he had no aspirations for teaching at a research institution; in the USAF he did research on the morale of bomber crews, but was relieved to get a job at UW because he discovered he enjoyed research.

00:09:14	Question: How did you do in grad school? Answer: Average. He said UM wasn’t especially challenging, assuming everyone accepted would complete the PhD. Asked about a glowing letter written of him by UW’s psychology dept, he attributed it to his enthusiasm for research. He talked about how much he enjoyed staying up late to listen to music and write up his research without neglecting his family.

00:14:15	[no question] He went on to discuss how he got into the study of aggression in his first UW course and the timeliness of the topic. A neglected topic, he was able to get grants and publish extensively in the 1960s, though social psychology had declined in later years. He also did experimental research in the role of media in aggression.

00:17:34	Question: Talk about the psychology dept when you arrived. Answer:  It had been highly regarded, and hadn’t changed its culture of empirical research even though personnel cycled through. A deficiency was its lack of theoreticians, though Harry Harlow was a notable exception.

00:20:15	[no question] He gave some context about the state of psychology in 1950s. At the time, the study of learning was the most prestigious subfield, and the Midwest was the center. Figures like H. Harlow, Wulf Brogden, and David Grant were UW psychologists who gave UW visibility in learning research (and primates research). Though they were not interested in social psychology, contrary to popular perception they realized in order not to be narrow, it had to be represented. So there was a “live and let live” atmosphere that didn’t lead to much collaborative research. He discussed the importance of Graduate School Research Committee and WARF resources, as well as (from 1957 on) federal research grants, for his research. 

00:28:11	[no question] He talked about his own inclination to do laboratory research, which is what the dept favored. And though the dept expanded and the “big three” grew older and lost their influence, the dept’s empirical culture nevertheless remained the same. Follow up: Did you ever worry about that? Answer: Yes, many depts, including sociology, had the same problem. [end tape 1, side 1; begin side 2] Follow up: Because of salaries? Answer: No; it may have been a matter of UW’s image. In the early 1960s, the field’s emphasis changed from conditioning-oriented learning research to research on cognitive processes, which caused UW to fall behind. He felt the dept was in danger of being less regarded, as followers not innovators. 

00:35:25	[no question] He also attributed UW’s declining stature in psychology to developing young talent rather than “buying established talent” like Stanford and Michigan, partly due to salary.  While UW prides itself on doing this, it indicates the university is not a “big time operator,” not in the forefront.  He thought biochemistry might be an exception to this trend. The psychology dept helped develop talent by taking care in granting tenure, though some good people developed here had then left.  He noted that the dept (no longer with a national reputation) was ranked tenth in the US.

00:42:29	Question: Talk about Carl Rogers. Answer: He said Rogers seemed to be a “mover”—after deciding to leave U. of Chicago, he had put out feelers at UW and they’d jumped at the chance to developing clinical psychology.  While Berkowitz didn't have much contact with him, he felt Rogers largely to blame for the denouement, because he was not as open to new ideas as he let on.  Some of this revolved around the issue of UW’s (already relatively loose) requirements for graduate training, which Rogers found too restrictive—first, students had to pass a required proseminar (though failing students could repeat the exam) and Rogers didn't want exams or evaluations. He felt nothing of use was being taught in American psychology. Rogers' idea of graduate training was to evaluate only at the end—which Berkowitz felt was cruel.

00:51:04	[no question] While Rogers said evaluations stifled creativity, Berkowitz felt Rogers’ main problem was that he couldn’t tolerate divergent ideas between himself and the dept. While he attracted a lot of students, they weren’t very good ones, Berkowitz thought because of his idea that a good therapist must just be a “good guy”. This pointed up the need for people to be tolerant in a dept, where Rogers was almost vindictive. Berkowitz used the example of Rogers’ conduct in a specific meeting and his turning away prospective students by criticizing UW, then circulating carbons of letters. He recalled Rogers’ track record for moving around, but also his poor relations with the psychiatry department. 

00:58:02	Question: Whose fault were the data problems in his research? Answer: He didn’t know. Follow up: What’s his present reputation? Answer: He did have an international reputation. Berkowitz thought Rogers would loom large in the history of 1960s psychology, speculating he was an example of being in right place at right time.  He cited a New York Times review of Rogers’ theory, for which society in the 1960s was particularly ripe. He speculated had he come along earlier or later, he wouldn’t have had the same standing [end tape 1].

