Born in
South Shields on 6 January 1860, Stout studied psychology at the
University of Cambridge under
James Ward. Like Ward, Stout employed a philosophical approach to psychology and opposed the theory of associationism. It was as a fellow of
St. John's College, Cambridge (1884–1896), that Stout published his first work in 1896: the two-volume
Analytic Psychology, whose view of the role of activity in intellectual processes was later verified experimentally by the Swiss psychologist
Jean Piaget. The term
analytic psychology is Stout's translation of Brentano's term
deskriptive Psychologie –
descriptive psychology. (Cf.
Analytic psychology in Dilthey.) Stout was appointed to a new lectureship in comparative psychology at the
University of Aberdeen in 1896, before becoming reader in mental philosophy at the
University of Oxford (1898–1902), where he published his
Manual of Psychology in 1899. This work formulated many principles later developed experimentally by the
Gestalt school of psychology. In addition, from 1891 to 1920, he served as editor of
Mind, a leading philosophical journal, and was president of
Aristotelian Society from 1899 to 1904. In
metaphysics, Stout is well known for his contribution to
trope theory, specifically in the form of a 1923 paper for the
Aristotelian Society. He delivered the
Gifford Lectures in
Edinburgh over 1919–1921, a first volume based on the same, was published as
Mind and Matter in 1931. A second volume was published posthumously under the editorship of his son as
God & Nature in 1952. == Significant publications ==