Naomi Weisstein

Naomi Weisstein (October 16, 1939 – March 26, 2015) was an American cognitive psychologist, neuroscientist, author and professor of psychology. Weisstein's main area of work was based in social psychology and cognitive neuroscience. She considered herself a radical feminist and used comedy and rock music as a way to disseminate her views and ideologies: Weisstein was an active member in founding the Chicago Women's Liberation Union, which promoted feminist activities and improved women's way of life. She received a Bachelor of Arts from Wellesley College in 1961. She then went on to complete her PhD at Harvard University in 1964. After her PhD, she finished her post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Chicago. Furthermore, she was a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Psychological Society.

Biography Weisstein was born on October 16, 1939, to parents Mary Menk and Samuel Weisstein. Growing up, Weisstein was inspired to pursue a career in science after reading the book Microbe Hunters written by Paul de Kruif. After completing many years of schooling and educational work, she became bedridden in 1983 due to chronic fatigue syndrome and after battling ovarian cancer, she died on March 26, 2015.

School and work life Weisstein graduated from Wellesley College in 1961 and during her time there, she was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, composed music, did stand-up comedy and wrote for the school newspaper. She later received a PhD from Harvard University in 1964. Meanwhile, Weisstein had to complete her laboratory work at Yale University where she met her husband, Jesse Lemisch, and close friend, Virginia Blaisdell. Her dissertation was on the concept of parallel processing; which is the notion that the brain is an active agent in shaping reality. despite gender discrimination from the male students and faculty. On her first day, Weisstein, along with the other female students, were told that they did not belong in graduate school, as they should be more focused on becoming wives and mothers. She was also unable to use the equipment that Harvard had to offer because they questioned her ability to use it properly, and the faculty prioritized the male students' access to the equipment.

While working at the university, Weisstein still faced many challenges including not being able to become a full professor because of the Nepotism Rule. Even further, faculty members began pressuring Weisstein to focus on having a family instead of pursuing her research. She was then fired from the University of Chicago in 1966. as well as joining the Congress on Radical Equality. She continued to pursue her research in the field of cognitive neuroscience and mentored many graduate students throughout her years there. She was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship grant in 1979. Weisstein also wrote an article for the New Haven Women's Liberation monthly magazine, "Will The Women's Movement Survive?"

Weisstein alleged that she faced harassment from other faculty members at the institution. This supposedly included the intimidation of her students, the disputing of her findings, and sexual harassment. She was an important figure in contributing to the feminist movement by identifying distortions and biases in psychology.

Psychological constructs of women Weisstein believed that psychology was prejudiced towards women, in that psychologists did not respect evidence that showed men and women were equal. Weisstein stated that due to the prejudice, psychologists limit the discovery of actual human potential that women possess. Similarly, according to Weisstein, women were only studied within terms set by social expectations (i.e. weaker, 'nurturer', inferior, etc.). She details more of her ideas in her article, Psychology Constructs the Female. This is known as the concept of parallel processing. Weisstein focused on three main areas of research: visual detection, flickering and non-flickering regions perception, and figure-ground organization and spatial frequency. All of her studies were in collaboration with other notable researchers in the field.

Visual detection In 1974, Charles S. Harris and Naomi Weisstein discovered that when a target line is presented to an individual, it is better identified when combined in an appearing three-dimensional object (i.e. overlapping squares), in comparison to a simple two-dimensional line.

Flickering and non-flickering regions perception Later in 1985, Eva Wong and Weisstein indicated that the depth segregation (the perception of flickering regions lies behind the non-flickering regions in visual field) is caused by a visual channel response to higher temporal frequency.

Figure-ground organization and spatial frequency In 1986, Victor Klymenko and Naomi Weisstein found that spatial frequency differences have the ability to alter ambiguous patterns of images that are perceived through their background (i.e., figure-ground organization depicted in Figure 2). They discovered that if there is higher spatial frequency, then it is more likelihood that a figure will be seen in the stimuli. Moreover, this can be influenced and affected by several factors (i.e., shape and occlusion cues).

Notable publications

Weisstein, N. (1971). Psychology constructs the female'' (pp. 68–83). Boston.