After completing his Ph.D. with Wundt in Germany in 1886, Cattell took up a lecturing post at the University of Cambridge in England, and became a Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge. He made occasional visits to America where he gave lectures at Bryn Mawr and the University of Pennsylvania. In 1889 he returned to the United States to take up the post of Professor of Psychology in Pennsylvania, and in 1891 moved to Columbia University where he became Department Head of Psychology, Anthropology, and Philosophy; He became President of the American Psychological Association in 1895.