Grete L. Bibring

Grete Bibring ( Margarethe Lehner; 1899–1977) was an Austrian-American psychoanalyst who became the first female full professor at Harvard Medical School in 1961.

Life Vienna Grete Bibring was born as Margarethe Lehner on January 11, 1899, in Vienna, Austria. She was the youngest child of factory owner Moriz Lehner and his wife Victoria Josefine Lehner, née Stengel. Her siblings were two older brothers, Ernst and Fritz, and a sister, Rosi. Her upbringing was amongst a wealthy Jewish family that often hosted dinner parties and imparted to her an appreciation for music, science, and art. During her time at school, she excelled at Greek and Latin and became familiar with the works of Sigmund Freud. After graduation, she began studying at the University of Vienna in the same year. During her studies she met Edward Bibring, a fellow medical student and dissection class partner, whom she later married in December 1921.

She graduated from the University of Vienna in 1924, going on to specialize in neurology and psychiatry. Alongside joining the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, she also became one of the first students at the Vienna Training Institute in 1925. He accepted the position and, in 1941, Grete and Edward Bibring, along with their children George and Thomas, emigrated to America. Bibring officially became an American citizen in 1946 and continued her work and research, establishing many positions, consultancies, and fellowship in a variety of institutions and organizations.

In 1959, at the age of 64, her husband died of Parkinson's Disease.

Bibring was also affiliated with other institutions which included Radcliffe College in Cambridge, where she was a consultant for research, and the Children's Bureau in Washington, where she was a psychiatric consultant. Vice President of the International Psychoanalytic Society and Institute from 1959 to 1963, and was President of the American Psychoanalytic Association in 1962–1963. In 1968, she accepted a fellowship at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Bibring's pioneering work included observations of the effects of environmental stress on individuals as well as how aspects of pregnancy are interpreted through a psychoanalytic lens, where she concluded that affective issues experienced by women during pregnancy might be brought on by environmental stresses that may affect women who are not pregnant in different ways.

Selected publications Bibring, G. L. (1953). "On the 'passing of the Oedipus complex' in a matriarchal family setting." In Drives, Affects, Behavior. Loewenstein, Rudolph M., (Ed) 278–284, International Universities Press, Madison, CT Bibring, G. L. (1954). "The training analysis and its place in psycho-analytic training." The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 35, 169–173. Bibring, G. L., Dwyer, T. F., Huntington, D. S., and Valenstein, A. F. (1962). A study of the psychological processes in pregnancy and of the earliest mother-child relationship. The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, 16, 9-72.