01:02:39	Question: Talk about Brogden and Harlow. Answer: [begin tape 2, side 1] He said Wolf Brogden was a very responsible departmental and university citizen, whose rigid, narrow point of view was never destructive. When he came, Brogden was associate dean of graduate school and a rigid rule-enforcer. Brogden’s important scholarship was largely over by the time arrived, but he remained very active and opinionated in department affairs—he didn’t want women in department because he felt they wouldn’t be properly dedicated to the dept.

01:08:29	Question: Was “having women” being discussed? Answer: Not in general—he pointed to the case of Mavis Hetherington’s candidacy (early 1960s). After coming to UW with her husband who was on the law faculty she requested to joint psycho-logy on joint appointment with educational psychology. She fit the depts’ long time need for combined expertise in clinical psychology and child development.  While Brogden expressed his skepticism (which affected her raises early on), Berkowitz worked toward correcting the situation by giving her larger than average raises later on. He expressed his disappointment at her departure.

01:13:17	[no question] He remarked on the great potential for conflict in the department because salaries are discussed in executive committee—he discussed changes in the procedure over time. Because most faculty in the dept were very active academically, and the dept also tried to be discriminating with salary recommendations, tensions were always latent. But remarkably little conflict existed, perhaps because it was a “dept of deniers,” with the exception of Smith.

01:18:35	Question: Are there area groups? Answer: Yes, the dept could be considered a confederation of areas. Though areas had more contact with one another, they still didn’t collaborate much within an area. The question was which area would get the next hiring slot. Follow up: Do you take the next best person, or slot a particular area? Answer: Toward the latter; even in 1960s the department was very slow to hire because of need for consensus in executive committee, such that Dean Epstein actually kept encouraging department to hire. UW’s is one of smallest depts in the Big Ten in spite of large enrollment. 

01:23:07	Question: Why did the dept reorganize in 1965? Answer: He found the “Archer business” interesting. Archer was far more rigid than Brogden, very organized, but unlike Brogden, he was intolerant of disagreement, which he took personally. He gave the examples of Archer 1) cleaning the faculty lounge in an attempt to shame the dept. and 2) sending lecturing memos during a controversy over how teaching credits should be allocated for an experimental video course the dept was offering. Eventually the dept rebelled against him, but at just that time he was offered the job at Univ. of Colorado—never once did UC ask anyone at UW about him, hence the same thing happened there and at Rhode Island, where he went after Colorado. This was likely the thought process behind devoting all departmental power to the 14 committees.

01:35:15	End of First Interview Session

Second Interview Session (November 24, 1982): Digital File				
Time	Keywords

00:00:00	Start of Interview/Interviewer’s Introduction

00:00:27	Question: Talk about Harry Harlow. Answer: He remembered Harlow best for his contributions to psychology but also his dedication to the dept. He talked about Harlow’s foundational involvement in the development of the primate laboratory and his deep care for and identification with the university. Follow up: It wasn’t easy to talk to him? Answer: No; he was always playing a role and made little small talk. He recalled an anecdote how, when asked a question about psychology, Harlow gave little answer initially but later came out with a poem about it—he was very concerned with his image and his standing in the university despite being a great scholar. He doubted anyone took issue with Harlow’s “posing” as being mean.

00:07:21	Follow up: Doesn’t that sound petty of a true scholar? Answer: Berkowitz affirmed Harlow’s real contributions to psychology, echoed in a recent article. He also talked about the difference between the primate lab and the primate center. Follow up: How were his relationships with students? Answer: He didn’t know, though Harlow had some very good students and was concerned about his younger associates—he gave examples of Harlow’s advocacy for some of his younger colleagues. He supposed Harlow’s grad students were in awe of him.

00:13:10	Question: Did someone else in the end run the primate lab? Answer: Harlow’s reputation for being an alcoholic was exaggerated because he had Parkinson’s disease. While he did have several other people help him run the primate lab, he’d never heard any accusations that the ideas for the lab weren’t his. Follow up: Anything else? Answer: He wanted to give credit to Harlow’s wives—Margaret, who was a respectable psychologist in her own right and promoted his best research and Clara, his 1st/3rd wife, who “resocialized” him after Margaret died. Follow up: Talk a little about the primate research. Answer: His primate research was highly important, not only for psychologist, but also for psychiatrists. 

