Article archive / February 1, 2012
Originally published: . Volume 3, No. 6. Source pages: 10.
Long-time LSU professor and head of the developmental psychology graduate program at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Dr. Nathan W. Gottfried, died January 16, 2012, at the age of 83.
Dr. Gottfried was a retired professor emeritus and a licensed psychologist under the Louisiana State Board of Examiners of Psychologists. He was known to many in the community as a kind, thoughtful, and effective educator, researcher, and colleague.
A memorial service will be held today, Wednesday, February 1, from 2–4 p.m. at the LSU Faculty Club on the LSU Baton Rouge campus.
Dr. Nat Gottfried received his doctorate in psychology from Columbia University in Ohio, and spent the majority of his career at LSU Baton Rouge where he influenced the training and careers of thousands of undergraduate and graduate psychology students. He was the head of the LSU Developmental Psychology Graduate Program and also later the Director of the LSU Psychological Service Center.
With colleague Dr. Bill Seay, Dr. Gottfried authored The Development of Behavior: A Synthesis of Developmental and Comparative Psychology, published by Houghton Mifflin, 1978.
Nat developed and administered the first LSU faculty teaching evaluation. He also developed an observational test, “An observational technique for pre- school children,” along with Bill Seay, in 1970, published by Educational Testing Service.
He was a disaster research consultant and helped evaluate the human impact of environmental disasters in Louisiana, Mississippi and Puerto Rico. With Drs. Larry Siegel and Rosemary Hays-Thomas (formerly Lowe), Dr. Gottfried worked on a the 1982 Illinois Central Gulf freight train derailment near Livingston and the aftereffects of fires, explosions and chemical spills on those living in the surrounding community. He and his colleagues examined the event and the impact of stress on those involved, published in “Emotional Distress 18 Months After a Train Derailment and Chemical Spill,” in Advances in Personality Assessment, Volume 7, 1988.
He was instrumental in the “MinneMath Program” and developed tests for evaluating math teaching and teaching effectiveness.
Dr. Gottfried authored and coauthored over 40 research articles, including “Attachment Relationships in Infant Twins: The Effect of Co-twin Presence During Separation From Mother, with Bill Seay and Erin Leake, in the Journal of Genetic Psychology, 1994.
With Audrey Sistler, professor at Southern U., Nat published and presented “Shared Child Development Knowledge Between Grandmother and Mother,” at the 95th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association.
He coauthored, “The social distance of the exceptional: A study at the high school level,” with Reginald Jones and Angela Owens, in Exceptional Children, 1966, and also “Psychological needs and preferences for teaching exceptional children.” with Reginald Jones, in Exceptional Children, 1966. With J. Horrocks he published, “Psychological needs and verbally expressed aggression of adolescent delinquent boys,” in Journal of Psychology: Interdisciplinary and Applied, 1966.
He served his country in the United States Marines.
Dr. Gottfried is survived by his wife, Gretchen Wilson Gottfried; two daughters, Deborah Hays and Judith Kingman; his sister, Gloria Leberman, from Conneticut; his brother, Sidney Gottfried, Mill Valley, California; and five grandchildren. He is also survived by his stepchildren, Charles Wilson, Charlotte Asher, Dwight Wilson, Duane Wilson and Greer Cowart.
This article is part of a historical newspaper archive. Read the original issue for its original layout, photographs and graphics.