Heinz Rudolf Schaffer HonFBPsS; FRSE | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1926 Berlin |
| Died | 2008 |
| Nationality | German/ British |
| Alma mater | Birkbeck, University of London; University of Glasgow |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | University of Strathclyde |
| Thesis | Psychological factors in the development of cerebral palsied children (1962) |
Heinz Rudolf Schaffer (1926-2008) was a German-born British developmental psychologist.
He was born into a Jewish family in Berlin in 1926. With the rise of Nazism, his parents arranged his escape to England on the kindertransport. His father died of pneumonia in Theresienstadt concentration camp, and his mother was gassed in Auschwitz.[1]
He started studying architecture at the University of Liverpool but left before completion. He moved to London, took a job with a glass exporting company, and enrolled at Birkbeck College to study psychology in the evenings.
From 1951–55, he worked at the Tavistock Clinic under the direction of John Bowlby.
In 1955 he took a position as a clinical psychologist at the Hospital for Sick Children in Yorkhill, Glasgow where he worked until 1964. At the same time, he gained his PhD from the University of Glasgow.
In 1964, he joined Gustav Jahoda to help establish the Department of Psychology at the University of Strathclyde.[2] He began his academic career as Lecturer, was promoted to Professor and was then Head of Department from 1982 to 1991 when he retired as Emeritus Professor.[3]
Schaffer was one of the most influential developmental psychologists in Britain. He researched and published prolifically in all aspects of child social development. Reflecting his own traumatic childhood, he was particularly interested in early child socialisation, attachment and mother-infant interaction. In 1992 he established the journal Social Development.[3]
