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Psychology, John Dewey's first book, is an appropriate choice for volume one in the Southern Illinois University Press series "The Early Works of John Dewey, 1882-1898."  This definitive edition of all Dewey's early writings stems from the complete and comprehensive collection of Dewey materials amassed since 1961 by the Co-operative Research on Dewey Publications Project at Southern Illinois University.  The years covered by these volumes are commonly considered Dewey's formative period, beginning with the philosopher-educator's first published article when he was twenty-two years old and including the longer works written while he was chairman of two departments, Philosophy (which included psychology) and Pedagogy, at the University of Chicago.  In these early years, as throughout his life, Dewey's interests were wide-ranging, but because many of his writings appeared in out-of-the-way journals and have not previously been reprinted, it has been difficult for students of his work to grasp and understand that range.  In addition to illuminating the scope of his interests, the present edition, that offers all his works in approximately chronological order, serves to emphasize the organic quality of Dewey's thought.

With an original publication date of 1887, Psychology us Volume 2 of "The Early Works."  It appears first in the series to introduce scholars and general readers to the use of modern textual criticism in a work outside the literary field.  Designed as a "scholar's reading edition," the volumes presents the text of Dewey's work as the author intended, clear of editorial footnotes.  All apparatus is conveniently arranged in appendix form.  As evidence of its wide adoption and use as a college textbook, Psychology had a publishing history of twenty-six printings.  For two of the reprintings, Dewey made extensive revisions in content to incorporate developments in the field of psychology as well as in his own thinking.  The textual appendices include a thorough tabulation of these changes and detailed evidence for editorial decisions. 

In recognition of the high quality and scholarly standards of the textual editing, this edition of Psychology is the first nonliterary work awarded the Seal of the Modern Language Association Center for Editions of American Authors.  By applying to the work of a philosopher the procedures used in modern textual editions of American writers such as Hawthorne, the Southern Illinois University Dewey edition is establishing a pattern for future collected editions of the writings of American philosophers.

At the time Dewey wrote Psychology, the relation between psychology and philosophy was in dispute, and he attempted to incorporate the new physiological psychology represented by G. Stanley Hall into the philosophical system and ethics of George Sylvester Morris.  He wrote in May, 1886, that he wanted his textbook in psychology to be one "with the greatest possible unity of principle, so that without ceasing to be a psychology, it shall be an introduction to philosophy in general."  His goal, expressed in these terms, foreshadowed the direction of his work in the years that followed, with its continuing emphasis on the interrelations among the various disciplines rather than on separate specializations.  In his long and fruitful professional career, this was to be his only attempt to treat the whole field of psychology systematically.  Although he maintained a lively interest in psychology, that interest was expressed in connection with his writing in other areas such as ethics, education, logic, social philosophy and aesthetics.