Mariano Yela

Mariano Yela Granizo (2 March 1921 – 5 November 1994) was a Spanish psychologist and philosopher.

Biography

Mariano Yela Granizo was born on March 2, 1921, at 34 Zurita Street, in the Madrid neighborhood of Lavapiés, and lived during his childhood at 12 Torrecilla del Leal Street, in the same traditional neighborhood. His childhood was as difficult as it was satisfying, as he himself recalled in his autobiography. He soon developed an intense love of reading, and began to stand out in the classes of the "Andrés Manjón" school in Lavapiés Square.

At the age of 14, he was selected as a gifted student, receiving a scholarship from the Madrid City Council to be able to continue studying. Everything changed abruptly, months later, with the Civil War. After the war, he had to combine his studies with countless jobs to help his family (from waiter to porter, mechanic assistant, office assistant, and private tutor). Even so, he completed his Baccalaureate — at the Instituto de San Isidro — and the State Examination in only three years, with the qualification of Extraordinary Prize. In those three years his vocation was definitively forged: "to study man, by all possible ways".

And so he did. Continuing with his numerous jobs (administrative assistant, shorthand typist, teacher here and there...), and finding time to travel all over Spain "eating and sleeping wherever God wanted", in 1945 he graduated in Philosophy and Letters at the Central University of Madrid, also with outstanding and Extraordinary Prize.

Thanks to this he received one of the scholarships for the 5 best university records to further his studies in the United States, where he stayed for three years, between the Universities of Washington and Chicago (1945–1948). Before returning to Spain, he furthered his studies at various universities in Great Britain, France, Belgium and Germany, working with distinguished psychologists such as Thurstone (collaborator of Thomas Edison), Cronbach, Rogers, Burt, Bartlett, Köhler, Piaget, and philosophers such as Heidegger (1948–1952).

He could have stayed abroad, with more means and possibilities for research, but he returned to Spain. His attachment to his country and his hometown weighed more and "sensibly or quixotically" (in his own words) he returned. And in 1952, he obtained his doctorate in Philosophy and Letters, also with an Extraordinary Prize, won the chair he would later hold for more than 30 years, always in his beloved hometown, became close friends with the most distinguished Spanish philosophers (Ortega, Zubiri, Marañón, etc...), and began to develop an intense task of institutionalizing Psychology in our country, to which we psychologists owe so much, and which would often keep him away from his true vocation of study.

In 1955, he married Maria Concepción García Morán, also from Madrid, with whom he had 5 children, all of them born in Madrid (two of them also psychologists, María and Carlos). After living in different places in the capital, he settled at No. 2, Hilarión Eslava Street, in the Argüelles neighborhood, where he lived from 1959 to 1976, when he moved to the outskirts, in Puerta de Hierro, where he lived until his death in 1994. In 1987 he received his retirement amidst awards and tributes, but this only meant an intensification of his work, as can be seen in his curriculum vitae. That same year he was named Professor Emeritus, a position he held until the morning of October 26, 1994, when, while working in his office, he suffered a severe heart attack that would end his life a few days later at the Ramón y Cajal Hospital in Madrid.

Research

He published about 350 works, including books (14 of his own and about 40 in collaboration), chapters, articles, prologues...etc, covering the most diverse areas of Psychology, from Epistemology and Philosophy of Science, to Psychometry, including the Psychology of Intelligence, Perception, Work, Education, Old Age, History of Psychology, and also dealing with other human knowledge, such as Philosophy and Anthropology. Among them it is worth mentioning: Psicología de las Aptitudes (1956), Apuntes de Psicometría y Estadística (1957), La Técnica del Análisis Factorial (1957), Introduction à l'Analyse Factorielle (1964), La Estructura de la Conducta (1974), Estudios sobre Inteligencia y Lenguaje (1987), El Sentido de la Conducta Humana (1987), The Meaning of Behavior (1987), Cara y Cruz de la Inteligencia (1990), Pensamiento e Inteligencia (1991), Las Ciencias Humanas (1994), or Nuevas Perspectivas en la Psicología de la Inteligencia (1995; posthumous).

On the other hand, he participated — and often organized — in more than 60 national and international congresses; he elaborated and/or adapted nearly 200 tests; he directed more than 70 doctoral theses, and gave almost 500 courses and conferences throughout the 5 continents.

Among his main contributions, in addition to his extraordinary abilities, unanimously recognized, of expository clarity and synthesis capacity, we must note his Theory of Intelligence (Theory of the Hierarchical Heterogeneous Continuum of Covariation), internationally recognized and debated. His texts on Psychometry, Statistics and Mathematical Psychology have had multiple editions and have been (and continue to be) used by multiple promotions of numerous Spanish and foreign universities (mainly Spanish-American and Belgian). On the other hand, he was the main introducer of the factor analysis technique in our country.

Most of his research articles are published in the journals Psychometrika, American Journal of Physiology and Revista de Psicología General y Aplicada, of which he was deputy editor.

Mariano Yela is considered one of the fathers of Spanish Psychology, having developed an intense foundational and institutionalizing task. He has held nearly a hundred positions, often as founder, co-founder, member of the Board of Trustees and director of many psychological institutions in Spain and abroad (including the founding and presidency of the Spanish Society of Psychology, or membership in the Royal Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, and the New York Academy of Sciences).

Finally, he has received dozens of awards, distinctions and tributes, among them the "Cátedra Francqui" of Belgium (1961); the Medal of Honor of the University of Louvain (Belgium, 1962); the Silver Medal of the City Council of Madrid (1975); the National Prize of Philosophy (1977); the Medals of Honor of the Pontifical University of Salamanca and the Complutense University of Madrid (1987); the Doctorate "Honoris Causa" from the Pontifical University of Salamanca (1987) and the University of Oviedo (1990); several books of tribute during his lifetime (from the UPS and the UCM, 1987–1992), the Honorable Mention from the Official College of Psychologists (1994), several posthumous tributes (at the Complutense and Autonomous Universities of Madrid, 1994), and the Grand Cross of Alfonso X the Wise (by Royal Decree, posthumously, 1995).

See also

• José Luis Pinillos Díaz
• Miquel Siguán

External links

• Works by Mariano Yela at Dialnet
• Works by Mariano Yela at Persée
• Works by Mariano Yela at JSTOR
• Works by Mariano Yela at Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes
• Inteligencia y Cognición: Homenaje al Profesor Mariano Yela Granizo