Research project: Psychotechnics in Austria (1920-1950)
This individual project, funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) and headed by Univ.-Prof. Dr. Dr. Martin Wieser, aims to reconstruct the emergence and development of the field of practice known as “psychotechnics” from its foundation in the early 1920s to its consolidation in Austria in the 1950s.
As the “science of the practical application of psychology in the service of culture” (Münsterberg), psychotechnology was introduced as a new field at the beginning of the 20th century in order to make psychological knowledge and psychological practices usable beyond the academic field.
During and after the First World War, psychologists carried out pioneering work in this field by using tried and tested methods of measurement, aptitude testing and counselling in experimental laboratories in the military, industry, public administration, education and state-owned companies. The focus of the “psychotechnical” expertise was on finding the “right man (or woman) in the right place” with the help of psychology.
While the history of psychotechnology in Germany is relatively well known today, the foundation and development of psychotechnology in Austria is still largely in the dark. In order to close this research gap, this project brings together an interdisciplinary team from the fields of psychology and history, which has access to a wealth of primary sources and archive documents from the period under investigation.
Project lead & team
Project lead & team
Project Leader
Prof. Martin Wieser, PhD, PhD, is Professor of General Psychology, specialising in the history of psychology, at Sigmund Freud Private University. His research focuses on the philosophical, political and cultural foundations of psychology as a science and a profession. The project ‘Psychotechnik in Austria (1920–1950)’ is the third FWF-funded research project in which he is involved or leading, alongside ‘Psychology in the “Ostmark”’ and ‘Operative Psychology’.
Project team
Dr Verena Lehmbrock is a historian of science with an interdisciplinary background in philosophy, history and psychology. In her research, she examines the historical co-constitution of subjectivity, socio-economic orders and forms of knowledge. Her current research focuses on incorporating socialist modernity into a contemporary history of the self in the 20th century, the history of social psychology, and processes of psychologisation in the 20th century. She most recently taught at the University of Lübeck in the field of history, theory and ethics of psychology and is a board member of Cheiron – The International Society for the History of the Behavioural and Social Sciences.
Mag. Tanja Kotik studied sociology, global history and global studies at the University of Vienna. She is currently a PhD candidate in the Department of Contemporary History at the University of Graz, where she worked as a university assistant and lecturer from 2020 to 2025. In her doctoral thesis, she examines the intertwining of economics and politics in relations between the Federal Republic of Germany and the People’s Republic of China in the 1980s and early 1990s. Her research interests lie in the economic, social and intellectual history of the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as in transnational processes of interconnection.
Funding body
Funding body
Fund for the promotion of scientific research
Grant-DOI: 10.55776/PAT1394625
Project duration
Project duration
2026-2029 (36 months)
If you are interested in the research project, please contact martin.wieser@sfu-berlin.de
*Picture credits source: Psychotechnical Institute Vienna/Susanne Hackl-Grümm