Ferenc Mérei

Born in Budapest into a bourgeois family, Mérei often spent time in his parents' photography studio at the Garay Bazaar.

The lecture, in which he criticised Jean Piaget, attracted Wallon's disapproval, and it was then that Mérei developed his key idea, the essence of which is the social determination of humans.

He obtained two degrees, one from a career advising college, and one from the Sorbonne Faculty of Arts in philosophy, sociology, psychology and pedagogy.

After his return to Hungary in 1934 for a time he became a pupil of Leopold Szondi,[2] as a fresh graduate he could not find employment, so he worked as a psychologist without pay at the Állami Gyermeklélektani Intézet (State Children's Psychological Institute), founded by János Schnell) until 1938.

Between 1938 and 1940 he worked at the Special Education Teacher Training College, once again without a salary, so he lived on the money he received from teaching languages.

In 1944 he escaped, crossed the front line and joined the Soviet army, where he attained the rank of captain by the time his military service ended.

From 1945 until 1948 he was the leader of the Fővárosi Lélektani Intézet (Budapest Institute of Psychology), a teacher at the Pedagógiai Főiskola (Pedagogical College) and at the Eötvös Kollégium, and the leader of the central seminar of NÉKOSZ (People's National Association of Colleges).

He was appointed the head of Országos Neveléslélektani Intézet (National Institute of Educational Psychology) in 1949.

[4] From February 1964 he worked at the National Neurological and Mental Hospital where he founded and became the leader of the clinical psychology laboratory.

With the aim of having a workshop, he gathered his colleagues and students around him, including Ferenc Szakács, Lívia Nemes and Ágnes Binét.

In 1982 he was named a doctor of psychology by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and was awarded the Pál Ranschburg medallion.