Gardner Murphy (July 8, 1895 – March 18, 1979) was an American psychologist who specialized in social and personality psychology and parapsychology.

[1] His career highlights include serving as president of the American Psychological Association and the British Society for Psychical Research.

Murphy succeeded Troland as holder of the Hodgson Fellowship in Psychical Research at Harvard University.

After the first world war, in 1919, Murphy continued his studies at Columbia University, working towards his PhD, which he was awarded in 1923.

[4] Murphy was recognized for being generous and kind, such as by offering assistance or loans if a student or colleague was in trouble.

Murphy was inspired by the work of psychologists and scientists such as Herbert Spencer, Sigmund Freud, William James, and Charles Darwin.

Murphy studied the medium Leonora Piper and collaborated with French chemist René Warcollier on a transatlantic telepathy experiment.

In 1925, at a psychical research symposium at Clark University, Murphy and Harvard psychologist William McDougall advocated for the academic study of telepathy, while acknowledging scientific skepticism due to past debunking efforts.

He became the Hodgson Fellow at Harvard in 1937 and served as professor and chairman of psychology at City College, New York, from 1940 to 1942.

He subsequently served as the President of the British Society for Psychical Research in 1949 (which he joined in 1917) and was Director of the Parapsychology Foundation in 1951.

[1] He also supported (through his own book royalties) experimental studies by J. G. Pratt at Columbia (1935–1937); authoring an introductory review to the field, The Challenge of Psychical Research (1961), as well as William James and Psychical Research (1973) (with R. Ballou), and a 20-page article on parapsychology for the Encyclopedia of Psychology (1946); editing an English-language publication of Warcollier's reports (1938) and writing forewords for several parapsychological monographs.

These particular works were so inspiring that, at the time, many European refugee psychologists referenced his ideas in their arguments for peace in their countries.

In recommendations three, four, and five, Murphy suggested using different research methods to study the paths, decisions, and predictions that lead to war.

[16] Murphy believed that perception fulfills multiple roles beyond relaying the sensory information to the brain.

Murphy's Historical Introduction to Modern Psychology (1929) received a positive review in the British Medical Journal which stated "no purely objective record could be as successful as Dr. Gardner Murphy's presentation of the history, which bears evidence everywhere of a judicious choice of material and of such emphasis as is free from any prepossession.

[19] However, Ralph H. Turner wrote Murphy maintained an "exceptional order of objectivity through most of his presentation" and described it as "a very useful text".

[24] John L. Kennedy wrote there was inadequate information about the role of the experimenter during psychical research experiments.

[25] Ralph W. Gerard gave the book a positive review but stated the results from the experiments may be explainable by alternative factors such as misinterpretation or unintended cues without recourse to the paranormal.

[26] Psychologist L. Börje Löfgren heavily criticized the Challenge of Psychical Research stating that Murphy hardly ever considered the "possibility that spontaneous occurrences might actually be memory falsifications (conscious or unconscious), simple lies, or similar phenomena."

He concluded his review by suggesting the book is "especially apt to do much damage and seduce people into believing in things for which there is extremely scant evidence.