00:21:30	Question: Why did you accept the chair? Answer: Because it was his turn; but he noted that it was a bad time to be chair because he was a “much too excitable” person at a time when there were TA strikes, the movement for a Black Studies program and he had disagreements with Stephen Kleene over having funding to replace tenured faculty members. 

00:26:23	[no question] He recalled an occasion when militant psychology undergrads presented “non-negotiable” demands that would essentially remake the entire curriculum and he “lost his cool.” In more recent years, he said it was very difficult to get student involvement in the department at all, with the exception of [undergrad advisor Arlene] Davenport. Follow up: Are those positions new? Answer: They came about in the mid-1960s and Berkowitz thought they were very worthwhile since many faculty didn’t know the rules very well. The only pitfall to this system was a decline in faculty-student interaction, which he felt was solvable through office hours and independent study. [end tape 2]

00:32:31	[begin tape 3] Question: Talk about the excitement of the TA strike. Answer: Yes, they were exciting days; he didn’t feel the psychology TAs were mistreated, but they felt a connection with TAs from other depts. He recalled one incident in which TAs tried to invade and hijack one of Heatherington’s classes and when she refused, they threw a table at her. On another occasion, striking students invaded a class of KU Smith, who threatened the students with a pointer. He observed that the Black students’ strike was in large part promulgated by white students sympathetic to the cause. He recalled another incident in which he lost his cool.

00:39:08	Question: What was your attitude about the period? Answer: Though he thought his research on aggression didn’t affect his attitudes, he nevertheless didn’t support any of these endeavors. Follow up: Did the authorities solicit your help ever? Answer: Not really, with the possible exception of the Vietnam protests—at first, authorities were at a loss how to handle the protests, so he served as a consultant on commissions on urban violence under Lyndon Johnson, for which he wrote some studies that presaged later police experiences during the protest era. 

00:43:21 	Follow up: But you were interested in the source of the violence? Answer: Yes; he noted his disagreement with some theorists who saw the period as rational attempts by minorities to improve their situations, where he viewed it as often irrational. He noted he was more professionally interested in urban disorders than in the disruptions on campus, observing much of it was an attempt by students to get attention, a behavior that was only reinforced by media attention. He wished the Regents had had the wisdom to ignore the student unrest, but didn’t think it would have been feasible.

00:48:13	Question: Were you against the Vietnam War? Answer: He didn’t think he was opposed to it at the start, but by the end of Johnson’s administration, he saw it as futile, citing the “Munich analogy.” 

00:49:29	[no question] Berkowitz again recommended Smail talk to people with experience with K.U. Smith. He observed that his own feelings toward Smith were mixed—that he felt Smith was irresponsible and at times libelous toward “those academic gangsters”—Brogden, Harlow, and Grant. 

00:52:43	Question: Talk about important changes and people at UW. Answer: He in some ways regretted the inevitable growth of UW from 17,000 to over 40,000 students, from a more comfortable university to a larger university, as well as the slowness with which psychology grew relatively. He noted being offered a chair at the University of Michigan, to which his Vilas professorship was a direct response; he decided to remain because of the “real attractions of the place” and because he thought UM was much too large for him to be comfortable. 

00:57:31	[no question] He remarked about being impressed by UW’s resistance to the entrepreneurial impulse that attracted Michigan and Stanford—partially because of leadership and finances, but partially because of the culture of UW. Follow up: Who are the good people in psychology now? Answer: He said there were a lot of good people, though not many theoreticians—Frances Graham, Loren and Jean Chapman, Steve Sumi were standouts. When asked about his influence, he observed that his role had become peripheral in more recent social psychological scholarship.

