Background

Frederick H. Kanfer was born on December 6, 1925, in Vienna, Austria. He was born in Vienna. He was in his teens when he and his parents fled Austria, settling in New York in 1941.

Education

After earning his bachelor's degree from Long Island University in 1948, Frederick Kanfer, a naturalized United States citizen after his family fled to the United States from Austria, fought in Europe with the United States Army. He then earned a master's degree and completed his doctorate at Indiana University in 1953. Kanfer received his diplomate in clinical psychology from the American Board of Examiners in Professional Psychology in 1969.

Career

During the 1950s and 1960s, Frederick Kanfer taught at various universities, including Washington University, Purdue University, and the University of Oregon. In 1968, he traveled to Germany as a visiting Fulbright professor in psychology. Over the next 35 years, he played a role in the development of modern clinical psychology in Europe through consultations with government agencies, scientific organizations, and clinical training workshops. After receiving his diplomate in clinical psychology in 1969, Kanfer was a professor at the University of Cincinnati, joining the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1973 and retiring as professor emeritus in 1995. In 1995-1998, he worked as a senior fellow at the University of Minnesota's psychology department.

During his lengthy career, Kanfer earned a reputation as someone who went against empiricist orthodoxy in developing the theory that patients could actively participate in overcoming negative behaviors. When he developed his theories in the 1960s they were considered revolutionary; they have since become widely accepted by psychologists. Kanfer published several books on behavior therapy, including coauthoring Helping People Change: A Textbook of Methods (1975) and Guiding the Process of Therapeutic Change (1988), as well as writing A Mentor Manual: For Adults Who Work with Pregnant and Parenting Teens (1995). He was also an associate editor of Psychological Reports from 1961 to 1999 and a frequent contributor to other professional journals and textbooks.

Frederick Kanfer advocated patients managing their own behaviors, from weight loss to smoking cessation. In a 1975 study, he suggested that parents teach their children not to be afraid of the dark rather than wait for them to outgrow their fears. He said that "we have overlooked the notion of putting children to work to help themselves."

Achievements

• Frederick Kanfer was a psychology professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for 29 years. He laid the foundation for theories of self-management widely practiced today. Kanfer wrote more than 150 published scientific articles and six books on self-management and behavior change.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Guiding the Process of Therapeutic Change 1988
  • Helping People Change 1975
  • A Mentor Manual: For Adults Who Work With Pregnant and Parenting Teens 1995
  • Self-management and Behavior Change: From Theory to Practice 1982
  • Maximizing Treatment Gains: Transfer Enhancement in Psychotherapy 1979

Personality

Quotes from others about the person

• "He helped a generation of psychologists understand that being a hard-nosed empiricist did not require blinding oneself to the complexity of behavior. He blazed his own intellectual trail, making use of whatever he found along the way, without regard to orthodoxy." - Gerald Clore

Connections

Frederick Kanfer was married to Ruby Kanfer, who gave birth to his daughter Ruth and his son Larry.

Daughter:

Ruth Kanfer

Ruth Kanfer is a Professor of Organizational Psychology at Georgia Institute of Technology. Her research examines the role of motivation, personality, emotion, and self-regulation in training, performance, and work transitions across the lifespan. She has co-edited three books and published over 100 papers and chapters on these topics and has received awards for her work from the American Psychological Association, the Academy of Management, and the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP), including the SIOP Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award. She is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Sciences, and the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology.

Wife:

Rubu Kanfer

Son:

Larry Kanfer