The Birth of Psychometrics: Cambridge 1886 to 1889 It is a little known fact that psychometrics as a science began in Cambridge between 1886 and 1889. The first laboratory dedicated to the subject was set up within the Cavendish Physics Laboratory in the University of Cambridge by James McKeen Cattell in 1887. In Cattell's own words " In the Cavendish Laboratory was also set up apparatus for research and this was the beginning of the first British laboratory of psychology" (Cattell, Early Psychological Laboratories,1928). Cattell, an American, completed his PhD, entitled ?Psychometric Investigations? (Cattell, 1886), with Wundt at Leipzig . During his period in Leipzig , Cattell had been in frequent correspondence with Francis Galton at his Anthropometric Laboratory in London (Galton, 1887) and he quickly saw the potential for synergising Wundt?s psychophysics with Galton?s mathematical approach to the examination of individual differences. On leaving Leipzig , and after a brief visit to America , Cattell returned to Europe to take up an appointment in the University of Cambridge in October 1886 as ?Fellow Commoner? at St John?s College and lecturer in the University. Anthropometrics at Cambridge 1885 - 1886 Before the arrival of Cattell, Galton had presented the Rede Lecture at Cambridge in June 1884 on the topic ?The nature, principles and objects of the quantitative estimate of some of the less commonly and less easily measured of the human faculties?, and presented the University with several instruments similar to those he had used in his South Kensington Anthropometric