01:04:05	End of Second Interview Session

End of First Interview

SECOND INTERVIEW

Interview: 	2008 (1 session)
Interviewer:	Sandy Pfahler
Index by: 	Stephen A. Pierce
Length: 	1 hour, 45 minutes

Abstract: In his November 2008 interview with Sandy Pfahler, Leonard Berkowitz reviews much of the same detail from his 1982 interview, covering primarily the decades from the 1950s to 90s.  He talks more extensively about his research methodology and conclusions, and developments in the field since 1982; he also provides more detail on his family and travel. This interview was conducted for inclusion into the UW-Madison Oral History Program

Key words: New York City; New York University (NYU); University of Michigan (UM); social psychology; United States Air Force; teaching; research; aggression; helpfulness; urban disorders; tenure; TAA strike; Black Studies program; travel; university service.

First Interview Session (November 11, 1982): Digital File

Time	Keywords
00:00:00	Start of Interview/Interviewer’s Introduction [tape 1, side 1]

00:00:51	Question: Talk about your early life. Answer: Berkowitz was born in 1926 in the Bronx to lower middle class Russian immigrant parents (who arrived in the 1920s). While his parents spoke Yiddish, they didn’t teach their children the language or even Jewish traditions. His father was an independent door-to-door “customer peddler”—providing goods to families without sufficient credit to buy things on layaway from dept stores—in Harlem. He talked about the dangers of his father’s work and his eventual ability to open a dry goods store.  He said his mother was a homemaker, but a talented chess player as well. Though his parents had little formal education, he remembered his father avidly reading newspapers.

00:07:45	[no question] Berkowitz recalled attending the local public school, at which he succeeded enough to be accepted to the all-boys Stuyvesant HS in lower Manhattan, though he didn’t remember “that much science being taught.” This required him to travel on the subway for an hour each way—which allowed him at times to skip school and attend films and concerts, like Sinatra—but didn’t allow for much extracurricular activity.

00:11:01	[no question] After HS, he went to NYU. Follow up: Was this encouraged by your parents? Answer: Absolutely; they wanted him to become a doctor, but he was never interested in biological science, as opposed to his deep interest in social sciences, which allowed him to discover laws of how people act and why. He started at NYU because of the myth that Jewish students could get into med school more easily from a private university. He described his education at NYU as “third-rate” because of its shortage of teachers—who weren’t up to date—and the way it conceived of itself. 

00:16:15	Question: Did you realize that while you were at NYU? Answer: No—he described himself as unsophisticated, which showed itself in the way he got into UM. While applying to grad school, he was advised to take the Miller’s Analogies Test, and could only think of UM to have the scores sent to. But soon after arriving at UM, he decided to move over to social psychology from industrial psychology and serendipitously received research assistantship from the Office of Naval Research that led to his dissertation.

00:20:29	Question: Do you remember many faculty from UM? Answer: Yes; by good chance, UM was the center of major social psychology research at the time. Follow up: You received your PhD quickly. Answer: Not because he was outstanding, but for lack of standards at UM, he thought. 

00:23:00	Question: How did you decide on UW? Answer: He noted that in 1951, the academic job market was still quite poor, so he was able to get a job with the USAF, which was concerned with getting the most out of its crews using social psychology research (investigating bomber crew morale). He doubted that the USAF got its money’s worth out of his research, and by 1955 he was desperate to get an academic job and wrote his major professor, who knew of the job at UW and recommended him for it. Follow up: Did you compete for it? Answer: Yes, with Bill McGuire, later a major figure in social psychology.

00:29:20	Question: Did UW count any of your years in the USAF? Answer: Yes, they did. He talked about coming to UW for less money than he made with USAF but more than any of his cohort, which annoyed one of them. Follow up: What was life like as an assistant professor. Answer: He loved it. Because psychology was considered a science, he only had a two-course load. One of these led him to the topic of aggression, and he used his preparations for that class to compose a research grant in the topic. 

00:35:54	Question: Talk about how you did this research. Answer: Like other faculty at UW, he did experimental research; so he would frustrate his subjects until they reached the point of aggression and developed tools to measure aggression. Follow up: Where did you get subjects for your research? Answer: From undergraduate classes. His interviewing experience with prisoners, etc., came later, since his research went on for over 20 years.  During the mid-1960s, he also became interested in helpfulness. 

00:41:58	Follow up: What did that research conclude? Answer: Interested in when people lived up most completely to the social ideal of helpfulness, he saw that there is a kind of resentment in reaction to these social norms. He discussed other research that had followed after his. Again emphasizing the role of chance in his career, he noted that he’d been aided by widespread societal interest in the issues of helpfulness, aggression, and urban disorders.

