Eleanor Jack Gibson: 1910–2002

MARION EPPLER
East Carolina University

"For her conceptual insights in developing a theory of perceptual learning; and for achieving a deeper understanding of perceptual development in children and basic processes in reading," Eleanor J. Gibson was awarded the nation's highest scientific honor. When President George H. W. Bush presented the National Medal of Science to Gibson in 1992, she was only the tenth psychologist out of 304 recipients to be so honored. Gibson was one of the most prominent experimental psychologists of the 20th century, defining the domain of perceptual learning for decades to come, reviving a virtually defunct field of experimental research on reading, and initiating a surge of developmental research on the reciprocal relationship between perception and action in infancy.