Abstract
The social context from which the earliest psychologists emerge worked to keep women uneducated and at home, operating under the belief that women were inferior to men. When women challenged the Zeitgeist and chose careers as psychologists, society responded by pushing them into low-end careers, usually doing jobs that were similar to the domestic activities accepted as the women’s sphere, and often jobs that resisted any notoriety. Despite these social forces, however, women did pursue their careers as psychologists and they often succeeded, making significant contributions to the field.

In studying the history of psychology, one might wonder, where the women are. Have they been left out of psychology’s history because they did not contribute remarkable and noteworthy work; or was it that women did not achieve adequate prominence so as to rank with men? Whatever the circumstances may be, the scarcity of women in psychology’s textbooks does not accurately represent women’s contributions to the field. The exclusion of women and their work has been reduced to the belief that women have not contributed significantly to psychology; therefore, directed society to disregard their definite participation, thus reinforcing the initial belief that women have played no eminent role in psychology. Women have in fact been present and active in psychology since its beginnings, but for a variety of reasons women and their work have been largely invisible to psychology as a whole. Women have faced many trials and overcome numerous tribulations in order to be a part of psychology. One factor that greatly hindered the advancement of women in the field of psychology was the Zeitgeist, or the current point of view held by the society as a whole. When psychology was still on its way to becoming a major force, women who desired to join the growing ranks of psychologists,