00:46:52	Question: Talk more about aggression research. Answer: After originally researching the affect of frustration, he moved to study how violent movies affected aggression. He described setting up the experiment by showing a violent film or control film to subjects and then giving them a task potentially leading to aggression. The results very consistently showed that violent films increased the incidence of aggression. Because Berkowitz’ research was high profile and because he was a productive publisher, UM offered him a chair, which led to UW countering with a Vilas professorship, accompanied with research funds, which allowed him to stop applying for research grants.

00:54:46	Question: Any other observations from the aggression research? Answer: Interviewing didn’t yield important results, but contributed to his “theoretical stance,” shifting his view from seeing aggression as planned out to seeing some aggression as impulsive. He wanted to see what contexts contributed to these strong reactions out of impulse. The interviewing also allowed him to carry out research overseas, in Oxford and Scotland. He noted the lack of control some of his subjects had, as well as the reputation some felt they had to protect. Follow up: And movies have only gotten more violent. Answer: Berkowitz talked about being part of a small group of experimental social psychologists who study people who are especially prone to aggressive reactions based on situational factors. He noted the consistency of the research and factors that could aggravate or alleviate the violence seen on screen.

01:06:10	Question: Talk about the culture of the psychology dept when you came. Answer: It was easy for him to get tenure, because he was productive and universities in the 60s were growing dramatically. He noted a shift in the 60s to people being very anxious about tenure. Question: Did you enjoy working with grad students? Answer: He didn’t think he was a good graduate supervisor, comparing his focus on his own ideas to one of his colleagues’ ability to allow his students to flourish in their interests. 

01:10:33	Question: Other activities—campus governance? Answer: He talked about being active on the L&S executive committee and the University Committee during a quiet time, and chair of the psychology dept during troubled times. Follow up: Talk about that. Answer: There was unrest in the faculty union, the TAA’s efforts to get recognition, and the creation of a Black Studies program. Follow up: What was your perspective? Answer: He was chair at the time, when there were few of these “special studies” programs. He recalled occasions when a group of striking students tried to blockade the psychology dept.; when classes were invaded by protestors; and when a professor had a desk thrown at her.

01:16:03	Question: What about the Dow riots? Answer: He wasn’t involved in it. He remem-bered that the day he left in 1970 to go to CA was the day of Sterling Hall; the unrest during the 1970s over greater student participation in curriculum planning; and his difficulty keeping his cool in a situation. Question: Anything else about university life? Answer: He had become very detached from the university, and really only missed keeping in contact with other faculty. 

01:19:40	Question: What are the significant developments in your field recently? Answer: He said there was a growing recognition that in many domains of human behavior, people react in a “non-thinking way.” Follow up: Why do you feel your research on violence hasn’t helped reduce violence? Answer: There were “all sorts of reasons”—a lot of research was experimental, so people didn’t think they were generalizable; people often react unthinkingly and don’t see aggression in their own lives; refusal by some major influences (including NY Times) to believe this evidence; inconsistent interpretations of the 1st amendment to cover violence in films.

01:24:59	[no question] He gave another example of situational stimulus—research he’d done in the 1960s showing that the very presence of a gun in a situation to arouse aggressive tendencies. Recent research built on this idea showing that it was the aggressive meanings of the weapon that were important in behavior.

01:28:05	[no question] Adding to his theme of the role of chance, he noted the serendipity of his being able to do a lot of European travel because social psychology, nascent in the 1950s, grew slowly in Europe—so Europe was eager to have American psychologists visit and share their work. Follow up: Talk about awards and honors. Answer: He thought that his recognition in the field was due to the popularity of aggression in social psychology at that specific moment.

01:32:06	Question: Talk about retirement. Answer: He and his wife traveled a lot, did some reviewing for journals and some encyclopedia article-writing. He talked about his children and grandchildren. He also related how his first wife came down with breast cancer in 1957, which recurred in 1969, from which she died. He discussed the vast improvement in UW Hospital’s cancer care in the succeeding years.

01:39:37	End of First Interview Session

End of Second Interview

END OF ORAL HISTORY #232