Jeanne Block

Jeanne Lavonne Humphrey Block (July 17, 1923 – December 4, 1981) was an American psychologist and expert on child development. She conducted research on sex-role socialization and theories of personality. Block was a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and conducted her research with the National Institute of Mental Health and the University of California, Berkeley. She retired in 1981 after being diagnosed with cancer, and died in December of the same year.

Early life and education Block was born in 1923 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She was raised in a small town in Oregon. After graduating from high school, she entered Oregon State University as a home economics major, but she was dissatisfied with her education. She joined SPARS, the women's branch of the United States Coast Guard, in 1944. While serving in World War II, Block was badly burned and nearly died. She was treated with skin grafts, and she was able to return to military service until 1946. At Stanford, Block met two mentors, Ernest Hilgard and Maud Merrill. Hilgard wrote a popular general psychology textbook and co-wrote a textbook on learning theories, and he became president of the American Psychological Association. James had been an associate of intelligence researcher Lewis Terman. Block also met her future husband and research collaborator, Jack Block, during her time at Stanford. In 1963, she was awarded a National Institute of Mental Health Special Research fellowship and spent a year in Norway with her family. Just over ten years later, the Block Study was featured on a PBS television program title, "The Pinks and the Blues." The episode focused on Jeanne Block's work regarding gender roles. She became a professor-in-residence in the department of psychology in 1979.

Through her later career, Block received multiple awards and recognition of her work. In 1972, she was appointed as the Bernard Moses Memorial Lecturer at U.C. Berkeley. Block received the Lester N. Hofheimer Prize for outstanding psychiatric research from the American Psychological Association (APA) in 1979

In 1984 her book, Sex Role Identity and Ego Development was published posthumously. She had been diagnosed with cancer earlier that year. She was survived by her husband, Jack, who died in 2010, four children, her brother and mother.