Thérèse Gouin-Décarie
Canadian academic and psychologist (1923–2024)
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Biography
Gouin-Décarie was born in Montreal, Quebec on September 30, 1923, to Yvette Ollivier, an artist and playwright, and Léon-Mercier Gouin, a lawyer, professor, and Canadian senator. She studied psychology at the Université de Montréal, earning a bachelor's degree in 1945 and a master's degree in 1947. She pursued clinical training at the Centre d'orientation in Montreal (1948), at the Children's Center in Boston (1948), and at the Centre médico-pédagogique at the Université de Paris (1948–1949). In 1949, she married the Canadian philosopher Vianney Décarie.
In 1949, Gouin-Décarie returned to teach psychology and complete her dissertation at the Université de Montréal, where she would remain for the rest of her career. She completed her PhD in 1960. She earned the title of full professor in 1965 and, after her retirement, professor emeritus in 1991.
Décarie died in Montreal on April 2, 2024, at the age of 100.
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Research
Gouin-Décarie conducted research on children's development. Her dissertation, Emotional Intelligence in Young Children, reconciled the developmental theories of Jean Piaget and Sigmund Freud. This work was published as Intelligence and Affectivity in Early Childhood, and included a foreword by Piaget. It was later translated into several languages.
In the 1960s, Gouin-Décarie led a longitudinal study of children born to mothers who had taken thalidomide during their pregnancy. Her work assessed the psychological and emotional health of these children, and received international attention.
Gouin-Décarie's later research examined topics of early social development, including infants' responses to strangers and toddlers' perspective-taking skills.