In my first Observer column as President of APS, I wrote about the maturation of neuroscience and explored what’s next in psychological science. This month’s guest columnist is Thomas R. Insel, the director of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health. Below, Insel More

As part of APS’s 25th Anniversary celebration, the Board of Directors is honoring 25 distinguished scientists who have had a profound impact on the field of psychological science over the past quarter-century. Eight individuals have been selected to receive the James McKeen Cattell Fellow Award, honoring a lifetime of significant More

Recent advances in neuroscience have effectively put an end to the “nature or nurture” debate. Instead, the focus of discussion has switched to mechanisms and brain-based interventions — in what ways are neural circuits changed by experience? When is the brain most receptive to education and learning? And what effects More

The James McKeen Cattell Fund has awarded its 2013-2014 Fellowships. Presented in partnership with APS, the Fellowships are awarded yearly to North American university faculty committed to developing scientific research in psychology and its applications to improving human welfare. The award provides financial support that allows recipients to extend their More

This article is part of a series commemorating APS’s 25th anniversary in 2013. By all accounts, one of the major events in 20th-century psychology was the birth of cognitive science. Prior to this time, the study of cognitive processes was siloed. Philosophers, linguists, computer scientists, neuroscientists, psychologists, and anthropologists rarely interacted. More

Over a decade ago, the positive psychology movement encouraged the discipline to examine the possibility that it had focused too much on problem-focused stories and research questions, while ignoring the positive features that made life worth living. This shift in attention catalyzed the study of human flourishing, strengths, and virtues. More

Task #1: Understand the Purpose of the Research Statement The primary mistake people make when writing a research statement is that they fail to appreciate its purpose. The purpose isn’t simply to list and briefly describe all the projects that you’ve completed, as though you’re a museum docent and your More

I first met Tom, a 13-year-old boy at a school for children with emotional and behavioral difficulties, when first starting out on my PhD research. Tom was a charming and effusive pupil and I instantly warmed to him. One day, over a cup of tea in the staff room, I More

R. Duncan Luce died on August 11, 2012. He was one of the most prominent mathematical psychologists of the 20th century, one who was very good at experiments as well. Luce was born May 16, 1925, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He received a bachelor of science degree in 1945 from the More

Two of the many shared goals professors and graduate students have are (a) taking and teaching courses that are integrated with our research and (b) contributing to the field through publications. At the University of Virginia, we recently implemented a model that satisfied both of those goals. A seminar on More

C. Nathan DeWall, University of Kentucky, and renowned textbook author and APS Fellow David G. Myers, Hope College, have teamed up to create a series of Observer columns aimed at integrating cutting-edge psychological science into the classroom. Each column will offer advice and how-to guidance about teaching a particular area More

This year I was fortunate to have the opportunity to participate in the Summer Institute in Social and Personality Psychology (SISPP), one of the many summer institutes in psychology that have emerged in recent years. As graduate students, many of us look forward to a relatively commitment-free summer, allowing us More

Congratulations to six APS Fellows recently elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Some of the world’s most accomplished scholars, scientists, writers, artists, and civic, corporate, and philanthropic leaders make up this year’s class of 198, including: Robert A. Bjork, a University of California, Los Angeles, psychology professor More

APS James McKeen Cattell Fellow Michael E. Lamb, University of Cambridge, has won the 2014 G. Stanley Hall Award for Distinguished Contribution to Developmental Psychology and the 2013 Award for Distinguished Contribution to Psychology and Law, from the American Psychology-Law Society. Lamb, whose research focuses on developmental psychology as well More

APS Fellow Jeffrey Sherman, who studies stereotyping and prejudice at the University of California, Davis, has been awarded the Anneliese Maier Research Award. Presented by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and valued at €250,000, the award is given annually to outstanding researchers from other countries with the aim of advancing More

“The NIH Dental Institute has a psychological science program?” We’re accustomed to hearing that question from our behavioral science colleagues when we describe the behavioral science programs we oversee at the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), part of the National Institutes of Health. The answer is an More