Hermans was born as son of a baker in Maastricht, The Netherlands. He studied psychology at the Radboud University Nijmegen, where he became staff member at the psychological laboratory of the same university in 1965. In 1973 he became associate professor of psychology at the University of Nijmegen and in 1980 full professor at the same university. Since 2002 he is president of the International Society for Dialogical Science and since 2006 editor-in-chief of the International Journal for Dialogical Science. For his merits for the Dutch society, he was appointed as Ridder in de Orde van de Nederlandse Leeuw in 2002. His 2006 Dutch bookDialoog en Misverstand played a role in the preparation of the Dutch government in 2007. From 1961-2007 Hubert Hermans was married to Els Hermans-Jansen, a psychotherapist, with whom he cooperated in the development of the Self-Confrontation Method. The couple has two children and two grandchildren. From 2008-2013 he was married to Agnieszka Hermans-Konopka, who wrote a dissertation on the relationship between self and emotions. The couple continues to cooperate on the further development of Dialogical Self Theory in the International Institute for the Dialogical Self.
Work
Hermans is considered a key figure in narrative psychology. His dissertation was on Motivation and achievement and resulted in two psychological tests: The Achievement Motivation Test for adults and The Achievement Motivation Test for children. Both test belong since then to the most frequently used psychological tests in the Netherlands. As a reaction to the static and impersonal nature of psychological tests, he developed a Self-Confrontation Method. Application of this method in practice led to the establishment of the Dutch Association for SCM Consultants that counted around 260 members in 2013. In the nineties of the last century he developed the dialogical self theory, inspired by the American pragmatism of William James and the dialogical school of the Russian literary scholar Mikhail Bakhtin.
Dialogical self theory
Hermans’s, basing on ideas of M.M. Bakhtin, W. James, purpose is to contribute to research and development of dialogical relationships, not only between individuals, groups, and cultures, but also between different I-positions within the dialogical self of the individual person. He does so in the conviction that dialogical relationships between individuals, groups, and cultures cannot exist in separation of productive dialogical relationships which individuals develop with themselves. On the basis of this purpose, bi-annual International Conferences on the Dialogical Self are organized: in Nijmegen, Ghent, Belgium ; Warsaw, Poland, Braga, Portugal, Cambridge, United Kingdom, Athens, Greece, Athens, Georgia, USA, and The Hague, The Netherlands.
