Eduard Spranger

German philosopher and psychologist whose theories on education as both a reflection of and a possible solution to the moral and social problems of the adolescent were influential on German education in the 1920s.

He served as professor of philosophy in Leipzig (1911–20), Berlin (1920–45), and Tübingen (from 1946), and in 1937–38 he lectured in Japan. He was briefly imprisoned in Berlin late in World War II (1944) but was released at the request of the Japanese ambassador.

Spranger was a student of Wilhelm Dilthey and continued his teacher’s research in the Geisteswissenschaften (human sciences), emphasizing in his most important works, "Die Lebensformen" (1914; Types of Men) and "Psychologie des Jugendalters" (1924; “The Psychology of Youth”), the effects of culture and history on human ethics and actions.

He died on 17 September 1963, aged 81, in Tübingen, West Germany.