Our October time machine

At the beginning of each month, we will revisit some past issues. What did you miss? How have the ideas within the articles stood the test of time? 

Let's set the controls for October…

Last year, we were 'working together' with a special issue on collaboration.

Our October 2019 issue was a special collection of articles on the theme ‘under’, including:

• Our mental depths – Nick Chater
• Under the weather ­– Trevor Harley
• Working under a hierarchical structure – Rosalind Searle 
• Underwater – Laura Walton
• The underdog effect – Ciaran O’Keeffe 
• From underworlds to outerworlds – Nathan Smith
• Underwear – Carolyn Mair

Our 2018 issue arrived with The Psychologist Guide to Pets, pulled together by our journalist Ella Rhodes who also spoke to psychologists who work with non-human species. Brian Hughes argued that psychologists are facing an exaggeration crisis. We also had David Bramwell on the strange world of Wilhelm Reich.

In October 2017 Sarah Mackenzie Ross asked if exposure to chemicals could damage your brain. We had Jennifer Cleland on simulation-based education, Adam Jowett on 1967’s Sexual Offences Act, and a debate between Cordelia Fine and Joe Herbert on sex differences in behaviour. Ella Rhodes brought us The Psychologist Guide to University Life.

In 2016 our editor Jon Sutton and Aidan Horner spoke to psychologists and their children about parenting. Nancy Tucker outlined the evidence on bulimia nervosa, Annie Brookman (well before she became our deputy editor!) looked at the benefits and concerns in educational neuroscience, and Sofia Deleniv considered genomic imprinting. We also had David Pilgrim on what it is to be human.

Our October 2015 issue was out of this world, featuring interstellar message composition, deep space, close encounters, extraterrestrial intelligence and aliens in fiction. 

In 2014 we had a special on autism including a look at 70 years of research, autistic cognition, risk and resilience, myth and reality, being a parent of a child with autism and stereotypes in fiction.

In our 2013 issue find cyborg technology, responding to extraordinary claims, super-altruists, exceptional drawing and super-recognisers.

Our October 2012 issue featured our most read online article of all time, on mirror-writing. We also looked at promoting mental health through schools, sexual health and postnatal depression. In 2011 we examined England’s riots, mindfulness in schools, workaholism and false confessions.

In 2010 we featured golf, bad dancing, fathers’ behaviours and the explosion of sensory history. In our 2009issue find Where the Wild Things are, oral storytelling, attachment theory and the default mode network.

In October 2008 we looked at insomnia, and the impact of diet on behaviour and intelligence. We asked if Sherlock Holmes can help cognitive psychology.

We had a special issue in 2007, on nurturing the next generation of psychologists. In 2006 we asked, do you really know yourself? We looked at how to improve memory, and at psychology in Chile. 

Our October 2005 issue featured the bizarre Dr Strangelove syndrome, and in 2004 we had children’s art and liberating psychology in Latin America. In 2003 we asked if psychology can revolutionise Higher Education, and we looked at the psychosocial issues around facial transplants.

Our 2002 issue considered transitions in family life, attachment theory and parenting classes. In 2001 we featured bullies and consciousness and searched for themes in the quiz show Who Wants to be a Millionaire?

In 2000 we thought about intelligence and in 1999 we described some answering machine styles. In 1998 we featured priming techniques, qualitative research and written communications.

We’ve now reached 1997 where issues are only available as whole downloadable PDFs… Find the mind’s construction in the face, social identity in Northern Ireland, the persistent vegetative state, a student specialand cruelty in experimentation. We also had memory and discourse, the psychologisation of illness and research and policy.

In 1989 find personal agency, and in our first ever October issue in 1988 find psychology in the real world.

Remember, you can explore our complete archive via https://thepsychologist.bps.org.uk/archive or by using the search function.